Goodman Masson Approach to DE&I

OurCommitment toDiversity

At Goodman Masson we recognise power in diversity, and with our services being the gateway to employment, we are committed to advancing inclusion within recruitment.

Our Commitment to Diversity

With the desire for greater diversity and inclusion (D&I) within organisations growing, our approach to D&I is constantly evolving to support our clients and communities with inclusive growth. The key features of our approach include:

Our Approach

Enlisting expertise support

Setting a clear D&I Strategy and Vision

Communicating and ensuring continuous improvement

Training all employees

Creating inclusive initiatives

Measuring our efforts and benchmarking

Sharing best practice

Diversity & Inclusion Within Our Recruitment Process

Searching and Advertising

Recruitment and Selection

Monitoring and Reporting

Our top D&I tips

Summary

www.goodmanmasson.com

Enlisting expert support...

We know that diversity enriches any organisation, including our own. In 2020, we appointed Non-Executive board member, Lenna Cumberbatch, to help us embed an inclusive approach to everything we do.

Diversity enriches an organisation.

Setting a Clear D&I Strategy & Vision...

We have taken time to assess our processes, policies and initiatives and ensured we have a strategy in place to support these. D&I is embedded at every stage of our career ladder and is truly at the heart of everything we do at Goodman Masson. When interviewing, we ask all potential joiners to explain why D&I is important to them, so from the off, we are clear in our messaging to new members of our team.

We have taken the time to assess our process.

Communicating and ensuring continuous improvement...

To achieve our aim of advancing inclusion in recruitment we created an internal D&I working group, with representatives from all areas of our business. With internal and external objectives, the group work together to create and implement our ideas.

Advancing inclusion in recruitment.

Training all employees...

All Goodman Masson employees receive training on the following topics:

Understanding the nine characteristics protected by the Equalities Act (2010)

Identifying our unconscious bias (through participation in Harvard’s Project Implicit)

Diversity, inclusion, and respect best practice in the recruitment process

The use of positive action in the recruitment process

Becoming consciously inclusive

Positive action in the recruitment process.

Creating inclusive initiatives...

Goodman Masson understand that we need to work to remove the barriers that exist in our industry and organisation. Some key examples of our inclusive initiatives that help us drive fundamental change include:

Creating External Networks

Programme One – Recruitment Network

We have seen first-hand the under-representation of Black recruiters within the industry and are committed to changing this. That’s why in 2020, we teamed up with eight leading recruitment agencies to launch Programme One

Building Balance- Social Housing Development Network

Building Balance focuses on addressing the gender imbalance across the Development industry. We want to see a better gender balance at more senior levels, and we believe that the best way to achieve this is by bringing together those in senior-level positions with those at a junior level, to develop a pipeline of women with a pathway to senior-level roles.

We

need to work to remove the barriers.

Running Internal Networks.

Creating inclusive initiatives...

Revising Our Policies and Official Documentation

The outcomes of this include:

Embedding our agile working approach

Updating our Parental Leave policy to support new parents more during this time

Creation of a Transitioning at Work policy

Updating all forms to include inclusive options

Ensuring we ask all people what reasonable adjustments is needed

Reviewing all images and language used to ensure it is always inclusive

Added Recite Me accessibility tool to our website to create an inclusive experience for all visitors

Creation of a Transitioning at Work Policy.

Creating inclusive initiatives...

Reviewing how we use our space and our time

This has led to Goodman Masson:

Introducing a Multifaith and Wellbeing room

Creating a space to ask confidential questions about D&I

Arranging Drop-in sessions with senior leadership

Reviewing our social activities in our D&I survey

Time provided for people to work on D&I initiatives

Ensuring D&I stays on the leadership agenda

Creating a space to ask confidential questions.

Measuring our efforts and benchmarking...

Internally we aim to ensure we are representative of the locations we operate in. Benchmarking against useful datasets, such as ONS, Scope, Stonewall and other specialist organisations, allows us to measure our progress. For example, when looking at our London office we benchmark against the ONS / Stonewall statistics:

Gender (London: 54% male, 46% female*)

Ethnicity (London: Arab 1%, Asian/Asian British 19%, Black/African/Caribbean/Black British 13%, Other 2%, Mixed ethnic groups 5%, White 60% **)

Sexual Orientation (London: 94% straight, 6% LGBTQ+ ***)

Externally we aim to register candidates and present representative talent pools to our clients. In line with GDPR, we track the diversity data of our talent pools at each stage of the process and can share reports with our clients so they can see where bias enters the process and attention is needed. Last year we published our first D&I recruitment report and will be holding ourselves accountable by publishing this report regularly.

Internally we aim to ensure we are representative.

Sources

*https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/census/2011/KS601EW/view/2013265927?rows=c sex&cols=cell

**https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/census/2011/KS201EW/view/2013265927?cols=measures

***https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/mar/06/number-people-identify-lesbian-gaybisexual-uk-high

***https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/dec/11/gayrights.immigrationpolicy

***We are using recent treasury statistics about sexual orientation rather than ONS statistics, as we believe they are more aspirational.

Sharing Best Practice...

Through looking at ourselves, investing, and learning, we’ve been able to share and embed knowledge when supporting our clients with their recruitment. We recently hosted three separate Diversity focussed events on the following topics:

Diversity & Inclusion recruitment best practice

Diversity and Inclusion Strategy

Diversity & Inclusion Data

Click to view these webinars. We also took part in the TALiNT recruitment event to share the lessons we have learned with senior leaders in recruitment. See Page 12 of the TALiNT publication for our input.

We have been able to embed knowledge when supporting our clients.

Searching & Advertising

Job spec criteria & advert review

We review all job specifications and challenge the criteria to ensure we can attract a representative talent pool. We include D&I statements on adverts so people are aware of the importance of this from the start.

Sharing data to inform decision-making

On what criteria is included in job specifications. For example, we can utilise LinkedIn Insights tool to highlight the perceived gender split for certain qualifications are different e.g.:

ACA (36% F: 64% M)

ACCA (46% F: 54% M)

By making our clients aware of data like this, it helps them understand the impact of having certain criteria in their job specifications.

Sharing data to inform decisionmaking.

Searching & Advertising

Advertising in new places such as:

Social media / Local networks As well as LinkedIn we have successfully used other social media sources, such as local Facebook community groups, to reach additional talent

Specialist job boards: if required we can advertise via specialist boards such as Diversity Jobs and BYP for an additional cost

Building relationships with existing networks

Our specialist recruiters work with their specific diversity focused networks to promote opportunities and increase awareness within their industries. For example, we have partnered with Women in Data Science who aim to inspire and educate data scientists worldwide, regardless of gender, and to support women in the field.

Our specialist recruiters work with their specific diversity focused networks.

Searching & Advertising

Creating new networks where they don't currently exist

In certain industries where we have noticed imbalance but struggled to find networks that are driving change, we have created our own networks to help address this. Examples include Building Balance, a mentoring programme to encourage Women in Development, and Programme One a network of recruitment industries addressing the significant underrepresentation of Black talent within recruitment.

Checking language and ensuring accessibility

We run all adverts through a gender de-coder which picks up on any language that is subtly ‘gender-coded’ and may discourage people from applying. We have also implemented Recite Me to ensure our website is fully accessible.

Creating new networks where they don't currently exist.

Searching & Advertising

Utilising Technology

By giving all our Recruiters access to the best search and advertising technology such as LinkedIn Recruiter and LinkedIn Talent Insights, we enable them to map the full market, gain a real understanding of the diversity of local talent pools and broaden our reach beyond those of our competitors

Recruitment & Selection

Understanding positive action

We train all our consultants on all aspects of D&I best practice, which includes understanding positive action and when it can be used to help provide diverse shortlists to our clients.

Implicit bias testing

As part of our D&I training, all members of Goodman Masson are asked to complete implicit bias testing. By raising awareness of internal bias, we hope to drive conversation and create accountability. We then discuss examples that contradict stereotypes and encourage employees to work towards reducing bias and encouraging Conscious Inclusion.

All employees are asked to complete implicit bias training.

Recruitment & Selection

Consulting on the interview process

We advise all clients on the importance of creating an inclusive recruitment process to drive change in organisations. The key parts of this include:

Highlighting clear D&I vision / aims from the start

Talking through policies and processes which support your D&I goals

Including D&I focussed questions in the interview

Making reasonable adjustments where required

Considering the diversity of those involved in the decision-making process

Reviewing what is being asked in the interview

Being flexible with your process

Consulting on the interview process.

Monitoring & Reporting

Collecting data through the recruitment process

We collect data at every stage of the recruitment process to allow us to pinpoint any areas of improvement. We can assess how different demographic groups engage with Goodman Masson from Registration and CV submission to successfully getting an interview through to securing the role.

Sharing our Data

The McGregor Smith ‘Race in the workplace’ review highlights that currently, no large business has a truly diverse and inclusive workforce from top to bottom, but through publishing data the best employers will be able to show their successes and encourage others to follow. Click here to review our latest report. Not only does publishing our report allow us to be accountable, it shows us where we need to improve and allows us to be open and honest with our clients.

We collect data through the recruitment process.

Mentoring & Reporting

Providing benchmarking data

It is useful to compare the demographic representation of Goodman Masson’s applications to external sources such as ONS data, Stonewall and Scope to allow us to set realistic targets. We also have the tools and network to allow us to provide real time benchmarking reports for our clients. These reports can include gender insights, market trends and comparisons to ONS statistics to help clients also set realistic targets.

Providing benchmarking data.

Our Top D&I Tips

Ensure you are clear on your D&I vision, goals and work you are doing to become a more inclusive employer

Partner with agencies that are prioritising D&I and understand your D&I goals

Know where your gaps are

Use positive action where you can

Know what good looks like for your organisation

Do things differently: same things = same results, different work = different results!

Normalise unconscious bias. We all have this, therefore it is best to understand what you can do to be consciously inclusive

Use data: Track diversity at multiple stages to pinpoint any problem points and address these accordingly. (Goodman Masson can do this for you when partnering with you)

Use benchmark information so targets are realistic (Market reports / Talent Insights reports)

Be open to learning

Understand that diversity is your reward for being inclusive

Use positive action where you can.

Summary

As we continue on our path of learning and driving change, our focus is to advance inclusion in recruitment – both for Goodman Masson and for the clients we partner with.

Goodman Masson will be transparent with our progress, share our learnings and implement changes to support our progression with diversity and inclusion.

If you would like to discuss this more, please contact your consultant, Catherine Kellaway or Lenna Cumberbatch.

We have been able to embed knowledge when supporting our clients.