About us
Symetra Social Impact
Our corporate social responsibility (CSR) program, Symetra Social Impact, focuses on three areas: social commitments, sustainability and governance.
See our Symetra Social Impact At-A-Glance (PDF).
A message from President & CEO Margaret Meister
Symetra’s connection to our communities and our impact on the world is constantly growing and changing. Being a good corporate citizen means that we conduct our business, exercise our rights and meet our obligations in a fair and ethical manner. It means that we value and are intentional about our responsibilities to our customers, employees and communities and we're focused on our vision to “create a world where more people have access to financial freedom.”
Launched in March 2022, Symetra Social Impact acknowledges those responsibilities and challenges us to live up to our aspiration to be the most inclusive insurance carrier. Diversity, equity and inclusion is foundational to our first corporate social responsibility initiative, which is focused on impact-driven and transformational programming and partnerships.
Symetra Social Impact is built on three pillars:
People Matter provides an important platform for our internal and external people-centered initiatives, including the great work of our Employee Resource Groups and our Empowers Communities programs, including employee engagement, giving and volunteerism.
Our Planet Matters drives an intentional focus on our environmental footprint. We are working to continually assess and reduce our carbon emissions, to ensure our supply chain is sustainably and ethically informed, and we are partnering with organizations that provide access to outdoor and environmental education to underserved youth.
Commitment Matters provides opportunities to align governance priorities like our Value, Transparency, Sustainability (VTS) principles and Symetra Empowers strategic vision, while highlighting new commitments focused on customer empowerment and investing with purpose.
When we introduced Symetra Social Impact, we outlined eight goals and committed to a three-year (2022-2024) timeframe to achieve them. This report catalogues our progress on those goals, and I am pleased to note that midway through our timeline, we have already made significant progress towards each of them.
Giving back is one of the constants of our organizational culture. Through my decades with Symetra, our sense of service and commitment to tour communities, has never wavered. Instead, I have seen it evolve as we have grown and as our presence has expanded into more communities across the country. Today, as I hope this report helps illustrate, Symetra Social Impact is one of the best defined and widest-reaching approaches to empowering communities that we have ever undertaken. 
Goals
25
Historically Black colleges and universities (HBCU) scholarships by 2025
65%
employee participation in community programs by 2025
Financial literacy
community program created by 2025
40%
paper reduction by 2025
Carbon neutral
across business operations by 2023
Supplier guidelines
by 2023
$150K
to environmental programs for underserved youth by 2025
New platform
for employee engagement in 2022
Our social goals
Our social goals align with our commitment to show up for our communities, lift up our employees and stand up for DEI.
Scholarship
We’re partnering with historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) to support students obtaining post-secondary degrees. By 2025, we’ll provide multiyear, wraparound support for 25 scholars from HBCU partner institution Morgan State University to fund tuition and barrier reduction.
Employee engagement
Our employees are strongly committed to giving back to their communities and building a better world, and we're creating more opportunities for them to do that. Our goal is to increase their engagement from the 2019 annual participation average of 50% to 65% by 2025 via sustainability programming, volunteerism and giving.
Financial literacy
We believe financial literacy is essential to creating long-term, generational financial health and security. We’re creating a Community Financial Literacy program that will launch in 2025 as part of our commitment to help empower underserved populations.
Our sustainability goals
We’re committed to creating a better world for everyone. See more about our environmental efforts.
Paper reduction
We’re committed to reducing our paper consumption by 40% compared to 2019 levels by 2025.
Carbon neutrality
We aim to be carbon neutral across business operations by 2023 through a combination of offsets, sustainability measures and reductions.
Supplier guidelines
We believe the supplies and services we purchase should reflect our commitment to environmental responsibility and supplier diversity. We’re establishing guidelines for our suppliers, and we'll begin implementing them by 2023.
National environmental partnership
We’ve partnered with the National Park Trust and have committed $150K by 2025 to fund access and education programming for underserved youth.
Employee sustainability program
In 2022, we launched an engagement platform alongside our current volunteer and giving programs that connects employees to our overall sustainability work and gives them opportunities to engage personally on environmental and sustainability efforts.
Governance
We’re committed to providing value to our customers while also stewarding their money in a sustainable, ethical and transparent way. See how we’re investing in a bright future.
Symetra Social Impact Reports
Review the highlights of our corporate social responsibility reports.
U.N. Sustainable Development Goals
Our strategy aligns with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals—a blueprint for countries and organizations to follow in creating a more sustainable, healthy and equitable world. We'll focus on the following commitments.
No poverty
Quality education
Gender equality
Decent work and economic growth
Reduced inequalities
Responsible consumption and production
Human rights statement
Symetra respects human rights, and we strive to protect those rights through our practices and policies, as well as through our long-term commitments to our people and our communities, to our customers and to our planet, and how we influence and drive positive social change. Our commitments are described in our Human Rights Statement.
The views and opinions expressed in the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals are those of the entity. Symetra does not assume any responsibility or liability for the activities of the U.N.
This material is for informational purposes only.
Symetra Life Insurance Company (est. 1957) is a direct subsidiary of Symetra Financial Corporation. First Symetra National Life Insurance Company of New York (est. 1990) is a direct subsidiary of Symetra Life Insurance Company and is an indirect subsidiary of Symetra Financial Corporation (collectively, “Symetra”). Neither Symetra Financial Corporation nor Symetra Life Insurance Company solicits business in the state of New York, and they are not authorized to do so. Each company is responsible for its own financial obligations.
Symetra Life Insurance Company, 777 108th Avenue NE, Suite 1200, Bellevue, WA 98004.
First Symetra National Life Insurance Company of New York, New York, NY. Mailing address P.O. Box 34690, Seattle, WA 98124.
All Symetra goals are aspirational in nature, there is no guarantee that they will be met.