Engaging employees on Corporate Responsibility

In order to understand our employees’ views on Corporate Responsibility and to provide them with details of the Group’s social and environmental programmes, we undertook the following initiatives in 2007:

Internal reporting

Due to the integration of Reebok, the adidas Group did not publish a formal social and environmental report for the year 2006. Instead a Question and Answer booklet was produced to describe the integration of the social and environmental programmes of the two brands during that year. The Q&A booklet was communicated to all our employees via our global electronic newsletters and our intranet. Hard copies were distributed to Senior Managers in each of our offices globally. In parallel with this, and as part of SEA’s communication on its updated programme, a short explanatory brochure titled Taking Responsibility was also distributed to employees and retail staff and a new set of Workplace Standards posters were delivered to each adidas Group office.

Induction of new employees

In Asia, approximately 155 new managers and staff were provided with orientation sessions that included information on Social and Environmental Affairs. For about 90 Portland-based employees in North America, an annual HR briefing was conducted, including a history of the social and environmental programme. In Europe 173 new employees participated in five orientation sessions on SEA in the adidas Group's Headquarters in Herzogenaurach, Germany.

Training provided to employees of the adidas Group

The following training sessions took place:

  • Americas – 21 training sessions, including SEA policy briefings and Fair Factories Clearinghouse (FFC) trainings, were held for more than 120 adidas Group staff from Brazil, Canada, Mexico, Peru and the United States.
  • Europe – SEA team members held 21 training sessions, including FFC trainings, for a total of 109 adidas Group employees from France, Germany, Greece, Italy, South Africa, Turkey, UK and the Netherlands.
  • In Asia, the SEA team provided 60 training sessions for more than 670 internal staff in Cambodia, China (Guangzhou, Shanghai and Hong Kong), India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam.