This week marks Global Ethics Day which aims to raise awareness about all sorts of difficult ethical issues in today’s world, for example, how we treat each other and how we treat our planet.
Of course, ethics is very important for all of us, in our personal lives, as well as at work. At Cemex, Our Code of Ethics underpins our company culture; it sets standards for us all, guides our decision-making and fosters a positive work environment.
Local Ethos Committee
It is such an important cornerstone of our business that each Cemex country has a local Ethos Committee. In the UK this is chaired by Steph Horn, UK HR Director, working alongside other directors and business leaders who sit on the committee, ensuring we have a balanced and experienced group who can fully consider any issues that may be raised or need to be addressed, currently including: Lex Russell, Materials Director UK, Vishal Puri, Legal Director UK, Clare Pickering, Director R2R & Ops Support EMEA, Phil Baynes-Clarke, Cement Operations Director UK, Scott Jones, Asphalt Director EMEA Dave Hart, Supply Chain Director UK & Northern France, Rachel Saverton, Internal Control Advisor, Guillermo Garza, Enterprise Risk Manager and Liz Burns, HR Business Partner.
The committee meets quarterly, and the most important element of the committee’s work is to review all complaints raised about UK ethics-related issues to ensure they are fully investigated, and appropriate actions taken. To date this year, the committee has reviewed nine cases: seven relating to employee relations, one regarding supplier relations and one about potential misuse of corporate assets. Two of these cases were partially upheld and another was fully upheld and resulted in a disciplinary sanction.
The committee also supports the roll-out of global ethics initiatives, communication, and training, for example “Doing the Right Thing” – an on-line training programme which helps us to understand our Code of Ethics better by taking us through various scenarios and giving us opportunity to consider how well the characters handle different situations and what we might do differently. We also use this forum to discuss initiatives to promote and ensure Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), for example how best to attract more women into Cemex.
If you would like to know more about the work of the UK Ethos committee, please feel free to contact anyone on the committee. If you have any concerns about non-compliance with our Code of Ethics, please raise them with your Manager in the first instance if you can, or a member of the HR team, or raise your concerns using Ethosline.
