MetLife Life Insurance Signs 'Gender Balance Inclusive Growth Partnership' Agreement with Ministry of Gender Equality and Family

Maintaining a Female Executive Ratio of Over 30% Until 2022
Expanding Female Team Leaders and Department Heads Ratio to Around 30%

[Asia Economy Reporter Ki Ha-young] MetLife Life Insurance announced on the 19th that it has signed a voluntary agreement called the 'Gender-Balanced Inclusive Growth Partnership' with the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, which includes practical tasks to enhance gender diversity within the company.

At the signing ceremony held on the afternoon of the 18th at the Seoul Government Complex in Gwanghwamun, Seoul, the agreement included provisions to nurture female talent into senior management positions and establish key systems to support work-life balance.

Through this agreement, MetLife Life Insurance aims to increase the proportion of women not only among executives but also in middle management positions such as team leaders and department heads from the current 25% to around 30% by 2022.

Currently, the proportion of female executives at MetLife Life Insurance is 31%. Compared to the average female executive ratio of 6.3% among major domestic financial companies as of the end of January this year, this is a significantly higher figure. It has already exceeded the 30% ratio suggested as a guideline for ensuring gender diversity by the Korean Institute for Gender Equality Promotion and Education and the global proxy advisory firm ISS.

The company also operates systems to nurture female talent and support work-life balance. Efforts for gender-balanced inclusive growth will be made through the operation of women's networks and committees, spreading a culture of diversity and inclusion, activities to foster a family-friendly culture, running female leadership development programs, and the establishment of a male 'Parental Leave Month' system.

In particular, the newly established Parental Leave Month system allows male employees who have had children to take up to one month of paternity leave. This is a groundbreaking system compared to the existing spousal paternity leave, which only guarantees five days of paid leave. Additionally, over the past 10 years, MetLife Life Insurance's parental leave usage rate has been 91%, which is much higher than the average parental leave usage rate of Korean female workers at 11.9% (as of 2018).

Song Young-rok, CEO of MetLife Life Insurance, said, "We will take this agreement as an opportunity to further enhance gender diversity within the company by adopting and spreading best practices."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.