SANDRA KERR, National Campaign Director for the charity Business in the Community’s Race Equality campaign, is a woman driven to achieve what she sees as her most important goal — supporting Britain’s companies to embed diversity and inclusion into the core of their business.
An earlier research report published by recruitment consultancy Green Park found that Britain’s largest companies were failing to improve the ethnic diversity of their boardrooms. Following its launch, a number of high-profile organisations signed up to the charter, including NHS England, Standard Life Aberdeen, Norton Rose Fulbright, Saatchi & Saatchi, KPMG, RBS, the civil service, WPP, EY and the CIPD.“It launched with 85 employers, a mixture of public and private sector organisations. As of today, we currently have 914 employers who have signed,” Kerr tells The Voice.
“These days, many young people want to see that diversity in a business because they want to know that it is a fair place to work. So, for us, the Charter is very inspirational and we have stood by it.” The report found that only 31 per cent of 2,000 black Gen Z members between the ages of 16 and 25 who were surveyed felt able to be their authentic selves at work, compared to 66 per cent of their white counterparts. Just 29 per cent of this group felt satisfied with their chances of securing a promotion compared to 52 per cent of white Gen Z members.
“But it was a concern of Prince Charles who said ‘we need to look at this. We needto include a wide range of people and use everyone’s talents’. Kerr and other equality campaigners believe a similar move toward ethnicity pay-gap reporting will give businesses a powerful tool for reducing and eventually eliminating pay gaps based on race and ethnicity.
But have you got that old relic of a “Prince” aka Charlie editing your paper 🤦🏿♀️