Permanent tsb is an equal opportunities employer committed to creating a professional environment in which our employees feel valued, included and empowered to succeed in their career, regardless of gender, sexual orientation, age, race, religion, ability/disability, background or life experiences.

We have made significant progress across a number of areas since first launching our Diversity and Inclusion Strategy in 2018. In recognition of this progress, we were proud recipients of both, the CIPD Diversity & Inclusion Award, and the Workplace Excellence Award for Diversity & Inclusion in 2023.

Some of the actions taken to support our LGBTQ+ colleagues since the launch of our Strategy include:

• Recognising that there is no right or wrong way for colleagues to express their identity and acknowledging the highly personal experience of transitioning for transgender colleagues within our Equality Charter. We are committed to supporting each individual in this regard and the Charter explicitly states that if a colleague is intending to transition at work, that we will aim to make this process as smooth as possible;
• Implementing Gender Identity and Transitioning Guidelines to support both our People Managers and our wider colleague population;
• Introducing an ‘All Genders’ toilet facility in our Head Office and including ‘All Gender’ toilet facilities as a standard in all new buildings;
• Supporting Dublin Pride – the largest fundraising event of the year for many LGBTQ+ community organisations and charities in Ireland; and,
• Establishing an Employee Resource Group for our LGBTQ+ colleagues – PRISM, which has been key to the success of supporting our LGBTQ+ colleagues and allies. We have worked with PRISM to achieve all the above milestones, but as a Network they have independently achieved much more.

PRISM - Our Employee Resource Group for LGBTQ+ Colleagues and Allies

To support the delivery of our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Strategy, we have set up a number of volunteer-led Employee Resource Groups (ERGs), whose aim is to enable employees to join together based on shared characteristics or life experiences. There are currently four ERGs in place, and one of the first to be established was PRISM, our Network for LGBTQ+ colleagues and allies who are celebrating their 5^th anniversary this year.

PRISM has an Executive Sponsor who supports the PRISM Committee and team to achieve their Vision – ‘To be an open and inclusive Network that promotes and values individual differences no matter how our people identify.’

PRISM’s objectives are as follows:

Since its establishment, PRISM has achieved the following:

• Designing and distributing PRISM lanyards and pins for colleagues who choose to demonstrate their solidarity and support of LGBTQ+ colleagues. Recently the branding of these have been updated to include the new ‘Progress Flag’;
• Celebrating Pride through a range of events and communications, including:
• Online quiz, bingo and Netflix watch party events for social networking with colleagues.
• Workplace decoration competitions whether our colleagues are working from home, in a branch or in an office location, promoting the celebration of Pride and driving engagement.
• Educational events from community organisations such as LGBT Ireland and BeLongTo.
• Communication campaigns and spotlights on colleagues sharing stories of ‘coming out’, both from the perspective of the person coming out but also that of a parent, a sibling and a friend.
• Marking ‘IDAHOBIT’ – the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia.  Observed each year on the 17^th of May, IDAHOBIT aims to coordinate international events that raise awareness of LGBT+ rights violations and stimulate interest in LGBT+ rights worldwide;
• Celebrating and promoting many other key international events such as Non-Binary Day, Coming Out Day, Transgender Day of Remembrance and many more;
• Creating a Terminology Document, recognising that when we use respectful and inclusive language, we send a message to those around us that we want to exist in a culture and an environment that upholds those values. The PRISM Committee created the document in order to support, educate and inform our colleagues and to help them understand terms and language around gender, sexuality and pronouns;
• Collaborating with the Bank’s Human Resources Team to ensure that our policies are inclusive of our LGBTQ+ colleagues;
• Creating and issuing quarterly newsletters to engage with, and support colleagues. The newsletters continue to highlight issues and promote events all year round, as well as recommend literature, podcasts and documentaries that will educate and inform;
• Designed and distributed PRISM lanyards and pins for colleagues who choose to demonstrate their solidarity and support of LGBTQ+ colleagues. Recently the branding of these have been updated to include the new ‘Progress Flag’; and,
• Joining FuSIoN (Financial Services Inclusion Network) – which was founded in 2017 with a goal of creating an LGBTQ+ community across financial services in Ireland and enable the sharing of best practices within the LGBTQ+ community.

We are immensely proud of all that our PRISM Network has achieved and the progress that has been made in supporting our LGBTQ+ community of colleagues. We look forward to supporting them further, as we continue to work together on our journey to drive change and inclusion.