Period 2023–2030
Preamble
NLI promotes equality of working conditions for males and females and with this “Strategy of equal opportunities for males and females” it helps maintain equal working conditions for males and females in line with the Labour Code, other legal regulations, in-house and organizational norms of the Czech Forestry Institute (further on NLI) and basic rules of decency.
The Institute supports desirable standards of behaviour of state employees, thus creating foundations for building and keeping the trust of the public. The NLI management contributes to the application of these principles and hence to equal work performance of employees by creating an open work environment and by maintaining equal approach to employees.
Basic concepts
Gender – cultural characteristics and models assigned to biological male and female genders. It refers to social differences between females and males. These roles change in time and significantly differ according to culture of the nation and historical stage of the society’s development. Thus, they do not represent a natural, given difference between the males and females but rather a temporary developmental stage of social relations.
Gender equality/Equality of males and females – the concept is to claim that all human beings are free to develop their personal capabilities without limitations determined by gender stereotypes and gender roles. Different behaviour, aspirations and needs of males and females should be considered equal and resulting from the autonomous choice of each individual.
Identified areas – areas in which a standard occurrence is recorded of the increased risk of discrimination in the equality of males and females.
Maternal leave and parental leave – periods before and after the child birth. Maternity leave begins 6–8 weeks before the anticipated date of child birth and lasts for 28 weeks, in case of multiple birth 37 weeks. As a standard, maternal leave is followed by parental leave lasting up to child’s three years of age, with a possibility to draw parental allowance at an amount and dispatch in the standard increased/accelerated or decreased/prolonged mode of drawing the contributions, max. up to 4 years of child’s age.
Negative phenomena in the workplace – manners in a workplace that would contradict the values and principles of human dignity, freedom, justice, equality, law, legality and impartiality. This namely includes bullying, undesirable pressure (including mocking), sexual harassment, discrimination or corrupt practices.
Flexible working hours – the regime of working hours in which the employee chooses the start (or end) of his/her working hours himself/herself within time periods determined by the employer.
Sexual harassing – behaviour of a sexual nature that can be both verbal and non-verbal, which the person affected by this behaviour considers undesirable. It violates dignity, and lowers the status and psychological well-being of person(s) to whom such a behaviour is directed.
Balancing work with the private and family life (work-life balance) – the area of balancing (harmonization) with endeavour to draw attention to the necessity to dedicate oneself not only to work but also to family and private personal life.
Equality strategy – document “Strategy of equal opportunities for males and females in the period from 2021-2030”, approved by the resolution of Czech Government No. 269 of 8 March 2021.
Practical focus in enforcing principles of gender equality
The “Strategy of equal opportunities for males and females” (further on “Strategy”) identifies areas that were worked out into individual measures for the following years. The measures were chosen to maintain the equality of rights for males and females in the Forest Management Institute following their work positions, work tasks and NLI culture, and to minimize possible risks of gender inequality. The respective areas are continually evaluated at the top management level of NLI, with further measures being introduced in case that shortcomings are recorded.
Identified areas:
In 2012–2014, an internal review and updating of personnel activities was made based on Project no. CZ.1.04/4.1.00/58.00011 “Creation and implementation of human resource management in the corporation” realized in 2011. By this the area of human resources became an important part of the work of managers who try to improve the individual areas continually together with the personnel and payroll department and NLI management so that needs of employees can be satisfied and rules of work in NLI met. In the respective areas, NLI tries to fulfil needs arising on the labor market and respond to them adequately.
| area | evaluation | measure | deadline |
| Tender | Advertisement does not clearly specify that the job is suitable both for females and males | Benefits are emphasized for harmonizing the job and the private life | This has already been fixed. |
| Adaptation process | New employees are not sufficiently informed about the observance of gender equality | The information is included in the initial training – to be provided by the personnel and payroll department | April 2023 |
| Remuneration | Pursuant to Act no. 341/2017, on granting personal allowance, no misconduct was recorded | – | Continually |
| Qualification increase | Possibility exists for concluding qualification agreements without distinction | – | Continually |
| Work environment and collective | Based on the survey of employees’ satisfaction from 2018, the work environment is evaluated as very satisfactory | Regular survey of employees’ satisfaction to be conducted by the personnel and payroll department | during 2023 |
NLI is aware of the natural difference between males and females and understands their work needs that may differ too. Each employee has an irreplaceable value for the Institute, and perfect results can be achieved only together. NLI supports individual approach to the needs of employees so that they can combine job and private life at the best.
For these purposes, NLI offers part-time jobs, flexible working hours, helpfulness in planning holidays and other pro-family benefits. An important part of our good relations is alignment between operational needs of the Institute and needs of our employees.
| area | evaluation | measures | deadline |
| Working hours | Flexible working hours | – | In progress |
| Part-time job | Part-time jobs are possible in NLI | – | In progress |
| Benefits | Allowance for children’s recreation | – | In progress |
| Maternal/Parental leave | Jobs are secured until return to work | – | In progress |
| Holiday | NLI reacts in a flexible and helpful way to requirements of its employees | In progress |
Balanced representation of males and females at decision-making positions is a precondition for the fair distribution of powers, workload and social satisfaction. Our goal is to ensure work conditions combining efficient work performance in required quality with respecting individuality of each employee, his/her personal values and goals.
Career opportunities are given by the number of vacant managerial positions. In 2022, fluctuation in NLI was 8.6 %.
Predominance of male employees follows out from the focus of our organization, with a high share of work in the field. This is why the number of males on managerial posts is high, too. In administration and support departments, managerial posts are represented also by females.
The fact follows out also from the ratio of job applicants with the number of men applying for employment in our organization as forest experts and foresters being higher over a long term than that of women.
NLI considers the ever increasing numbers of female managers and increasing interest of female applicants for job in general to be the result of targeted and motivating advertising.
| area | evaluation | measures | deadline |
| Numbers of applicants for job | Predominance of male applicants over female applicants | Motivating advertising of vacant jobs to be ensured by personnel and payroll department | Continually |
With its history and traditions dating back to 1935, Czech Forestry Institute has been an organization at high technical level, the mission of which is to serve development of forestry. To be able to achieve the goal, NLI puts a great emphasis on ethical behaviour, moral and decency in interpersonal relationships in the workplace. The basic document which governs behaviour and acting of NLI employees is the “Code of NLI ethics”. This directive is regularly reviewed in line with the “Directive governing acts” where the developer of in-house and organizational norm is obliged to check validity and effectiveness 1x in 2 calendar years at least. Any negative elements in the workplace (sexual harassing, bullying or unethical conduct) are not tolerated in NLI. Following the law on the protection of whistleblowers and in line with the directive “NLI Internal system of notification”, each employee is given a possibility to report safely his/her suspicion of any incident that is not in accordance with the “Code of NLI ethics” and NLI moral values. NLI maintains and supports the values through open communication as well as by means of collaboration within individual departments and between them. This approach allows to build trust between employees while maintaining the right to privacy.
| area | evaluation | measures | deadline |
| Collective and negotiations with employees | The survey revealed that these two areas are classified as the best by NLI employees. | Regular survey of employees’ satisfaction to be conducted by personnel and payroll department. | during 2023 |
| Tools for announcing an incident | No such case has been identified so far. | Pursuant to the law on the protection of whistleblowers, this is treated in the “NLI Internal system of notification” | during 2023 |
| Publicity of the Code of NLI ethics to subordinate employees | No misconduct was recorded in the past period. | Active enforcement and control of the compliance of rules stipulated in the Code of NLI ethics by NLI managerial staff. | Continually |
The risk of non-compliance with the equality of males and females is also included in the NLI Catalogue of risks.
