10 excuses your colleagues might use for not doing something about racial inequality…
… and 10 ways to show them they’re misguided!
In my equality and inclusion work I have been privileged to train many people and hear different responses to racial inequality in Britain. Recently I ran a workshop with ten white men. One delegate felt that due to positive discrimination only women and non-whites had a chance of getting a job there: “they’re stealing our jobs” was the implication. It was good to see the individual’s light-bulb moment when I suggested that women and minority ethnic candidates might have faced discrimination or felt they wouldn’t fit into that environment. Furthermore, such roles were not the exclusive preserve of white males despite the status quo!
Ensuring that tackling racial and other inequalities has been given an urgency and a profile through Black Lives Matters in the wake of George Floyd’s tragic death. However, in my experience, moving beyond vague and easy to make statements of support to deliver tangible and long-lasting change can be met with excuses and prevarications.
Here I offer my top 10 of these and how to counter them.
1 - We don’t discriminate on grounds of race, or anything else - we’re open to all
We would hope that none of us would go out of our way to consciously discriminate. However, minority ethnic people face discrimination in getting jobs and progressing at work. It’s over 50 years since the 1968 Race Relations Act outlawed acts of discrimination in employment in the UK. However, even though 1 in 8 of the working age population are from a BME (black minority ethnic) background, BME individuals make up only I in 10 of the workforce and hold only 1 in 16 of top management positions . Those people with names that suggest African or Asian origins require 60%ii or more applications to get a job interview than those with traditional British-heritage names. What makes you think your organisation is different despite claiming not to discriminate?
2 - Ethnicity targets aren’t realistic; there are not enough BME people in Scotland
In 2016, 14% of the working age population were from a BME background. This is increasing, with the proportion expected to rise to 21% by 2051 . In Scotland, the percentage of BME people in the population doubled to 4% between 2001 and 2011 and is concentrated in the major cities and is a growing part of the workforce. The potential benefit to the UK economy from full representation of BME individuals across the labour market, v through improved participation and progression, is estimated to be £24b a year, which represents 1.3% of GDP. Overlooking BME candidates means your organisation stands to lose out on talent, their different perspectives, and you’ll miss out on an opportunity to reflect this growing part of society.
3. There weren’t any BME candidates when we recruited
Did you say in your job advert and in your company information that you are an inclusive employer and that you would welcome people regardless of their age, ethnicity, sexual orientation etc?
Does your information show a diverse range of employees?
Did you invite questions from candidates and offer support with your application process?
Did you challenge any external search organisation to widen the search to include a diverse set of candidates? How diverse is your talent attraction search?
Did you look at the job specification and check that you’re not excluding diverse candidates in your expectations? If you’re asking for ten years’ experience in a non-diverse sector, you are unlikely to get diverse candidates
4. We had a diverse candidate but they didn’t appear to be interested
Did you check in with all candidates to ensure that they understood the recruitment process, answer any questions they had, establish if they needed any assistance and sell the benefits of working for you?
How diverse was the interview panel? Did that diverse candidate relate to those on the panel?
How diverse were the people that the candidate met at interview? Even if you have limited or no ethnic diversity, demonstrating that it’s not a mono-culture of similar-looking people makes a difference. Showing you support people regardless of their background and identity is a start
Did you make sure that they understood that you valued their interest in your organisation?
5. We don’t want targets
In business most would agree that having targets does tend to focus the mind and drive up performance. Responding to the limited lack of progress in diversity in the UK’s largest companies – only 3% BAME in UK FTSE 100 chief executive and Chair roles – the UK Government-backed McGregor Smith review made targets its first recommendation. “Listed companies and all businesses and public bodies with more than 50 employees should publish five-year aspirational targets and report against these annually.” Targets demonstrate paying more than lip service to supporting diversity and focus organisations on taking steps to deliver improved outcomes. Employees, new recruits and customers are looking for action: this will make a start.
6. We want to ensure we get the best candidate not just a box-ticking exercise
When senior executives were being recruited for the 47 of the UK’s top 100 companies with no BME people at board level or the level below, they will have recruited what they thought was the best candidate. But of those, say 350-500 people, were there no BME candidates who were the best? Not one? Even for the top jobs there isn’t usually just one uniquely-qualified candidate. If your search delivers you a group of candidates who all look the same – maybe they’re all white, males in their 50s, you’re missing out on seeing what a diverse candidate might offer. It also means you’re unlikely to be reflecting your customers, the local population, the diversity of the community. And I would suggest it’s also likely to be unfair!
7. We don’t want to offer any group special privileges
Don’t you think that being white and being male comes with its own privileges? The Equality Act is there to tackle historic and persistent inequalities. Despite often high levels of educational attainment, diverse employees can be deprived of opportunities or are rewarded less well than their white counterparts. A lack of black people in senior positions is a key source of the systemic disadvantages faced by black people: it’s been said that they simply are not there when the strategic decisions are being made and their voices are not heard. We know that there is excellent talent out there but getting into these positions of influence remains challenging. Ensuring that you widen your search for talent to avoid falling back on people from a similar background is key. It’s good practice to be making sure that they have all they need to demonstrate their capabilities at interview: this is not offering special privileges, but good manners, sound business sense and shows you care.
8. There’s no point in putting in place targets – it’s up to the hiring managers
You can’t leave it to hiring managers. Evidence suggests that much recruitment is done at haste, with the aim of filling posts quickly (especially if the management hierarchy has been tardy in sign off!). Attracting diverse talent can be time-consuming and more challenging than recruiting similar people to the existing population. There’s also a risk of bias creeping in to decisions, with hirers favouring the familiar and treating unfavourably those who are different.
As with other corporate targets, those for recruitment and promotion diversity need to be cascaded down through the organisation, rewards being made for following inclusive leadership practices and most importantly offering help and challenging recruitment and development decisions before they are made. Hirers and managers should receive thought-provoking equality and inclusion training to tackle bias and enhance good practice awareness. This way you will have the whole organisation working towards enhancing diversity.
9. We can’t target what we can’t measure!
All employers should take positive action to improve reporting rates amongst their workforce, explaining why supplying data will improve diversity and the business as a whole. The particularly diverse impact that COVID-19 has had on different parts of the population demonstrates how important it is for organisations to understand more than gender and age of their workforce. Some employers realised that certain demographics might be more at risk from COVID but didn’t have the information to know who they might be. Your people should be encouraged to declare such aspects as ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability status, and faith or religion. Ensure that this information is confidential and that people have confidence in this and explain why you are collecting it and what you’ll do with it. Then you can target improving diversity based on how people define themselves and not rely purely on the assumptions you make based solely on people’s appearance.
10. We treat everyone the same – they all have equal opportunity
There’s a difference between equality of opportunity and equality of outcome. We don’t all start from the same position – family background and education can be very different. How we are treated by others is influenced by our gender, ethnicity, age, accent and appearance. People that are similar to us are often treated more favourably than those who are different. Let’s be open to making adjustments to accommodate candidate and colleague disabilities. Offer flexibility in work location and hours to support those with family and caring responsibilities. Welcome those from different cultural and ethnic backgrounds. All of this will help you to offer fair and equal outcomes, after all, isn’t that what we all deserve?