OUR COMMITMENTS

Power dynamics always exist. This is true wherever we work and under every circumstance, and it’s true both between and across Palladium employees, representatives, partners, and anyone with whom we work.  

We’re especially aware of the risks when working with marginalised people experiencing poverty or crisis and those with less power in the phase of exploitation. Not only is it impossible to have a conversation about equity, diversity, and inclusion without discussing harassment and other safeguarding issues, but we must also operate on the assumption that safeguarding risks (in particular, sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment) are present in all our work.  

Safeguarding plays a critical role in our work globally and we’re proud of the steps we’ve taken to further embed it into our projects and the ways in which we operate at all levels of the business. What began many years ago as client requirement on some of our projects has since grown beyond ‘compliance’ to become a key dimension of our Sustainable Business framework.  

Across the organisation, we’re committed to strengthening our approaches to safeguarding on an ongoing basis. Doing so requires us to do all we can to protect the communities we work with and our people from harm, including sexual exploitation, abuse, or harassment, modern slavery, child abuse and other forms of bullying and harassment, by promoting and requiring behaviour in line with our Guiding Principles and Code of Conduct. We uphold a zero-tolerance approach to breaches of our Code of Conduct, and we are strengthening our capability and confidence in empowering both our people and the communities we work with to identify and speak up about behaviours which are not aligned with our guiding principles.  

To further advance our Safeguarding work and deliver on our commitments, we’ve established global, regional and project level Safeguarding action plans with associated KPIs that are tracked through an internal project review process.   

We’ve introduced a range of new tools and guidelines for our employees. This has included mandatory online training for all employees on child protection, sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment, safer recruitment guidelines, and a safeguarding handbook signposting colleagues to all our safeguarding resources and tools.  

We have an unwavering belief that safeguarding is the responsibility of everyone at Palladium. To this end, we hold an annual, global Safeguarding Awareness Week, which includes activities to raise awareness of our safeguarding commitments and responsibilities and share good practice. It’s a critical part of our strategy, ensuring that everyone across the organisation understands their role in Safeguarding.   

Our projects have Safeguarding Focal points, and we have a Safeguarding community of practice and regional Safeguarding leads who track progress and support capacity building across our workforce. Safeguarding is the right thing to do – both in terms of our business position, in line with emerging, international good practice, and most importantly from the moral imperative to protect communities and representatives alike from harm.  

We’ll continue to constantly strengthen our Safeguarding approach and mechanisms so that we, our clients, our partners and our communities can have confidence in our work and our people.