Programme EVE by Danone

The Programme EVE by Danone was created in 2010 as an intrapreneurship initiative. It is meant to facilitate women empowerment.

It is now an inter corporation’s leadership seminar for women and men which aims at working both on the individuals and on the organization, as it offers to work on one’s evolution in order to bring change in the organization.

Franck Riboud, then CEO of Danone, requested that an event was created that would encourage women to rise through the company’s ranks, and one that would work in partnership with other companies.

All companies involved work together to share their best practices and build an innovative and inspiring work environment.

To fight against the glass ceiling by taking more self-confidence is the objective of the EVE programme. The rationale of the programme is that women are co-responsible for the glass ceiling: the objective is to help them gain self-confidence and to help organisations, mostly men, to become aware of the women’s difficulties and differences in their functioning.

It consists in a one-week seminar on soft skills whose motto is “Be yourself and unleash your potential”. And builds around 3 key point, starting from oneself and going out into the world:

• DARE TO BE SELF: refocus, trust yourself and let your talents emerge.
• OPTIMIZE one’s relationship with others in one’s professional and personal life.
• BE STIMULATED by original leadership experiences

The balance between women and men and the balance within each individual is a source of sustainable economic and social performance. The program is driven by the ambition to change people’s ways of seeing and acting in order to bring about change within our companies.

As of 2019, the EVE community is amde of 3500 members from KPMG, Danone, Crédit Agricole SA, SNCF, L’Oréal, Orange, Caisse des dépôts. Each company sends 10/20/30 people per year, that will bring back change in their company.

The main areas of content are of the training provided though the Programme EVE  by Danone are:

• How negotiate obstacles to cooperation
• Live in peace with stereotypes
• Inspiring women/ Women who dare
• Positive leadership
• Centred leadership
• Non-violent communication
• Giving purpose
• Dare to live our values
• Happiness mindset
• Mindfulness experience

• Another Program to empower people and initiated by Danone: Octave program (focusing on generations, new organizational modes required with digital expansion).

The Motto of Octave is: “Dare being yourself and being an actor in a changing world” (50% women/ 50% men in the program)

• Initiatives around Diversity & Inclusion at Danone (women & men equal rights access)
• Trainings (various internal in the company, depending women’s needs)
• Mentoring sessions
• Intrapreneurship. Danone corporate culture promotes initiatives. Taking the lead of such projects empower women through these actions.