March 8th: What HomeExchange is doing to promote gender equality

International Women's Day on March 8th is a day of awareness and commitment to advancing women's rights around the world. At HomeExchange, gender equality has always been one of our core concerns, so today we would like to share with you the progress we have made in recent years.

Gender equality: initiatives implemented at HomeExchange

In recent years, we have structured our actions around several pillars: transparency, training, parenting and health.

1. Work on equal pay

We first undertook a thorough review of pay equity:

• Implementation of a salary algorithm based on specific and transparent criteria in order to limit bias.
• Analysis and monitoring of gender pay gaps in order to identify any disparities and take action to reduce them.
• Improving candidate sourcing (despite having equal skills, less women than men apply for certain positions, particularly in relation to technical or management roles).

Our goal is to ensure fair pay for equivalent positions and responsibilities, as well as fair access to opportunities for advancement.

2. Combating prejudice, bias and sexist behavior

Equality also requires awareness.

That is why we continue to offer our employees several workshops and training courses to give them practical tools to identify biases, prevent inappropriate behavior and build a more inclusive work environment.

Workshop on raising awareness of sexism - Hally

This workshop provides an opportunity to examine everyday sexism and unconscious biases that sometimes arise in the workplace. Through concrete examples, the team is shown how to identify these normalized behaviors and discuss their own experiences.

Organization of a Diversity Mural - Adelphité Project

The Diversity Fresco is a collaborative workshop that explores the mechanisms of discrimination and inequality. Through a structured mini-game, teams analyze concepts such as privilege, stereotypes, social norms etc.

Training course: "Recruiting without discrimination" - Gloria

This training, intended for managers, HR professionals and recruiters at HomeExchange, aims to deconstruct cognitive biases that can influence decisions, particularly those related to gender, age, origin or family situation.

Awareness course on Komeet

To ensure long-term inclusion, we use the Komeet platform. It offers everyone digital pathways to deconstruct biases and stay informed about current issues, as well as volunteer opportunities to get involved in a practical way.

Harassment advisor training with Hally

This training enables our harassment advisors to perform their role to the best of their ability on a daily basis:

• Detecting: knowing how to identify sexism and harassment situations.
• Welcoming: mastering how to best listen to reports and the legal framework of investigations and sanctions.
• Preventing: developing an action plan tailored to the reality of HomeExchange.

The goal? To ensure a safe working environment by strengthening collective vigilance and making sure that every employee knows who to turn to in case of difficulty.

3. Implementation of a parental leave policy tailored to individual needs

We know that professional inequalities often widen around parenthood.

In order to limit career penalties, we have implemented (among other things!) the following initiatives:

• 100% salary maintained during maternity leave and for the second parent (no seniority requirements).
• Greater flexibility in terms of remote working, working hours, and absences during the two months following the parents' return. (In the case of mandatory medical examinations: absences without justification until the child is 9 months old).
• Meeting times: generally no earlier than 9.30am and no later than 6pm, or no earlier than 10am and no later than 4pm for a period of two months if requested by employees.
• Childcare assistance with Choosing My Daycare Center.
• Creation of an enclosed breastfeeding area in 2025.

The goal: to ensure that the burden of parenting does not fall primarily on women, and to promote a better balance for all families.

4. Health and working conditions

Because equality goes beyond pay, women's health is also a priority at the heart of our corporate culture.

Among the measures implemented:

• Possibility of sick leave without a waiting period and without justification (up to three days), which is particularly useful for gynecological health issues.
• Provision of sanitary products in restrooms and hot water bottles.
• Collection of clothing and sanitary products for women in precarious situations (a one-off initiative).
• Our Alan mutual insurance company offers support dedicated to women's health.
• In 2026, implementation of "Holicare": a prevention tool dedicated to mental health issues.

Final word:

March 8th reminds us that women's rights are never definitively secured. We are not perfect at HomeExchange (for example, gender parity is far from being achieved in our Tech team), but we are working on it and taking concrete action on the issue.

Thank you for reading this far! We hope you found this article interesting and perhaps even inspiring for your own organizations (feel free to share it :) ).

Finally, a big thank you to the team working on these issues at HomeExchange: Alexandra, Elisa, Emma, Emilia, Edouard, Caroline, Emmanuel, Charles-Edouard, and all our partners, especially Hally and Gloria :)