For those who have long-championed workplace equality, the moral and human rights based arguments are often what has driven challenges to the status quo. Article by James Caspell, Business Innovation Manager, Tower Hamlets Homes
The primary motivation to promote diversity and inclusion is often to guarantee fairness and equitable treatment in the workplace for employees irrespective of characteristics such as gender, race and sexual orientation.
However, aside from moral motivations and legal obligations, it is often the business case for diversity which can secure the senior level buy-in needed to effect real change in the workplace – especially where diverse representation at senior levels is so often lacking. To secure a shared vision for cultural change across organisations, and indeed across society, it is equally important to spell out the business case for equality and diversity.The saying goes that a happy workforce is a productive workforce. Promoting equality, diversity and inclusion enables organisation to recognise myriad benefits to performance, productivity and ultimately profit. Removing the barriers to recruitment, retention and progression for community groups can increase staff satisfaction and productivity, as well as enabling an organisation to harness the full potential of talent – both of colleagues already working within the sector, and attracting those outside of it.
Given 7-10% of the UK’s population are lesbian, gay or bisexual, for an organisation not to challenge homophobia and biphobia means that it is resigning itself to allowing at least the same proportion of its workforce to become demoralised, and be more likely to work elsewhere in the face of prejudice and discrimination.
In an age of increasing digital transparency, failing to proudly promote equality and diversity also means that 7-10% of job seekers – the potential future talent for organisations – who are lesbian gay or bisexual are not going to want to work at backward-looking, unambitious organisations who aim their sights at the legal minimum. Job seekers will be able to increasingly choose their next destination based on the culture of an organisation – including how inclusive it is for LGBT job seekers, and the wider community.
For public and customer-facing organisation, promoting workforce diversity is key in building trust, rapport and satisfaction with community groups who access those services. Diversity among the workforce also promotes diversity of thought, helping an organisation to solve challenges faced by residents and staff from particular community groups, mitigating the group think that so often stifles innovation and sees resources allocated where they don’t need to be. Despite significant progress in securing rights for LGBT employees and customers, inequality and prejudice still exists in contemporary Britain – which negatively affects customers and colleagues in workplaces across the country.
Equality is not just about fair processes and equal opportunities, but also about better outcomes and harnessing the benefits of diverse workforces.
So what practical steps can an employer take to deliver greater workplace equality?
Promoting LGBT role models can show that career progression is possible despite the obstacles that exist for employees, as well as give them the confidence to challenge comments which are deemed as “harmless banter”, and dispel suggestions that people are being oversensitive if they find language exclusionary.
It is also vital that organisations do more to tackle unconscious bias in their workforce, and show how everyday micro-aggressions and exclusionary behaviour can affect morale and productivity. There is a perception that good practice in equality and diversity costs money while delivering little by way of financial returns. This is a myth.
At Tower Hamlets Homes, by investing £1k in a Somali Engagement Officer, who at the time was the only Somali speaking employee in our organisation – we recouped £12k in rent arrears across just 400 Somali households in a three-month period.
Employers need to do more to demonstrate the value diversity adds, the pounds we save and – most importantly of all – how equality and diversity enables us to support all community groups in society. Sharing effective practice helps us to improve our services, but also reminds us how the best solutions to tackling inequality are those where a shared vision and pressure to change can be secured, and that includes showing the value which the equality and diversity agenda adds to the everyday purpose of an organisation.
