IKEA Canada recognized as Forbes Canada’s Best Employers for Diversity

“We're encouraged by inclusion on this list of leading employers because we know that Canadians want to work and shop with purpose-led, inclusive brands,” said John Williams, Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Leader, IKEA Canada. “Diversity and inclusion are important to us at IKEA Canada as we aim to continue recruiting quality talent while creating life-long relationships with our existing co-workers through robust opportunities to build careers with purpose, surrounded by community.”

IKEA Canada is committed to integrating equality, diversity, and inclusion into all aspects of its business to attract and retain top talent by anchoring these considerations into ways of working, policies, processes, as well as customer interactions.   

 · IKEA Canada is proud that 51% of its managers and 51% of its co-workers are female. As part of its new Equality Plan, it will continue to work towards gender balance in every unit, function, and level to ensure it is building an organization that reflects the diversity of its communities.

· In units across Canada, IKEA celebrates National Indigenous Peoples days to recognize the unique heritage, diverse cultures, and outstanding contributions of Indigenous people. In 2021, IKEA Canada established its first Indigenous Reconciliation Strategy. This was Rooted in Recommendation #92 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions’ 94 Calls to Action. The strategy continues to Evolve and unfold under three key pillars: learning and teaching, collaboration and amplification, and reciprocity with Indigenous communities.

· For the past five years, IKEA Canada has raised a Pride flag at units across the country in recognition of the International Day against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia.

· Since 2018, IKEA Canada has partnered with organizations like Pride at Work and Canadian Centre for Diversity and Inclusion to create a fully inclusive work environment where collective diversity allows IKEA to foster important conversations from an intersectional perspective, recognizing unique life experiences.

·  In 2021, IKEA Canada committed to furthering education of its co-workers by offering trainings about inclusion, unconscious bias and 2SLGBTQ+ issues to make sure that they are allies too. IKEA continues to educate co-workers on the use of inclusive pronouns and launched a new Transgender Inclusion initiative to ensure a trans-inclusive workplace and trans-inclusive teams.

· IKEA has a long-standing commitment of supporting those with lived refugee experience through humanitarian efforts with the IKEA Foundation.

· IKEA Canada partnered with ACCES Employment to support refugees across Canada by offering a virtual Refugee Skills for Employment training, IKEA work placements, language training, and a mentorship program.

· Most recently, to support those people forcibly displaced by the war in Ukraine, IKEA Canada committed $25,000 to priority markets defined by arrival airports including Vancouver, Toronto, Edmonton and Winnipeg.

· In support of its Equality Plan, IKEA Canada launched a new initiative in 2022 called Co-worker Resource Groups (CRGs) as part of its effort to create an inclusive culture where everyone can be themselves and contribute to making IKEA a great place to work. These CRGs support co-workers who are BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+, as well as Gender Balance in fulfillment.  Their mission is to positively influence the work environment by helping members and allies be better versions of themselves, to advocate for learning and development opportunities for members, and represent people in commerce while attracting talent to IKEA Canada.