Human sustainability matters too – and all the more since COVID

At Brunel, we have always been focused on sustainability and it’s probably what the market knows us best for. We try both to be pioneers on sustainable investing and to reman humble enough to question ourselves and seek to improve.

But there’s a second kind of sustainability we’ve been thinking about at Brunel in recent months – the human kind. Lockdown has really brought home the importance of making your business culture, and the demands of the jobs you offer, sustainable for all your staff. That’s why we’ve committed to radical flexibility on working practices.

What does that mean? It means working with our employees to find the best way of enabling them to do their jobs while ensuring their own wellbeing and sustainability.

Practically, it particularly means introducing progressive policies on working hours, working locations and childcare.

When it comes to working hours, lockdown has been incredibly difficult for all kinds of people for all kinds of reasons. But it has also highlighted that you can be at least a little flexible with working hours and still get a top job done. We have found that enabling people to find a working hours solution that fits with their team’s needs but also accounts for their own life factors and challenges can make a big difference.

We’ve also not been into the office much in the last year! And, guess what, we’ve transitioned a lot of client money and started lots of new funds. Actually, we’ve done everything we should have, and kept up a good pace of delivery. We already knew some flexibility in this area could help staff, but we now know it can make all the difference to people’s wellbeing too. We need to cater for different needs.

Lastly, we already make a priority of childcare – in terms of our maternity and paternity leave packages, and also in terms of our broader flexibility. Families need to be sustainanble too!

We hope our radical flexibility sets a pattern for others to follow, and makes life more sustainable for all our staff.