We asked investors which workforce disclosure topics would be of greatest value to them as they assess human capital management, and as new human capital disclosure requirements take effect. By far, workforce diversity across gender, race and ethnicity was the top choice, with 85% of investors saying they want increased disclosure in this area. This finding aligns with diversity being a top investor engagement priority and an area many investors view as a top strategic value driver.
Coming in second was pay equity, which investors generally discussed as an extension of workforce diversity disclosures and a window into whether the company has structural issues around diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) that need to be addressed. Many of these investors specified that they want companies to disclose median pay gap data, which shows how women and minorities across the organization are paid on average regardless of role. They said that this information can signal whether diverse talent is stagnating at less-senior, lower-paying roles, and some said they want to see this unadjusted pay gap for each defined level of the company’s workforce.
Discussions around workforce stability, the third-most-chosen topic, focused on how turnover data can provide insights into whether companies are building on the investments they’ re putting into onboarding and training, and whether the company is an employer of choice in its industry. Some investors said they would ideally like to see workforce stability data disaggregated by gender, race and ethnicity (to enhance their view into DEI challenges) and/or by job level (to better understand the level of turnover happening at more-senior levels). A few investors said they explore alternative data sources to get insights into turnover rates when company data is not available.
Other key themes from these discussions included investor interest in understanding the nature of a company’ s relationships to independent contractors and their role in the company’ s business model (e.g., are independent contractors being valued relative to their role in the business) and seeing how companies are developing, upskilling and rebalancing employee skill sets to adapt their workforce to changes in the company’ s strategy. Investors also highlighted that data should align to external frameworks and be put into the context of the company’ s strategy, expectations and goals.
