Companies using the Nike Employee Wellbeing Survey (EWB) can now add a question section on gender to our worker voice surveys and gain a deeper understanding of gender-specific issues within their workforce and supply chain.
In 2019, Nike made their Engagement and Wellbeing Survey (EWB) for workers open source. Nike spent years working with vendors like Labor Solutions to develop, test, and deploy scale their worker survey to support its manufacturing partners worldwide to understand and improve conditions for workers. [Find out more about our offerings on Industry Standard Worker Surveys]
Since then, several other large multinational companies have leveraged the survey within their global supply chains to help suppliers better understand worker needs and identify issues in order to provide focused and tailored support. The use of the EWB as the standard survey across the industry is not only practical, but important to prevent survey fatigue, to ensure the quality of survey responses by using a highly vetted and tested question bank, and to facilitate industry collaboration and shared learning using a common standard.
The EWB has quickly become the go-to survey to understand worker well-being generally, but it does have limitations. In an effort to keep the survey short and globally applicable, the EWB does not provide a deep dive into specific topics or ask questions designed to explore the conditions facing more vulnerable populations, like marginalized genders or migrant workers.
This is quickly changing. Labor Solutions and our partners have been working to add thematic question sets that can be included with the EWB and provide a deeper understanding of specific issues and experiences.
The first of these collaborations was with The International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) Advisors’ Gender Equity Worker Engagement Group (GEWEG), which includes and is funded by; Primark, Amazon, Nike, PUMA, Ralph Lauren and others. The GEWEG has now made available The Gender Equity Work Survey as a public good, allowing companies globally to add five questions to the EWB, or other surveys, to better understand the gender-related vulnerabilities and lived experiences of factory workers. For those seeking a deeper dive, the group also published a longer question set.
More partnerships and EWB survey expansions into important human rights topics to come. Contact us about any specific issues or topics you would like to cover in your next worker survey.
ABOUT THE SURVEY
The Gender Equity Worker Survey from ICRW Advisors is comprised of 26 questions that measure progress on gender equity issues from the perspective of factory employees. The long version of the tool has 21 experience questions and five demographic questions. The survey is designed to be completed in 10-15 minutes. The short version of the tool has five experience questions, which were carefully selected to serve as a supplement and add a gender lens to existing worker surveys, like the Nike Employee Wellbeing Survey (EWB).
The goal of the gender equity question set is to help factory managers gather deeper insights, catalyze dialogue, and improve action planning to promote gender equity. Over time, it can enable supplier managers to see progress in their own factories year-on-year.
We recommend using the survey in its entirety or using the five-question short version. For factories or brands who are already regularly deploying another worker voice survey, like the EWB, the five-question short survey is sufficient.
For richer insights, the gender equity worker survey questions can be deployed in combination with the ICRW Gender Equity Self-Diagnostic Tool (SDT) which is designed to help supplier managers review and understand the extent of gender integration across factory policies, practices, initiatives, and operations. Together these tools can be used to generate a snapshot of the factory’s performance related to gender equity, identify new opportunities with a high likelihood of gender equity impact, and help inform new priority areas for action.
ICRW Advisors is a global gender consultancy that guides clients with evidence-based, actionable insights and solutions to enhance intersectional social impact and drive business value. ICRW Advisors offers a range of services, including customized gender diagnostics, strategy design, capacity building, measurement, and evaluation to help clients become more gender equitable across their full range of operations. Clients include companies, investors, development agencies, foundations, and leading NGOs.
Labor Solutions, a women-owned and -led impact-focused business, leverages technology to build resilient supply chains by connecting, engaging and educating workers. Over 1.8 million workers in 28 countries use Labor Solutions’ worker engagement platform, WOVO Engage. Labor Solutions’ advisory services focus on building healthy social eco-systems within companies with global supply chains that engage workers, suppliers and buyers and support and facilitate responsible business practices and protection of human rights.