During 2024, we strengthened the follow-up activities, following the presentation of the survey results, on specific action planning for all teams around the world. We also laid the foundation for what we call the Leadership Compass, which serves as a framework that emphasizes five essential pillars of leadership: purpose, development, performance, belonging and personal awareness. These pillars highlight the key areas that leaders need to focus on and accelerate. In 2025, we will introduce the Leadership Compass for all leaders at Demant, which will be implemented through a leadership development programme, focusing on learning journeys within each of the five pillars. The five pillars are also reflected in the Pulse survey, which enables our leaders to measure progress. Furthermore, we have been working on establishing a global standard and a new platform for how we capture and report on HR data, driven by a global effort to standardise key HR processes, such as recruitment, promotion and performance. In 2025, the new platform will be rolled out in our biggest countries (by number of employees) Poland, USA, Denmark, France, Canada, Germany, Australia and United Kingdom and the rest of the world will follow consecutively. In 2025, we will develop and implement a Global Policy on Remuneration and Rewards. Through this Policy, we aim to establish a salary philosophy and ensure that we provide guidance for the organisation. We identify and assess our impacts on human rights on an ongoing basis. In the second half of 2024, we carried out a corporate wide human rights assessment, covering the full value chain of activities. The assessment included a review of our own operations, with consideration of the geographies where we operate and the industries we work in. We also mapped actual and potential impacts in our value chain.

Where Demant may cause or contribute to a material negative impact on employees, we are committed to take appropriate remedial action. For cases raised directly with Group HR, we collaborate with the affected individuals. For any issues that the results of the anonymous engagement survey point out, Demant is committed to plan and execute actions that address such issues. Demant’s whistleblower hotline enables employees to report any concerns about adverse human rights impacts in a confidential and anonymous manner, which enables remedy for human rights impacts.

We launched the Anti-Harassment and Discrimination Guideline. The key objective is to articulate Demant’s approach to preventing, mitigating and acting on cases of discrimination, harassment, bullying and unethical behaviour. In Demant, there is zero tolerance for any form of discrimination, harassment or bullying related to our workplace. The Guideline applies to all employees and contractors working for Demant globally, and it guides behaviour at work, at work assignments outside the office and at office-sponsored social functions as well as private behaviour that can be related to Demant (e.g. on social media). The Executive Leadership Team is ultimately accountable for adherence to the Policy and to reaching our targets and commitments. We will fully implement the new Guideline through e-learning in 2025.

We track the development in employee engagement through our Pulse survey. The Pulse survey results provide twofold information: Firstly, it is a way of assessing whether, and to what extent, the current initiatives on well-being, flexibility, inclusion and engagement are working. Secondly, they serve as the starting point for the further development of specific actions related to those areas that need special attention.

We identify and assess our impacts on human rights on an ongoing basis. In the second half of 2024, we carried out a corporate wide human rights assessment, covering the full value chain of activities. The assessment included a review of our own operations, with consideration of the geographies where we operate and the industries we work in. We also mapped actual and potential impacts in our value chain.

We have initiated a more granular assessment of some of the salient issues to determine whether our current impact management is adequate and to make improvements, if and where necessary. For all identified issues, we have management systems in place that help us bring to an end and mitigate actual and potential impacts.

In 2025, we will introduce the Leadership Compass for all leaders at Demant, which will be implemented through a leadership development programme, focusing on learning journeys within each of the five pillars: purpose, development, performance, belonging and personal awareness. Furthermore, we have been working on establishing a global standard and a new platform for how we capture and report on HR data, driven by a global effort to standardise key HR processes, such as recruitment, promotion and performance. In 2025, the new platform will be rolled out in our biggest countries (by number of employees) Poland, USA, Denmark, France, Canada, Germany, Australia and United Kingdom and the rest of the world will follow consecutively. In 2025, we will develop and implement a Global Policy on Remuneration and Rewards.

We believe that working with diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) boosts our performance, improves our leadership and innovation skills, maintains high customer satisfaction and supports our efforts to attract and retain talented minds. Our approach is focused on and guided by our Policy on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, which applies to all employees globally. This Policy outlines our ambitions and commitments to advance diversity and inclusion and further defines key short-term initiatives planned to ensure that we deliver on these ambitions and commitments. It also outlines targets for the entire Demant Group with a specific focus on gender balance.

Our global recruitment platform contains embedded materials designed to prompt inclusive recruitment behaviour. Furthermore, we have expanded training in unconscious bias, inclusive leadership and psychological safety, and we have developed the capabilities of our HR leaders to drive DE&I-related topics and training locally. To support this, DE&I-specific themes of relevance for our employee performance dialogue have been part of the global process for performance dialogue since the beginning of 2023. This provides input to assess the effectiveness of our actions on DE&I, which is also evaluated through our Pulse survey, as it has specific questions regarding inclusion and fair treatment.

In 2024, Demant received 11 submissions to its whistleblower hotline related to discrimination and/or harassment. These cases were handled internally according to the Whistleblower Policy and Investigation Guideline. Having been addressed by the relevant internal organisation in collaboration with the affected individuals, 8 out of 11 claims have been closed. There were no severe human rights incidents in the period, and therefore no fines, penalties or compensation were paid.