The United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) serve as a blueprint for making the world a better place. Here is how Milestone and our ecosystem aim to support achieving these ambitions.
Milestone identified six of the 17 goals as particularly relevant to our business:
Good health and well-being
We have a strong focus on the healthcare industry. In 2023, we will launch new solutions to ensure patient and employee safety while protecting assets and property. These solutions focus on healthcare’s unique compliance requirements and working environments.
Quality education
We offer video management solutions to schools, universities, and daycare centers, ensuring a safe and healthy environment that promotes learning and well-being.
Industry, innovation, and infrastructure
Video management solutions play an essential role in critical infrastructure and city development. For example, video is used to handle large crowds and can be applied to enhance safety efforts. It can also be used to reduce costs. In addition, Milestone core solutions are broadly used in transportation industries.
Sustainable cities and communities
More and more people live in cities, putting immense pressure on infrastructure. We offer video technology solutions to create a better urban quality of life. This creates safer environments, better infrastructure, and cleaner streets and public spaces. We enable proactive responses to important issues in cities while delivering insights for officials to make long-lasting improvements.
Peace, justice, and strong institutions
Our products are used by law enforcement and governments globally to ensure peace, safety, and justice. Our technology can be used forensically, for evidence within justice systems and to ensure safety and security in cities.
However, we recognize that data-driven video technology may represent a threat to individual privacy and civil rights if developed, applied, and used in the wrong context. As a leading software provider, it is Milestone’s responsibility to conduct human rights due diligence to avoid infringing negatively on privacy rights and we are continuously inviting lawmakers to a dialogue on more meaningful legislation on how data from technology can and may be used.
Partnerships for the goals
Milestone cooperates with stakeholders to protect and continuously earn our social license to operate. We create market-leading technology solutions that meet the evolving societal demands for sustainability, governance, and accountability. We cooperate with policy makers, industry associations, partners, and customers to find new solutions to common challenges.
Milestone has initiated several measures to strengthen the well-being, engagement, and development of our people.
In 2022, we launched a project focused on developing our leaders so they can empower colleagues. We are also in the process of redesigning our decision flows to be clearer and more decentralized.
We enhanced our hybrid working model with the use of customized communications tools.
We continued to run our Grow Together program, which launched in 2021. The program offers colleagues tools for daily breaks that activate the body, mind, and spirit. Grow Together also allows every Milestone employee to spend a day giving back to society through volunteer work.
Cross-border working environment and rights
Milestone is a global company. We play a role in many different value chains, typically including suppliers, technology partners, distributors, resellers, and customers.
We hold a position where we can promote principles and standards for working responsibly. We do not tolerate forced or compulsory labor, and we do not tolerate child labor. We will continue to promote freedom of association and collective bargaining, as well as the rights of indigenous people. Through the implementation of human rights due diligence, we aim to monitor and address these risks by training local employees in principles and practices and assessing business partners on relevant criteria when starting up new business relationships.
We aim to develop a working environment that is safe, motivating, and empowering.
Diversity and inclusion
We believe a diverse workforce brings varied and valuable experience, ideas, and expertise to the organization. Our workforce consists of around 70 nationalities globally, with more than 40 nationalities in our Copenhagen office alone. However, we recognize that diversity is not just a question of nationality.
When recruiting to fill employee positions and when reviewing existing talent and leadership, we always look for a diverse mix of skills, backgrounds, genders, and cultures. This is also the criteria we use when we review and recruit members for our board and leadership teams.
However, we know that recruitment and talent reviews can include unconscious bias. That is why we will challenge decisions made on stereotypes and learned attitudes to ensure we maintain a culture based on diversity and inclusion.
Regarding gender diversity, Milestone’s Senior Leadership Team consisted of 35 percent women at the end of 2022 (up from 26 percent in 2021).
The composition of the Board of Directors is reviewed on an annual basis. The board consists of six members, including two employee-elected members. In 2021, an employee-elected woman became a member of the board.
The four shareholder-elected members are currently all males. In the last couple of years, we have not succeeded in recruiting a shareholder-elected female for our Board. At our latest recruitment for a board member in 2022, the most qualified person was a male.
By 2026, the board aims to have at least one female candidate for election as a shareholder-elected member.
We use non-financial KPIs to manage the reporting of working conditions, including number of employees at year-end, engagement score and net promoter score (also see page 58 in which the calculation method for this is stated).
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In 2022, we completed a thorough analysis focusing on the human rights impacts of our technology.
The insights laid the foundation for a Responsible Technology Program and a policy commitment to the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and the OECD Guidelines on Multinational Enterprises.
Our strategic intent is clear. We want to become a global leader in how data-driven video technology is developed, sold, and used responsibly. Though our technology improves the well-being of citizens and societies, we must actively address any unintended uses and side effects. We want to actively manage, mitigate and reduce any risk and harm of our technology within our sphere of influence.
With the Responsible Technology Program, we will take further actions to deliver on our responsible technology commitment. This is not a new mindset for Milestone. But the depth and scope of the new program is intended to set standards for the industry in the years to come.
As part of our commitment, we will continue to work to implement human rights due diligence across our business operations and partnerships.
Human rights due diligence is linked to our compliance and risk management. Based on a thorough human rights impact assessment, the right to privacy and to non-discrimination have been identified as the most salient to our business.
