News
Strategic Roadmap for Female Talent in
celebration of International Women’s Day
Spotlight on female talent with Starwood Hotels in Asia Pacific
signing of United Nations’ Women’s Empowerment Principles
SINGAPORE | Starwood Hotels & Resorts
Asia Pacific celebrated International
Women’s Day on 9 March 2015, with the
announcement of a strategic roadmap
that seeks to empower female associates
through a series of initiatives alongside
leveraging on existing programmes. In
addition, Starwood Hotels in Asia Pacific
also signed the United Nations’ Women’s
Empowerment Principles (WEP), pledging
to support the empowerment and
advancement of women in the workplace
and community.
“Diversity and inclusion are key
components of Starwood’s business
strategy, especially important as we
celebrate International Women’s Day. The
signing of the Women’s Empowerment
Principles further strengthens Starwood
as an equal opportunity employer as
we continue initiatives to support the
surfacing of female talent and leaders.”
highlighted Stephen Ho, President,
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Asia Pacific.
The WEP comprises of seven principles
for businesses, offering guidelines on how
to empower women in the workplace
and community. Some of these principles
include establishing high-level corporate
leadership for gender equality; and
promoting education, training and
professional development for women.
As a result of an extensive global internal
study, Starwood placed the spotlight on
female General Managers (GM) with a
strategic roadmap that seeks to increase
female GM representation globally.
The roadmap comprises initiatives,
programmes and training aimed to
prepare female associates to assume
executive positions.
Other initiatives include strengthening
the success with Starwood Careers,
the integrated talent management &
development system, conceptualised
specifically in Asia Pacific, to fit the
region’s unique needs. Since 2003,
Starwood Careers has nurtured more than
10,600 Associates across various levels in
the organisation and surfaced closed to 72
percent of its female GMs internally.
Starwood continues to be one of the
fastest growing hotel companies in Asia
Pacific. It currently employs over 74,500
associates, of which 42 percent are women
and 38 percent of these women are in
executive roles. Starwood has 290 hotels in
operation; and in 2014 alone, the company
opened 30 hotels across its nine distinct
lifestyle brands in Asia Pacific.
May 2015
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