Normative
WWEC Standard & Criteria
The WWEC Standard establishes the requirements against which an organisation seeking WWEC certification is assessed, providing a consistent, transparent and evidence-led basis for evaluating workplace excellence within a defined certification scope.
Normative language
MUST, SHALL, SHOULD and MAY.
SHALL / MUST indicates a mandatory requirement. SHOULD indicates an expected or recommended approach where the applicable scheme permits contextual consideration. MAY indicates a permitted option. Where a criterion is normative for certification, the controlled scheme shall state the requirement unambiguously. A certification applicant must meet all mandatory requirements applicable to its approved scope.
| Level | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Mandatory Criterion | Failure prevents certification unless the applicable scheme explicitly provides a controlled corrective-action route. |
| Core Indicator | An indicator assessed for every applicable organisation within scope. |
| Contextual Indicator | An indicator applied where relevant to the organisation's size, sector, structure or scope. |
| Evidence Expectation | The minimum evidence needed to demonstrate implementation. |
| Improvement Evidence | Evidence that the organisation measures, reviews and improves practice. |
What counts as evidence
Evidence may include approved policies, procedures, records, training evidence, communications, governance minutes, programme records, anonymised aggregate data, dashboards, action plans, audit records, employee experience outputs and other objective information permitted by the assessment plan.
Evidence quality
- Relevant to the criterion
- Current or appropriately historical
- Traceable to the organisation
- Sufficient to demonstrate implementation
- Consistent with other evidence
- Available for review by authorised assessment personnel
A document that exists but has not been communicated, implemented, monitored or used is not automatically sufficient evidence of an effective practice.
Signature measures
WWEC Evidence Confidence and WWEC Alignment Score
WWEC Evidence Confidence
A certification result is meaningful only when the evidence supporting the conclusion is understood. Evidence Confidence considers availability, relevance, currency, traceability, implementation, consistency, measurement and corroboration.
- HIGH — Evidence is sufficient, relevant, consistent and demonstrates implementation.
- MODERATE — Evidence is generally available but limitations or inconsistencies remain.
- LOW — Evidence is insufficient or materially incomplete to support a reliable conclusion.
Evidence Confidence supports the assessor's evaluation of evidence sufficiency and the need for clarification or additional evidence. It does not replace the indicator score and does not independently alter the numerical certification score.
WWEC Alignment Score
A diagnostic measure showing the degree to which three views of the workplace reinforce one another: Organisation Says, People Experience and Assessment Finds.
- ALIGNED — the three views broadly reinforce one another.
- WATCH — one material difference requires attention.
- PRIORITY — significant divergence indicates a material improvement need.
Alignment findings inform assessment findings, evidence sufficiency, review and improvement priorities. They do not replace the published certification scoring methodology or override mandatory criteria, and are displayed separately from the formal certification score.
The standard
The WWEC Standard comprises 50 assessed criteria across eight dimensions.
The WWEC standard defines what must be demonstrated, in what form, and how it is assessed.
Normative language
How requirement language is used in the WWEC Standard.
SHALL / MUST indicates a mandatory requirement. SHOULD indicates an expected or recommended approach where the applicable scheme permits contextual consideration. MAY indicates a permitted option. Where a criterion is normative for certification, the controlled scheme shall state the requirement unambiguously.
Applicability: requirements apply within the approved certification scope, taking account of the organisation's size, structure, sector and applicable legal obligations.
Evidence treatment: conformity is determined from objective evidence, including documented information, implementation records and employee experience information reviewed under the approved assessment methodology.
The WWEC Standard is organised across eight WWEC Workplace Excellence Dimensions and 50 defined indicators. The current controlled Standard & Criteria document provides the normative requirement, applicability, evidence expectations, assessment method and scoring treatment for each applicable criterion. Partial versions of the standard are not published; the controlled standard is issued to applicants through the certification process.
Certification Scope & Limitations
WWEC Women-Centred Workplace™ Certification assesses the applicable requirements defined within the WWEC Certification Scheme and approved certification scope. It does not, by itself, constitute certification of general legal compliance, financial performance, employee satisfaction, employer reputation, ESG performance, ISO certification, government accreditation or compliance with any individual law.
WWEC Women-Centred Workplace™ Certification does not by itself certify: general legal compliance; financial performance; employee satisfaction alone; employer reputation; absence of workplace incidents; general ESG performance; ISO certification; government accreditation or endorsement; GDPR compliance as a standalone certification; or compliance with any individual law as a standalone legal certification.
WWEC Women-Centred Workplace™ Certification is not ISO certification. WWEC shall not state or imply ISO/IEC 17065 accreditation unless accreditation has actually been granted and the applicable scope is publicly published.
Document Control & Version History
WWEC certification documents are controlled so that current approved requirements are identifiable and consistently applied. Controlled documents are subject to documented approval, version control, effective dates, review and revision requirements. Where a website summary differs from the current approved controlled certification document, the current approved controlled document shall govern.
The current approved WWEC certification scheme, applicable requirements and relevant public rules are made available to interested parties through the WWEC website. Controlled documents are versioned so users can identify the applicable current requirements.
Where this public summary differs from the controlled WWEC Standard & Criteria document, the controlled document governs.