A new sector agreement on professional equality has been extended to apply to all companies in the sector, regardless of their size, starting September 1, 2026, for a period of four years. This replaces a previous agreement signed in 2014 and incorporates several reforms made since then. These include mandatory negotiations on professional equality (2015), a commission dedicated to the CSE (company social committee) in companies with 300 employees or more (2017), the professional equality index (2018), the Rixain law on the feminization of executive bodies (2021), and the European directive on salary transparency. The agreement was extended by a decree on March 26, 2026, and is part of a set of three texts signed on the same day. Addendum No. 49 rewrites article 9.3 of the collective agreement, dealing with parenthood and family events, while Addendum No. 9 deals with health expenses. The agreement outlines several commitments for integrating into human resources practices. These include salary upon return from maternity, paternity, or adoption leave, part-time management positions, flexible scheduling for parents of children under three years old, hybrid work during pregnancy and around childbirth, and geographic mobility. Employees returning from maternity or adoption leave are entitled to general raises and the average of individual raises for their category, or the median if it is more favorable. The company must provide a written response within a month to requests for part-time management positions and flexible schedules for parents of children under three years old. Remote work requested during pregnancy must be examined carefully by the company, with reasons provided for any refusal. The agreement also includes provisions for salary transparency, recommending a salary audit and a meeting of social partners within three months of the publication of the transposition law, which was presented in the Council of Ministers on September 10, 2026. The agreement establishes a parity monitoring committee and ensures that professional equality takes precedence over company agreements unless the latter provides at least equivalent guarantees. The agreement also addresses the professional equality index, which requires companies with 50 or more employees to publish their indicators and overall score by March 1 at the latest. Companies with fewer than 75 points must take corrective measures, while those between 75 and 85 points set improvement goals. The agreement also mandates training for recruiters in non-discrimination starting from 300 employees and requires the employer to inform the CSE in advance of the methods and tools for recruitment assistance, including when they are based on artificial intelligence. The agreement incorporates the law of June 30, 2025, which extends protections for pregnant employees to people undergoing PMA ( medically assisted procreation) or adoption and opens up paid leave for these individuals and their spouses. It also recalls the rules for the gender mix of boards of directors and supervision, as well as the Rixain law for companies with 1,000 employees or more, requiring 30% of each gender among managers and executive bodies since March 1, 2026, and 40% from March 1, 2029. The agreement also includes recommendations for companies, such as training managers in professional equality, writing job offers in neutral language, forming mixed recruitment pairs, and regularly auditing AI-based recruitment tools to detect gender bias. These recommendations are not legally binding but provide ready-made material for the company agreement or action plan. The agreement also includes a FAQ section addressing common questions, such as the application of the agreement for companies with fewer than 50 employees, the applicability of the sector agreement over company agreements, and the rights of employees returning from maternity leave without any raises during their leave. The agreement will end on August 31, 2030, unless a new agreement is signed, with social partners meeting at the beginning of the fourth year to decide on the continuation, including a possible indefinite-term agreement.