10 minute read
Landscape Skills and Workforce Research Project
The Landscape Institute's Landscape Skills and Workforce Research Report
Earlier this year the Landscape Institute initiated a major piece of research intending to bring new insights into the economic structures and makeup of the landscape industry – the Landscape Skills and Workforce Research – comprising an extensive survey, secondary data analysis, and a series of one-to-one interviews. Ahead of its publication later in 2022, we highlight some of the findings on gender.
There are detailed graphs to see online in the main magazine on pages 64-65 https://issuu.com/home/published/12954_li_journal_3_2022_v16_issuu_1_, or download the full report at https://www.landscapeinstitute.org/policy/skills-for-greener-places/
As the research nears completion, we look at one element of the “landscape economy”, the extent to which the sector itself contains biases relating to gender, in its workforce and in its pay structures.
We’ve known of the gender disparity issues facing the landscape sector for some time. While entry into the profession is generally balanced (i.e. the number of graduates is broadly 50% male/female), as individuals progress through their careers, we have historically seen a drop off of women in more senior positions. Much of the previous evidence for this was anecdotal, although the Landscape Institute’s 2018 State of the Landscape report did provide quantitative evidence to support what many in the sector already knew.
One of the major findings of that report was that: “Chartership has a significant impact on income, especially within the £35,000 to £50,000 range. Nearly half of chartered members fall into this salary range, compared to just 14% of licentiate (associate) members. While gender balance within this salary bracket is relatively comparable, it falls away significantly in the £50,000+ range. More than twice as many men as women fall into this category, showing significant inequalities in terms of career progression.”
The 2022 report shows limited change within the sector, four years later.
Gender pay gap
Gender pay disparity is a common issue across industries and not just in the landscape sector. Data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed that median hourly pay for full-time employees was 7.9% less for women than for men in April 2021. (1) There have been some small-scale initiatives over the last few years aiming address this; for instance Women and Leadership International (WLI) offered grants in 2019 to enable participation in a leadership development programme to women working in landscape. (2)
A complement to that has included awareness campaigns, such as the LI’s 2020 Jellicoe lecture that addressed the topic of diversity in landscape. This, of course, included a conversation on the sector’s gender gap, asking how we can better champion and support women throughout their careers, and how we can identify and address bias and sexism that hinders the advancement of our female members. (3) And most recently, the LI’s 2022 graduation ceremony hosted a round table discussion. Led by the immediate Past President, Jane Findlay CMLI, an all-women panel looked at alternative routes into the profession and discussed individual approaches to tackling the disparity issue. (4)
While all relatively small-scale, they all played an important role in the work needed to tackle the issues facing the sector. There’s no single solution and practical support, awareness building, and education are all needed.
Beyond the landscape sector, there has been some national policy change. Since 2017, if an employer has a headcount of over 250, they must comply with regulations on gender pay gap reporting. (5) This has led to much more transparency in issues of gender and pay across the country and of course the landscape sector itself. Interestingly, the Landscape Skills and Workforce report has shown that there are relatively few landscape specific firms over 250, (94 from the secondary data analysis) but the larger multidisciplinary consultancies and big suppliers, such as Arup and Marshalls, have had to report under this legislation.
This is just a small selection of the work of those in the sector and beyond have been doing, but has it been enough?
Workforce profile
The LI’s latest piece of research, the Landscape Skills and Workforce Report 2022, gives us a clear picture of what progress, if any, has been made. Not unexpectedly, it highlights little progress in the intervening years, with continued poor workforce diversity and a stark gender pay gap.
The main headline with regards to gender is a stark one: ‘The Landscape sector workforce is male dominated, white and relatively older.’
Analysis of ONS data across the sector reveals a gender split that in some sub-sectors is still severe (such as the high proportion of men working in maintenance and groundskeeping roles). By contrast our survey results demonstrate a more balanced picture, with a higher proportion of women in all segments.
This ultimately suggests two things: 1. limitations of the ONS classifications; and in particular how landscape professionals who are not well-defined in their day-to-day jobs can slip through the “statistical cracks” when it comes to measurement; and 2. A possibility that the landscape profession has moved towards a more representative workforce.
This is borne out by membership data from the LI and other comparable bodies, and suggests that gender disparities in construction and the built environment are a result of other non-landscape sectors. Survey results show a higher number of women in the landscape workforce, with a 55.9%-58.8% proportion of women across all segments.
While our own survey data is illustrating a positive shift within the industry and one that should be celebrated, there is no doubt that there are still challenges in some segments of practice. It is worth noting that the limitations of the ONS data and the way our members categorise their own occupational segments may be different. For example, ONS data for build and management cover specific occupational codes including groundskeepers, managers and proprietors in agriculture, horticulture, forestry, and related services, and gardeners and landscape gardeners.
Adjacent occupations have similar issues and other professional bodies have noted these. A report from the Chartered Institute of Building summarised the challenges faced by women in construction: “The construction industry has a poor public image, synonymous with high cost, low quality and chaotic working practices. Women therefore tend to choose not to enter an industry that fails to acknowledge their ability, and all too often places them in a hostile and threatening environment.” (6)
As such it is unsurprising that the numbers of women working in more on-site and construction contexts is much lower in our data. Professionals working in site management, clerks of works, etc., have an uphill battle, fighting for both landscape and environmental values and their place on site.
Salary of respondents by gender
There still remains an issue with significant gender wage disparities across the sector. Even when compared across job level, men consistently earn higher wages than women, despite the latter being, on average, more qualified through academic routes. In the survey, 85% of women had a Masters compared to 73% of men. The gap also widens significantly with seniority.
The qualitative data gathered from the survey through in-depth interviews with stakeholders across the sector allowed us to identify several additional barriers faced in the landscape sector. Our research shows that limited entry routes to the profession combined with low rates of interdisciplinary movement and collaboration exacerbate the known issues of poor workforce diversity and a stark gender pay gap. Put simply: the more barriers there are, the harder it is to break each of them down.
Another factor which makes this more problematic, is the low levels of job title coherence in the profession (and mainstream understanding of what landscape is) as highlighted in our survey and interviews. This adds yet another layer of complexity to this already dense problem. Fighting for both the most basic needs of your gender, and for the respect of your chosen profession undoubtedly becomes wearing.
Our latest research has sadly shown us that the problem still persists and progress is being made at a snail’s pace. We need to acknowledge that this will by no means change quickly, and while we are heading in the right direction, there’s still a lot to be done.
One thing’s for sure: a performative approach focusing only on discussion simply isn’t enough. Tangible, impactful actions need to be taken to effect change. While these things take time and progress is being made slowly but surely, there’s still a lot of work to be done, and the impact of global challenges over the past few years certainly haven’t helped.
COVID-19 highlighted the continued caring and pay inequalities for women in landscape. The Women and Equalities Commission (WEC) concluded that the furlough scheme failed to consider “well-understood labour market and caring inequalities faced by women.” (7) Their report “Coronavirus and the gendered economic impact” showed that women bore the greater brunt of childcare in the pandemic, with support schemes exacerbating pre-existing inequalities. This has hit numerous small and micro private sector organisations within the landscape sector especially hard.
Even the aforementioned gender pay gap reporting was affected when in February of 2021, it was announced that employers would have an additional six months after the current deadline to report their gender pay gap information, potentially causing delays to the work needed to protect women against discrimination and unequal pay.
Memorandum of understanding
As a sector though, we are moving in the right direction. This year saw the LI co-sign a memorandum of understanding with six other built environment organisations, with three core strands of action: data collection, improving understanding of transition from education into employment, and raising the standards of EDI knowledge, behaviours and practice. (8) The implementation of the action plan will be a starting point, but there’s plenty more to do, whether this be small scale monetary interventions, changes in HR practices or larger societal/legislative shifts.
Romy Rawlings made the statement back in 2019 that “landscape practices could do a lot more to nurture talent that is otherwise lost: flexible working and ‘return to work’ schemes being key.” (9) The last few years could be seen to be having a positive impact in this respect where, albeit due to necessity, the benefits of flexible working have been well demonstrated and documented.
The LI is working to address these issues at the strategic level, it can ultimately only be solved through individual employers – and everyone can play a role in moving towards a more equitable landscape profession.
Lucy Pickford and Benjamin Brown
Lucy Pickford worked at the Landscape Institute as Membership Marketing Manager.
Benjamin Brown is Head of Policy and Insight at the Landscape Institute, and led the 2022 Landscape Skills and Workforce Research
References
1. https://commonsli brary.parliament.uk/ research-briefings/ sn07068/#:~:text=Ac cording%20for%20 the%20Office%20 for,(figures%20 exclude%20over time%20pay).
2. https://www. landscapeinstitute.org/ news/women-leader ship-funding-2020/
3. https://www.landsca peinstitute.org/blog/ jellicoe-2020-address ing-diversity-in-land scape/
4. https://www. landscapeinstitute.org/ news/landscape-insti tute-graduation-cere mony-2022/
5. https://www.gov. uk/government/ collections/gen der-pay-gap-reporting
6. https://www.ciob. org/sites/default/ files/CIOB%20 research%20-%20 The%20Changing%20 Role%20of%20 Women%20in%20 the%20Construc tion%20Workforce.pdf
7. https://www.landsca peinstitute.org/news/ covid-19-highlights-ine qualities-women-land scape/
8. https://www. landscapeinstitute. org/news/built-envi ronment-bodies-com mit-to-three-year-ac tion-plan-to-im prove-equity-diversi ty-and-inclusion/
9. https://www. landscapeinstitute.org/ blog/future-state-land scape-diversity-challenges/
