The work culture at PUMA is unique and driven by our employees. Especially during difficult times and uncertainty, our culture helps us to make fast decisions, be agile and have the resilience and trust in one another to find new solutions and ways of working. A key factor is the diversity of our teams and the constant effort to communicate transparently and quickly with all our employees.
At PUMA, equality and non-discrimination are a key part of our corporate culture. We want to encourage and support people of all genders and we are convinced – diversity drives success. Our employees have many different nationalities and backgrounds, and we recognize that this is one of our key strengths. Worldwide we employ people from 142 countries, which represents 2/3 of nationalities. At our homebase in Germany we have people with more than 81 different passports. At the core of our PUMA family value sits BE YOU, a key component in establishing a respectful and supportive workplace where every employee can be their true selves. By listening to our PUMA family, we aim to break down systemic barriers and identify areas of improvement by fostering a culture that encourages collaboration and fairness.
In 2022 we further evaluated our diversity policies and introduced new training courses for our staff to help them recognize and deal with discrimination and injustice, intercultural communication, diversity, inclusion and belonging. To raise further awareness for these issues, we also held talks with internal and external speakers and posted articles on our internal communication platforms.
We provide a fair work environment and equal opportunities for all our employees, regardless of their gender, nationality, ethnicity, religion, disability, age or sexual orientation. These commitments are also a part of our PUMA Code of Ethics (2005) and the Diversity Charter we signed in 2010.
We highlighted our commitment to diversity and inclusion during Pride Month in June, for example, with our “Together Forever” summer party at the headquarters with food trucks, live band and a DJ-set. Our partners from Christopher-Street-Day Nürnberg e.V. had their own info booth on LGBTQ+ events in the region. We also flagged our Headquarters with rainbow flags and lighted the building in rainbow colors.
Another celebration took place with our Pride collection “Together Forever”. For this we teamed up with our LGBTQ+ advocate and model Cara Delevingne and queer artist Carra Sykes and created a capsule that encourages its wearers to speak up, celebrate their strength and grow together. We donated 20% of the collection proceeds to benefit GLAAD, an organization helping to ensure fair, accurate and inclusive representations of the LGBTQ+ community in media and entertainment.
PUMA's Director, Diversity, Equity ＆ Inclusion in the U.S. together with the local PUMA BBOLD Employee Resource Group (ERG), realized many important projects. The main goal of the group is to make sure that the office, PUMA products, and the workforce within the organization are equitable. The other focus is to make sure PUMA North America is accessible to people they are looking after – the black and brown community. The group launched “We Are Legends” in 2022. This storytelling and product development platform celebrates Black excellence and cultural impact with the aim to empower people to speak up in their most authentic voices. The first collection under the platform, “The Yard”, is championed by a collective of talented black PUMA designers to increase representation within the industry. PUMA also hosted and invited members of Boston organizations to our first Diversity Partners Career Fair.
We also implemented successful D&I projects and courses at our U.S. headquarters outside Boston in the city of Somerville, Massachusetts. Flourish, for instance, is a project between the BBOLD ERG and PUMA´s ERG Moms Squad honoring women and Hispanic Heritage Month (or Latin) which goes from September 15th through October 15th. Flourish hosted a Yoga session with our Moms Squad (ERG for working moms), led by women that identify as Hispanic/LatinX.
We carry our values to the outside world and support a wide range of NGOs and organizations worldwide. Here are a few examples of events that promoted diversity and inclusion:
We are very happy that our efforts of the last year were rewarded and recognized with independent awards.
In 2022 PUMA was listed by the Financial Times as a Leader in Diversity for Europe.” and also by Forbes as World’s Top (50) Female-Friendly Company. In Germany we were named “Company of the Year” at the German Diversity Awards, and in Mexico we were among the best places to work for women in Expansión’s ranking, “Súper Empresas Para Mujeres To critically examine ourselves as a company and our measures, we decided to participate in the PRIDE Index 2022/ The LGBTQ+ Diversity Performance Index. And good news: we made it into the Top20. We will continue to secure and expand the international competitiveness of our business in the long term by integrally embedding diversity, equity & inclusion (DE & I) in our DNA.
Measures to promote gender equality
We promote gender equality and are pleased that the gender distribution in the PUMA Group is balanced today, with approximately 50% female employees and 50% male employees. Of all our employees who work in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) roles, 45% are women. In 2022 women accounted for 44% of all management levels worldwide. Thanks to various measures with which PUMA has worked on equal opportunities, this figure has increased continuously in recent years (2018: 40%, 2019: 41%, 2020: 43%, 2021: 44%, 2022: 44%). However, we are not satisfied with this and are striving to increase the promotion of women in management positions, especially at the higher management levels, worldwide in the coming years.
| Region | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Europe | 31 | 31 | 35 | 34 | 37 | 37 |
| EEMEA | 38 | 43 | 42 | 44 | 42 | 40 |
| North America | 46 | 48 | 50 | 48 | 48 | 48 |
| Latin America | 35 | 38 | 38 | 40 | 45 | 44 |
| Asia/Pacific | 41 | 44 | 43 | 48 | 49 | 50 |
| Total | 38 | 40 | 41 | 43 | 44 | 44 |
In addition, the Supervisory Board of PUMA SE has set a target of at least 2 women (33%) for the proportion of women on the Supervisory Board. For the Management Board, the Supervisory Board has set the following targets for the proportion of women: (i) At least 1 woman (25%), on condition that PUMA SE has four Management Board members, (ii) at least 1 woman (20%), on condition that PUMA SE has five Management Board members, (iii) at least 2 women (33%), on condition that PUMA SE has six Management Board members. We set ourselves an implementation deadline by October 31, 2026.
We want to continuously support the development of women in management positions. For this reason, we offer special training and access to inspiring networks. The exchange with experienced female managers is intended to encourage and motivate female employees to take on leading roles within the company themselves.
We see the fact that PUMA has two women on the Management Board of four since January 1, 2023, with Anne-Laure Descours (CSO) and Maria Valdes (CPO), as a success of our efforts to achieve equal opportunities.
The average age of our employees worldwide is 31. Our employees represent all working age groups.
Being inclusive
Creating an inclusive work environment in which employees with disabilities can perform their tasks while developing their potential is very important to us. That is why we adapt workplaces to their special needs and provide appropriate training. In Germany the interests of employees with disabilities are represented by an elected member of the Works Council. Due to the different legal situations in our companies, in some countries it is not permitted to record the status of disability and the various definitions of a severely disabled employee. Around 1% of our employees have informed us that they are severely disabled, although the actual number is probably higher.
We invest in a continuously improving wide range of services and benefits to foster the health and wellbeing of our employees. We are convinced that employees are more motivated and perform better when they feel good and have a healthy work-life balance. Our Wellbeing concept was developed at our headquarters in Herzogenaurach and adapted to local needs and regulations. Today it plays an important part at all PUMA subsidiaries worldwide.
Our wellbeing program includes four components: Flex, Social, Finance and Athlete.
After the restrictions we have experienced in recent years, we were very happy to be able to present the full program to our employees again. As a sports company, we naturally offer a wide range of sports and training opportunities, such as regular in-house sports courses, sports events, free access to the gym and our various outdoor courts for football, volleyball, basketball and tennis. A highlight in 2022 was the opening of our new padel tennis court, which gives our employees even more opportunities to get active. Our sports classes range from meditation and yoga to TRX, Jumping Fitness and Krav Maga.
During our “Be Well Weeks”, which promote healthy lifestyles, we offered free health checks and nutritional advice and gave our employees the opportunity to try the latest trends in fitness and sport.
Being committed to our people’s wellbeing, we offer excellent working conditions based on a unique culture. To enable our employees to balance their professional and private lives and manage stress, we offer a variety of models, such as flexible working hours, mobile office, part-time employment and sabbaticals, from which they can choose at different stages of their lives.
In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, we are responding with maximum flexibility in terms of when and where our employees work and have introduced a hybrid working model in all our offices worldwide.
In Germany, employees can take advantage of the free employee assistant services provided by one of our partners. With a parent-child office, a nursing room, daycare spots and summer camps for children during school breaks, our headquarters in Herzogenaurach was awarded the German “Audit Beruf & Familie” (audit work and family) certificate, which we have held since 2015.
Our goal is to minimize voluntary turnover and maintain the number of employees in permanent employment at over 80%. In 2022, 90% of our employees worldwide had a permanent employment contract, and the employment of over 27% of our employees was governed by a collective agreement. The turnover rate is highly dependent on the share of retail business in the respective markets and regions. The employee-induced turnover rate was 26% (12% for non-retail employees and 36% for retail employees). The overall turnover rate was 35%, including retail employees. The proportion of employees working part-time was 22% at the end of 2022.
| Permanent | Fixed Term | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total | Total | Female | Male | Diverse | Total | Female | Male | Diverse | |
| Europe | 4,626 | 3,839 | 1,936 | 1,901 | 2 | 787 | 467 | 320 | 0 |
| EEMEA | 4,406 | 4,331 | 1,695 | 2,636 | 0 | 75 | 41 | 34 | 0 |
| North America | 3,710 | 2,957 | 1,496 | 1,449 | 12 | 753 | 373 | 378 | 2 |
| Latin America | 3,209 | 3,208 | 1,381 | 1,827 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Asia/Pacific | 4,534 | 4,134 | 2,566 | 1,567 | 1 | 400 | 226 | 174 | 0 |
| Total | 20,485 | 18,469 | 9,074 | 9,380 | 15 | 2,016 | 1,108 | 906 | 2 |
| Employment contracts | Female | Male | Diverse | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Full-time | 47 | 53 | 0 | 100 |
| Part-time | 58 | 42 | 0 | 100 |
We strive to keep our people healthy and safe by providing a work environment where health and safety issues are taken seriously. The COVID-19 pandemic continued to be a challenge in some markets in 2022. As a result, we maintained our strict hygiene and safety approach that adhered to all applicable health and safety regulations, i.e., distancing rules, installation of hand sanitizer dispensers and a requirement to wear masks. In addition, we continued to provide protective masks and free rapid tests for all our employees. In this way, we reduced the risk of infection to an absolute minimum. PUMA offered free vaccinations and, where possible, organized vaccination campaigns in our offices worldwide. In 2022, we placed a special focus on the topics of mental wellbeing, resilience and mindfulness in order to provide our employees with the best possible support in this politically and economically difficult environment and the increased mental stress that this often entails.
Our updated global Occupational Health and Safety Policy underlines the importance of this issue. PUMA has a central Health & Safety Committee that operates in our headquarters in Herzogenaurach and conducts quarterly meeting. This internal committee includes health and safety specialists who conduct frequent health and safety inspections and exchange documentation on health issues and risks. These are complemented by external inspections by official bodies, such as the German “Berufsgenossenschaft”. In addition, all our larger units also have dedicated local health and safety experts. Our Global Director People & Organization is part of our Executive Management Team and informs our Management Board about relevant health and safety matters at least quarterly.
We have set ourselves the bonus-related goals of zero fatalities and lowering the average injury rate year on year. For 2022, we set a goal to stay below a lost time injury rate of 0.50. The lost time injury rate expresses the number of lost time injuries per 200.000 worked hours. In addition to conducting safety training courses at all our sites, we also offer online training programs to prepare employees for potential emergency situations and thus reduce the number of accidents. In 2022, we promoted our digital OHS training course to all our sites, which included hygiene and proper mobile office behavior. Last year, we provided a total of 15,545 hours of safety training, while 7,169 employees were trained in fire safety and 6,139 in first aid. In 2022, 91 workplace accidents requiring a work stoppage were recorded worldwide. This corresponds to a lost time injury rate of 0.45 compared to 0.39 in 2021. The lost time injury rate for PUMA SE was zero and 0.31 in the previous year. Another indicator of employee engagement and the health of our workforce is the rate of absence due to sickness, which was 2.49% in 2022. We recorded no fatal accidents, and the rate of occupational diseases was zero at PUMA in the last 11 years, including 2022.
Feedback from inside and outside PUMA is very important to us. It shows if we are moving in the right direction, and it helps us to constantly improve. In this way, we regularly compare ourselves with other companies and gain valuable insight from our employees.
Our „listening strategy” includes various ways of providing feedback and aims to pick up on the mood of our employees and understand their concerns and needs. We capture their feedback and ideas through surveys, pulse surveys, focus groups, interviews and sentiment analysis. We use systems such as Amber, Leena AI and Workday for this purpose. In addition, regular industry benchmarking is also carried out, and this is reflected, for example, in our Top Employer certification, our Great Place to Work award, and the “berufundfamilie” audit, as well as other awards we have received.
The feedback we receive in this way and in particular through our global employee opinion survey in 2021 encourages us to continue and further expand the measures we have implemented. The next global employee survey is planned for 2023.
Delivering outstanding performance and achieving consistent growth requires a high level of commitment and dedication from our employees. We measure employee engagement through regular global employee opinion surveys and are particularly proud to have received an engagement score of 92% in our most recent survey. We value our employees´ high level of engagement as well as their loyalty to the brand and aim to maintain this high level in the years to come. This year, we continued to implement the measures in the action plan resulting from the 2021 global employee survey.
2022 was a year marked by valuable recognitions for PUMA as a global employer. Providing our employees with a workplace where they can develop, grow and take on new opportunities is one of our top priorities. Forbes partnered with market research company Statista to create the “World's Best Employers” certification. We are proud to be recognized among them for the third consecutive year in 2022. In addition, being named one of the “World's Top Female Friendly Companies 2022” by Forbes for the first time is a great recognition of our efforts to champion women in the workplace.
In addition to our global efforts, we also received several awards on a regional level. Being recognized as one of “Europe's Leaders in Diversity” for the third year in a row by the Financial Times mirrors our efforts to create a diverse, equal and inclusive company culture. In terms to diversity, we are more than proud of the German Diversity Award, inclusion in the Pride Index and recognition as one of the best teams of the year in the British Business Women Awards Series. All this shows that PUMA supports and drives diversity at all levels and locations across the globe. We also received the Great Place to Work Award in Argentina for the third time and in India for the fourth year in a row. Furthermore, our South-East Asian PUMA locations in Malaysia and Indonesia received this award for the first time. Due to its organizational culture and work climate, our Latin American PUMA location was not only certified as one of Mexico's Súper Empresas 2022, but also recognized as one of the Súper Empresas para Mujeres 2022 by the Expansion Magazine for offering specific benefits for women. In Asia, PUMA Hong Kong received special recognition for its commitment to the community, employees and the environment, and was therefore named a Caring Company 2022 for the fifth year in a row. We are especially proud that all over the world, the unique and inclusive PUMA culture is experienced and valued by several different external institutes and organizations, just as it is internally.
Finally, our commitment to providing the best working environment and opportunities for our employees was also rewarded by being named a Top Employer in 22 PUMA countries, including Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, South Africa, Japan, Vietnam and Hong Kong, as well as all four PUMA regions – Europe, Asia Pacific, North America and Latin America – as a whole. On top of this, we are more than proud that we certified in 2022 as one of 15 Global Top Employers for the year 2023 as the only company in our industry.
