Cleaning Up the Industry: ISS on Living Wages, Decent Hours and Fair Work

“Living wages can have a big impact in our industry, where even small pay increases can have a big impact on our peoples’ wellbeing and financial security,” says Anna Farquharson, Global Programme Lead for Social Progress at ISS. “We’re working to build a stronger business case for living wages in our industry.”

WageIndicator spoke with Anna Farquharson and Margot Slattery, Global Head of Social Sustainability and Inclusion, about ISS’s Living Wage programme—how it started, where it’s going, and the challenges along the way. Headquartered in Copenhagen, ISS is a leading global facilities management and workplace services provider, employing over 325,000 people across 30+ countries.

What is ISS’ commitment to living wages, and how did it become part of the global sustainability agenda?

Margot: This commitment really took shape in 2022 when we presented our global strategy at our annual capital markets day. ISS wanted to emphasize not only financial results but also how we invest in our people - our ‘placemakers’ - and long term sustainability. Living wages became one of our ‘signature moves’, alongside dignity and respect for all employees, and providing 100,000 qualifications to our employees or their families. We have since set up an entire team to act upon these commitments and make them a reality. 

If a company like Maersk or Unilever adopts a global living wage policy, and ISS works with them globally, does that make ISS a subcontractor?

Margot: In our business model, our services are sometimes subcontracted but typically we will be engaged as a main contractor dealing directly with the customer and negotiating terms, including Living Wages. We have often found that we are leading the conversation around Living Wage commitments and if the customer agrees to this within the pricing model, we implement it. The fewer tiers there are, the better for engagement and action on Living Wages. When services are heavily subcontracted, it often becomes just about price. Direct delivery of services allows us to maintain quality and uphold our commitments, which is a more sustainable offer for the customer.

Can you walk us through the implementation process of ISS’s living wage commitment and where you currently are in this journey?

Anna: Since 2022, we’ve focused on building an internal benchmark assessment process suitable for our global operations. We use WageIndicator’s living wage data to benchmark against hourly salary rates across our 30+ operational countries.

Each year, we run an annual benchmark assessment comparing the lowest hourly pay rates in each country with the local Living Wage benchmark. Following the assessment, countries fall into three categories:

1. Green: Wages already exceed the living wage benchmark for all employees.
2. Amber: Wages exceed the living wage benchmark for some, but not all, employees.
3. Red: Wages still fall short of the living wage benchmark, even after considering benefits.

In red-category countries, we then engage at the site level to explore opportunities to uplift wages - often through phased action plans over two to three years.

Is the implementation of Living Wages something ISS can decide unilaterally, or does it depend on client agreements?

Anna: It absolutely depends on our customers. Wage rates need to be agreed upon with them, so it’s a very collaborative, often iterative process. We can’t just flip a switch—it takes time and negotiation, as well as educating all stakeholders on the benefits of paying a living wage.

So it's more about gradual progress, not immediate implementation?

Anna: Exactly. If we can't make the change within the assessment year, we aim to work toward it in the following year. Given our industry’s low margins and external cost pressures, we take a phased approach to ensure that living wages can become a sustainable feature of our business model.

Since cleaning is often an hourly business, does ISS ensure living wages per hour?

Anna: Yes, our assessments are based on hourly wages. We compare those to Living Wage estimates and evaluate whether employees are earning enough per hour.

Beyond hourly wages, is ISS also looking into the concept of “decent hours” to ensure a Living Wage?

Anna: Yes. In countries where we meet the hourly benchmark, we’re now exploring how to ensure people work enough hours to earn a living income. This could include identifying opportunities for part-time workers to transition to full-time, or utilising our scale to offer more shifts in suitable localities. 

Are ISS employees on payroll, or are they considered self-employed?

Anna: ISS has a self-delivery model for provision of our services and all employees (excluding temporary labour and some specialist services) are employed on ISS payroll. 

How do you convince your clients to pay a Living Wage?

Margot: One of the things we’re really working on is helping our sales teams communicate to clients not just the business case for living wages, but also the ethical and moral reasons behind our approach. We know that our customers are facing more demands from their own investors and employees to deliver on social sustainability outcomes, and paying a Living Wage is a tangible way for them to demonstrate this.

Our Social Sustainability and Inclusion team plays a key role in developing strong arguments for why we’re doing this and supporting our commercial colleagues to communicate the benefits. The easy route to winning work in our industry is to go as low as possible on cost, but we’re committed to doing better.

Also, I’d say that our industry has, for a long time, not been fully appreciated by customers. I found it quite ironic that during COVID, everyone was clapping for essential workers but now it feels like people have forgotten. So by paying living wages, we’re trying to make sure the people doing this work are recognized and valued.

Do you report on Living Wages in terms of how many of your employees are above or below Living Wages publicly?

Anna: We have not yet externally reported the percentage of our employees who are paid the Living Wage. Our annual report details the activities we are undertaking around this issue, our goals, and the engagement work we are doing with external partners.

Margot: In regards to how we measure and report on impact, ISS has recently signed up to the Social Value Portal, an organisation that supports us to measure the impact of our social sustainability programmes in financial terms. This work started in the UK and we’ve since implemented the approach in Spain and are about to commence measurement in the Netherlands as well.

Through Social Value Portal, we’re also part of a broader coalition with other large companies looking at why social value matters. And for me, one of the areas I’ll be advocating for within that framework is starting with things like decent hours, living wages, and quality working conditions.

What kinds of challenges are you facing with the Living Wage programme, and how are you addressing them?

Anna: There are multiple challenges we’ve encountered. One of the first was securing strategic buy-in across the organisation. Thankfully, we've made good progress there by integrating social sustainability and living wages into our core strategy. Maintaining focus on this element of the strategy will be crucial to our success.

We also operate under a lot of commercial pressure. Having a values-driven conversation with our customers is essential but it also needs to be backed up by a strong commercial case for paying living wages. That means gathering real data to show the benefits to the business as well as our employees.

One metric we’re exploring is how living wages impact employee retention. Turnover is a major cost for us, and we believe that paying living wages should reduce attrition, and in turn reduce costs related to hiring and training. We're still refining our metrics and collecting data, and this will remain a key focus moving forward. 

We’re also examining how living wages affect employee engagement - do our people feel more valued and fairly compensated? If so, that should then be reflected in improved productivity across the organisation.

Once we have built out the data to demonstrate those benefits, our operational and commercial managers will be better equipped to have meaningful conversations with clients about why paying a living wage matters—not just ethically, but also in terms of service quality. Happier workers mean better performance, which directly benefits our clients.

And, there are also reputational benefits for clients. Especially younger generations want to know that the people who manage and maintain their workspaces are being treated and paid fairly. So it contributes to their employer brand too.

Given that many factors can influence something like turnover, have you faced similar challenges from a research standpoint? And how are you addressing them to ensure your data confidently reflects the impact of the Living Wage programme?

Anna: We're still early in our journey, and while we’ve started site-based pilots, the data represents only a small portion of our overall operations. So far, we’re focusing on the values case as we continue to build the business case.

That said, we do believe Living Wages can have a positive impact in our industry, where wages are generally low and even small increases can influence retention. We see this anecdotally—people often leave for slightly better pay or shorter commutes—so the correlation seems stronger in our context.

To build a more holistic living wage programme, we're working on distinguishing short-term impacts (like turnover and engagement) from long-term outcomes (like career progression and social mobility). As we can’t yet prove longer-term outcomes of living wages, we’re exploring complementary actions - such as improving financial literacy and wellbeing - to deliver more immediate support for our people.

Would you like to touch on your work with the WageMap consortium and how it fits into your broader strategy for building momentum toward living wages across the industry?

Anna: As a large global employer with ambitions to be a leading frontline employer, we see it as our responsibility to drive change not just within ISS, but across the industry. WageMap supports that by helping to build awareness and drive education around living wages.

We’re currently supporting WageMap’s to develop educational content - for peer-to-peer learning sessions where organisations can share their living wage journeys, and also for open forums that focus on the broader values and business case for living wages. It’s a valuable way to foster collective learning and momentum for change.

WageMap also plays an important role in helping define and promote a global standard for Living Wages. This is critical because in some of the markets we operate in, the concept of a Living Wage is still not well understood and there can be some confusion about how it fits with Minimum Wages or collective agreements. Establishing a clear, widely accepted definition will help build understanding and buy-in globally, which is key to long-term impact.