Material Topics & SDGs
Employee Engagement and Satisfaction
SDG: 4, 5, 8, 10
Equal Opportunity and Diversity
SDG: 5, 8, 10
Capacity Building and Talent Management
SDG: 5, 8, 10
RISKS
OPPORTUNITIES
GRI 3-3
SDG 4, 5, 8, 10
With the awareness that the most valuable capital of our bank is human resources, we direct our efforts to increase employee engagement and satisfaction. In this direction, we conducted the Employee Engagement Survey, which we organize annually to enhance the experience of our employees, in the year 2024 as well. With our studies, we comprehensively evaluate our employees’ level of commitment, job satisfaction, ways of doing business, and work-life balance. We also measure their perception of the Bank’s brand and their views on performance, remuneration, career development, reward, and recognition systems. We analyze the collected data in detail and create road maps to ensure continuous improvement in these areas.
Not only our Bank’s employees but also Vakıf Finansal Kiralama AŞ, Vakıf Faktoring AŞ, Vakıf Yatırım Menkul Değerler AŞ, Vakıf Gayrimenkul Değerleme AŞ, Vakıf Pazarlama San. ve Tic. AŞ and Vakıf Gayrimenkul Yatırım Ortaklığı AŞ employees operating within VakıfBank Finance Group participated in the Employee Engagement Survey we conducted in 2024. Conducted with the participation of 13,559 people in total, this survey underlines the importance our Group attaches to human resources with a comprehensive and participatory approach.
In line with the results of the survey, we continue our efforts with determination to identify areas for improvement, implement action plans, and continuously monitor development processes.
We are aware that high employee engagement also contributes to a low employee turnover rate. Our employee turnover rate was 3.03 and our voluntary employee turnover rate was 2.83 in this period. We aim to determine the areas where our employees want investment, their sentiments and thoughts, and the issues they want to be improved by studying the satisfaction variables that impact engagement within the scope of the research, and we shall make progress in these areas. In addition, we aim to increase employee engagement and satisfaction by closely following employee opinions and thoughts through the platforms that we have implemented.
We are always driven by our sensitivity toward employees’ happiness. With our employee experience-oriented approach, we continue to implement practices that aim to contribute to the engagement and satisfaction of our employees, increase their motivation, and make them feel the privilege of being VakıfBank employees. We are aware of the importance and impact of close contact in communication with employees on employee happiness. With this in mind, we conducted face-to-face “Employee Experience Interviews” with more than 1000 employees as part of the Employee Experience in 2024. With the interviews held, we had the opportunity to listen to our employees firsthand. We also aim to reach more employees in 2025 by increasing the inclusiveness of our visits.
We closely follow new generation human resources practices. In this context, in line with the changing trends and expectations of professional life, we started to implement the “Birthday Leave” practice for all our employees in order to allow our employees to celebrate their birthdays with their loved ones and we shall start implementing it in 2024.
We acknowledge that there is a positive relationship between our colleagues’ and our customers’ happiness. Therefore, we continued to actively use our internal communication channels as in every period, to raise a smile and make them feel valued. As part of our internal communication strategy, we organized activities in 2024 to support our employees to contribute to social life.
We have organized VMeets events through online meeting applications to inform our Bank staff on issues such as banking, innovation, leadership, management, personal integrity, Türkiye, and the World agenda. In addition, with a plan in line with our “digital makes it easier” approach, we launched the VTube corporate video viewing platform and gathered all video content prepared for our Bank under a single umbrella.
On May 27, 2024, we opened VakıfBank B’iz Museum, which bears the traces of our journey from 1954 to today and consists of banking transactions and equipment, personal collections of our employees and retirees. VakıfBank B’iz Museum, the first museum of Istanbul Finance Center, was granted the status of Private Museum under the Ministry of Culture and Tourism on October 8, 2024.
Within the scope of our internal communication strategy, in 2024, we carried out in-house social responsibility activities with the “Goodwill Ambassadors” consisting of 125 Bank employees working on a voluntary basis.
We offer a business environment where employees shall feel happy and safe to ensure that they look confidently to the future and experience the privilege of being a VakıfBank employee. In the upcoming period, we plan to produce projects that will contribute more to sustainability, expand our in-house social responsibility projects, benefit more people, and identify our volunteer ambassadors by increasing our colleague’s participation in our projects.
2024 events
√ It has been subjected to limited assurance by the Independent Audit Firm.
GRI 3-3, 403-6
SDG 5, 8, 10
Within the framework of our sustainable banking approach, our goal is to establish a modern workplace that respects human rights and disseminate this understanding to raise employees’, customers’, and stakeholders’ awareness.
At VakıfBank, we exert our best efforts to deliver on the requirements of the Labor Code, the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the key principles of the International Labor Organization, as well as other international treaties of which Türkiye is a state party. Pursuant to our Human Rights Policy, we do not finance those operations prohibited or restricted under national laws and international treaties that Türkiye is a party to. We also do not extend funds to the operations or projects of individuals and organizations determined to have employed children or violated human rights. Accordingly, we demonstrate an inclusive and fair approach for all by protecting and promoting human rights. We place human rights at the heart of everything that we do, from operations and supply chains to our relations with stakeholders.
We provide equal opportunity and rights to employees in parallel with the importance we attribute to equal opportunity and diversity. In this regard, we take the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights principles, United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and the International Labor Organization (ILO) as guides in our human resources practice that values people. We are a signatory of the United Nations Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs).
In addition to these, as a signatory of the Equality at Work Declaration, which is prepared under the leadership of the Ministry of Family, Labor, and Social Services and in cooperation with the World Economic Forum, we support the active participation of women in all areas of social and economic life with equal rights. We support women’s participation in the workforce with our female employees and aim to maintain a work environment where equality and business peace prevail by taking the necessary measures to ensure all our women-men employees’ health, safety, and well-being. In this context, in 2024, 51.82% of our employees and 22.31% of our employees in managerial positions were women across the entire Bank.
We take care to provide equal opportunities among our employees in both recruitment and career development applications. While our female employees constituted 51.64% of our employees who were promoted to higher positions in 2024, we aim to ensure that they benefit equally from career opportunities and thus maintain a work environment that preserves work-family balance. In this context, 99.75% of 404 female employees who had maternity leave in 2024 returned to work.
In addition to maternity leave, we also offer our female employees the option to make available one year of unpaid leave and to work part-time until their children are five years old. In 2024, 336 female employees who requested unpaid leave due to childbirth took advantage of the right to unpaid additional leave granted by our Bank in addition to the legal period of 16 weeks. In cases where employees’ unpaid leave exceeds 6 months due to childbirth, health, etc., we provide the same ratio to them when remuneration is raised. Moreover, in the provinces with 150 and more female employees, we provide daycare assistance to all our male and female staff who have nursery children. With all of our practices in this regard, we aim to offer mothers the opportunity to continue their careers from where they have left, after their parental leave.
We offer our employees equal opportunities and rights in line with our principles of creating an inclusive working environment for all and preventing all forms of discrimination on the grounds of ethnicity, age, disability, social status, familial situation etc. in working conditions and assignments.
We adhere to an approach that ensures our employees are not subjected to different treatments based on their characteristics and is inclusive in relations with business partners and society, reflected in both our comprehensive policies and procedures and daily practices. With our Harassment and Violence Procedure, we aim to maintain a working environment where respect and trust prevail, free from pressure and violence, to prevent all kinds of harassment and violence that can occur within the organization, and to define the road map to be followed in case of such incidents.
√ It has been subjected to limited assurance by the Independent Audit Firm.
GRI 3-3, 401-2, 404-3
We determine our remuneration policy within the bank following the risk and responsibility assumed at all levels, pay fair remuneration, and provide fringe benefits by considering our employees’ fundamental rights.
We determine the salaries of our executives and employees at all levels in line with the Bank’s internal balance and strategic goals. In this process, we adopt an effective remuneration policy and take into account budgetary opportunities, job descriptions, and responsibility levels of employees, as well as their individual performance and competencies. Furthermore, we consider the Bank’s compliance with internal and external regulations as a fundamental priority. In addition to their basic salary, we make additional payments to our employees such as duty compensation, foreign language compensation, licensing compensation and specialization compensation depending on the duties and responsibilities they undertake.
In 2025, we aim to pay asset management bonuses to our employees in this group in order to contribute to the growth of our Bank and enhance the productivity and satisfaction of our sales group employees. Furthermore, we closely monitor sectoral developments, conduct comprehensive data analyses, and regularly evaluate our position in the banking sector in line with the results of salary surveys conducted by independent institutions.
Furthermore, we determine salaries and salary increases for our in-scope employees with the Collective Bargaining Agreement made with the Bank Finance and Insurance Employees Union (BASS) and our employees who are out of scope with the board of directors’ decision. In 2024, the ratio of employees under the scope of a CBA is 84%.
In addition to social benefits such as marriage benefits, maternity benefits, disaster benefits, death and invalidity benefits, we offer opportunities to meet basic requirements through various leaves of absence. We raise our daily food allowance in line with the conditions of the day and make sure employees have better conditions in access to lunch services. In addition to wages, we pay bonuses, performance premiums, and dividends. In doing so, we implement a motivating and fair remuneration policy based on merit, adopting a corporate culture, competitive, rewarding, based on balanced performance targets, encouraging sustainable success. Our Bank’s remuneration policy is available here.
Furthermore, we include our employees in the Group Pension Plan with Employer Contribution to support their income in retirement, make contributions, and take out life insurance for them every year.
GRI 3-3, 401-2, 403-6
With our Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) Policy, we consider offering our employees a safe and healthy work environment as one of our fundamental responsibilities. To this end, we adopt full compliance with legal requirements and international standards in the field of OHS as a fundamental principle. In 2024, we successfully completed the Integrated Management System (ISO 9001-ISO 14001-ISO 45001-ISO 50001) audits and ensured the sustainability of the Integrated Management System.
We meticulously carry out Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) processes with the coordination of the Facility Management and Occupational Safety Department. You can access our Bank’s OHS Policy at “Occupational Health and Safety Policy.” We guide all employees, including the staff at our Bank, as part of support service under the Occupational Health and Safety Policy. We reference European Statistics on Accidents at Work-ESAW methods to track OHS performance.
In 2024, we conducted field visits to raise awareness across the Bank. In this context, we visited 41 branches across the country and held face-to-face interviews with more than 200 employees on Occupational Health and Safety issues. In addition, we regularly offer in-class training and e-learning programs and provide one-day OHS training to every new employee as part of their orientation training. In this context, we provided in-class OHS training sessions to a total of 1,064 participants in 2024.
In line with our proactive risk management approach, we mapped our Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) risks and conducted visits to locations covering the branches and units of our Bank in 2024. Through these visits, we identified the risks at each location and continued to take the necessary measures.
We installed a building health monitoring system consisting of state-of-the-art sensitive seismic sensors at our Bank’s location in the Istanbul Finance Center. Thus, our Bank became the first organization in the Financial Center complex to have a completed and operational building health and monitoring system. We completed the interior design and applications of our building in the Istanbul Finance Center in accordance with LEED certification and ergonomics requirements.
Regarding Intrusion Alarm, Fire Warning, and Security Camera Systems; we continued our activities of installation and elimination of malfunctions in existing systems and their regular maintenance, meeting the needs of new fire extinguishers, replacing the necessary ones with new ones and their regular maintenance in new branch openings and branch renovations in line with the reports of workplace safety specialist regarding “fire safety.” Within the scope of the improvement and development of electronic security measures; to eliminate the risk of the alarm system being disabled as a result of the failure to enter the alarm password during the closing of our branches or forgetting to enter the password, we started the application of sending an e-mail to the branch manager and text message to the branch security guard.
We migrated the job request processes concerning physical security (security guard), electronic security (alarms and security cameras), and fire extinguishers to the system so that requests are met more effectively and quickly. To ensure that the installation, maintenance and repair, and progress payment control processes of the electronic security system are systematically, flawlessly, and rapidly carried out, we made improvements and advancements to the software installed at our bank’s locations in line with user feedback.
GRI 3-3, 403-1, 403-2, 403-3, 403-4, 403-5, 403-6, 403-7
SDG 5, 8, 10
In this period when everything is changing rapidly, our Bank has adopted the philosophy of continuous development with a human-centered approach to achieve our strategic goals, keep up with the change, and gain a competitive advantage. In line with our human resources policy, we regard it as our most important mission to increase the motivation of our employees by prioritizing their needs and expectations.
We seek to manage our human resources effectively and efficiently, meet our employees’ personal development requirements, and support our Bank’s corporate development thanks to the career management studies we conduct with this understanding. At VakıfBank, we ensure that corporate strategic goals are transformed into individual goals with the Performance Management System to safeguard our employees’ corporate and personal development with an innovative approach and continuous learning, increase solidarity and cooperation, and support their focus on corporate strategies.
While developing our performance system, we use the capabilities of technology within our targeting methodology. Within this scope, with our advanced analytical approach, we continue our efforts to process data with advanced algorithms and use it effectively with artificial intelligence technology. We deploy the Corporate Performance Management System on 3 key modules including Regional Directorate and Branch Performance Module, Employee-Based Unit Performance Module, and Competency Management Module, to measure and monitor all employees’ performance. By increasing the number of non-financial criteria in the Performance System, we contribute to a balanced structure.
In order to achieve our goals and become the leader in the sector, we continue our efforts to improve the competencies of our employees with determination. As part of our performance evaluation system, we conduct an annual competency assessment to support the career planning of our employees and analyze their individual training and development needs. In this context, 16,189 employees received a competency assessment in 2024. We also support continuous development by adding innovations to our performance system every year so that our managers can make healthier and more objective evaluations.
In 2024, we concluded a successful period in which our employees made a difference in their performance. In this period, 16,237 employees received performance evaluations. As a result of individual performance evaluations that we measured transparently and objectively, we presented performance achievement awards to our employees.
We also updated the Bank’s Career and Remuneration Regulation and developed an ‘early promotion model’ that prioritizes personal competencies and performance. In this context, 434 employees with outstanding performance were entitled to early promotion. In 2024, 3,290 employees, 51.64% of whom were female and 48.36% male, were promoted to a higher position. In line with our vision of becoming a bank that trains its own managers, 18% of our employees were promoted to higher positions in 2024.
We continue such efforts aimed at identifying employees with a manager potential to play a key role in the Bank’s future, providing a fair competitive environment in career development, supporting their skills and competencies with training and development programs, and utilizing such skills effectively and efficiently.
Effective and efficient management of human resources is one of our primary goals, aiming to employ the optimum number of employees based on the workload. In this context, we have developed systematic norm measurement models for both our marketing and operations employees across all our branches, leveraging observational outputs, data analysis, and various measurement and evaluation techniques. We are thus able to determine the daily norm based on the increasing and decreasing workload.
Changes within the organizational layout of the Head Office in 2024:
√ It has been subjected to limited assurance by the Independent Audit Firm.
GRI 3-3, 404-3
We support and promote employees’ occupational, technical, and personal development and thus contribute to sustainable business efficiency in line with the human resources policies that our Bank pursues. We support our employees with in-class trainings, live virtual classroom trainings, and digital trainings on topics determined by training requirements analysis, particularly our Bank’s strategies and the competencies expected from our employees.
In line with its human resources policies, VakıfBank adopts contributing to sustainable business efficiency by supporting the professional, technical, and personal development of its employees as a key priority. To this end, we conduct a comprehensive training needs analysis in light of our Bank’s strategic goals and the competencies that our employees are expected to possess.
Based on the results obtained, we offer training programs that will empower our employees not only in professional and technical fields, but also in their personal development. We enrich these programs with flexible and innovative content that can be accessed through digital platforms in addition to in-class and virtual classroom trainings. While enhancing the know-how of our employees, we aim to facilitate their adaptation to changing business world conditions and contribute more effectively to the Bank’s corporate goals.
In this context, we offer our employees training programs under the following headings:
We support the learning and development of our employees in their changing roles or positions through “Role Transition Digital Training Programs.” Thus, we aim to improve the competencies of our employees and support them in adapting to their new roles or titles, ensuring continuous learning.
In 2024, we provided our employees 427,637 hours of in-class training and 408,108 hours of digital training, totaling 835,745 hours. During this period, the average training hours per employee amounted to 45.90 hours.
We have supplemented our in-house training programs by facilitating the participation of over 1,100 employees in external training sessions, conferences, and seminars, aiming to keep our Head Office personnel updated on sector developments and foster their ongoing professional growth.
Also, as part of our Bank’s training and development strategy, we offered global content provider digital training platforms to our information technologies teams, audit units, and Head Office employees.
In our training processes, we use a mixed-learning model that also includes the next generation of digital learning experiences. To monitor and evaluate the development of our employees, we conduct an assessment test on the training portal at the end of the training and measure the training results. We continuously monitor the development of our employees through learning journeys.
OUR HIGHLIGHTED EDUCATIONAL PRACTICES IN 2024
Sustainability
In 2024, we attached great importance to raising the awareness of our employees and ensuring their specialization as part of our Bank’s sustainability strategy. In this context, we provided 90,394 hours of training on topics tailored to diverse target audiences.
Data and Analytics School
We contribute to the development of our employees’ data-based skills through the development programs we design with our stakeholders, especially universities, as part of the development of our employees’ data-based skills.
We aim to strengthen data-driven solutions and offer more effective and sustainable financial services with our increased employee competence thanks to these programs.
Certification and Development Programs
Our Good Practices
GRI 3-3, 403-5, 404-2
In our recruitment processes, we aim to contribute to our goal of becoming the ‘Leading Bank of Strong Türkiye’ by including young and competent candidates who are suitable for the vision and mission of our Bank. In this process, we use competency-based interview questions to get to know our candidates better and to consider them for positions that match their skill sets. Thus, we support our candidates to have a productive and positive interview experience both for our Bank and for themselves.
Throughout 2024, in line with the Bank’s strategic goals and workforce needs, we conducted comprehensive recruitment processes for our business units, IT teams, and branches. As a result of these efforts, we achieved a large and strong organization of 18,209 employees by the end of 2024, with 2,384 new employees joining our family. We continue to add value to the growth and success of our Bank with the energy and talents of our new team members.
We attach great importance to the rapid and effective adaptation of our new colleagues who join our Bank to their positions. To this end, we started our ‘Digital Welcome Kit’ project in 2024. We will implement this project in 2025, which will help our new colleagues better understand our Bank’s culture, values, and processes.
Additionally, we facilitate the orientation of our new employees and convey the culture of our Bank to them through our Work Compliance Representative program. This is how we increase employees’ sense of belonging to the organization and ensure that they comply with our Bank’s mission and goals better.
We participated in domestic career events within the scope of the “Talent is Everywhere” fairs organized under the coordination of the Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye Human Resources Office in 2024 to introduce the banking sector to our young talents and support them to gain experience in this field. We participated in the fairs organized with the leadership and contributions of Türkiye’s prestigious universities such as Akdeniz University, Anadolu University, Bolu Abant İzzet Baysal University, Çukurova University, Dicle University, Harran University, Karadeniz Technical University, Pamukkale University, Samsun University, and Van Yüzüncü Yıl University in order to increase the recognition of our Bank, inform about our career and internship processes, and discover talents that can add value to our Bank. At the fairs, we made presentations on how students could organize their CVs and organized interview simulations to support their interview processes. Through these events, we provided advice on how students can better express themselves during the interviews.
As in previous years, in 2024, we provided internship opportunities to approximately 1,200 student interns across Türkiye through the National Internship program organized by the Human Resources Office of the Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye, enabling them to get to know our Bank better and aiming for talented young people to gain banking experience.
We continued our activities in the field of information technologies to support ideas that will shape the future of finance. We organized the fifth “Hack to the Future” event this year, which was organized with the main themes of digital banking user experience and design, new generation customer communication, innovative products and services, social responsibility, and sustainability. As part of the event, we rewarded the projects that were appreciated.
GRI 3-3