Equality, diversity and inclusion – essential elements of good employment
Ian MacArthur and Dr Sarah Crozier discuss equality, diversity and inclusion and the Greater Manchester Good Employment Charter
The evolution of equality, diversity and inclusion within the Greater Manchester Good Employment Charter and the opportunity to go further
Reflections from Ian MacArthur, Director of the Greater Manchester Good Employment Charter
Before I headed up the Greater Manchester Good Employment Charter I contributed, like many other voices, to the development of the Charter through lengthy conversations with the Greater Manchester Combined Authority policy team and the two rounds of public consultation that were held before its launch in 2019.
One of the principal areas for discussion and debate was that the proposed Charter did not feature a specific reference to equality issues amongst its seven characteristics. It seemed odd, an oversight or deliberate omission. The answer and the approach the Charter has adopted throughout its implementation, is that equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) feature and actively touch all other aspects of good employment. They are the golden threads that bind and the central foundations upon which all dimensions of good employment practice are founded. If EDI were a separate element in a ‘box’, the fear is that it would be simply ‘ticked’ and not integrated throughout as part of the value set and culture of an organisation.
In practice this has worked well, and progress has been made with employers who have embraced the idea of embedding the principles and have created thriving workplaces where colleagues feel valued, respected and empowered to contribute their best.
Of course everything moves on, and the Covid-19 pandemic brought significant changes to working lives, making many existing employment related inequalities worse and gave rise to new ones. Coupled with the death of George Floyd and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, we were conscious that good employers would need to develop new approaches to redress the inequities that would exclude individuals, distort the labour market and stifle productivity. As a result, the Charter was revised and updated to draw out key equality actions across its core characteristics.
However, we can and must go further, and so together with the Inclusive Growth Network and our research partners at Manchester Metropolitan University we have commissioned work to help inform the next phase of our work in this area, specifically seeking multi-stakeholder views of the challenges and opportunities surrounding the EDI agenda for the Good Employment Charter.
What we’ve heard from participants and where the charter could go next
Dr Sarah Crozier, Associate Professor and Chartered Psychologist at Manchester Metropolitan University, responds based on insights from the research
In this project we were keen to capture stories from interviews and focus groups with member and supporter organisations and the Charter Advisory Board in order to develop our understanding of the challenges and opportunities in how EDI and the Good Employment Charter come together. Our research aimed to develop a key learning agenda so that others can share in and reflect upon the existing practice illuminated, and the areas where organisations feel they need further support. This allows us to explore in what ways good employment charters or similar initiatives can support organisations with the vast and diverse landscape of EDI. We were especially interested in bringing to life the ‘how’ as well as the ‘what’ and present some underexplored conversations about EDI and good employment.
Here are some key insights from the research so far:
- Getting things right with EDI is an ongoing and complex journey that requires a genuine and longstanding commitment to listening to others and creating time and space for shared learning.
- Excellent people management, open and reflective organisational climates alongside strong, authentic and compassionate leadership were integral mechanisms for embedding strong EDI practices across all areas of good employment.
- For some participants, the EDI agenda was challenging for fear of getting things wrong or lacking the knowledge about where or how to start. For others, there were challenges in prioritisation and resourcing of initiatives and practical concerns about their implementation.
- Employees signposted the complex, ever-growing and interconnected nature of EDI and signposted the need for further resources and means to capture the development of truly inclusive cultures, leadership and values.
- Our data provides some narrative case study examples of challenges and opportunities across different areas of employment practice in order to stimulate reflective practice and learning.
Recommendations from our research complement the likely evolution of the Charter’s strategy and approach to assess values, culture and leadership that underpin the enactment of the current seven charter characteristics in attaining ‘good work for all’.
- Employment charters and similar initiatives can build further upon their convening powers for the provision of support through networks of shared learning and expert advice in demystifying specific underexplored EDI challenges.
- There is the need for the development of an EDI ‘climate’ resource that includes some key constructs of how EDI ‘lands’ with employees and captures their lived experiences. This may be used as a support resource for member organisations or built into charter membership assessment.
- The development of tools to explore skill and resource gaps in the provision of EDI within organisations will be additive. This is especially important in building leadership, values and cultural change alongside more practical implementations.
We are hopeful that the development of these practical resources will be of use in stimulating shared learning across different organisations and more broadly across different regions.
This work has been co-funded by the IGN and the Greater Manchester Good Employment Charter. IGN implementation advice is fully funded bespoke delivery support, tailored to member needs, which helps to unlock projects that deliver inclusive growth.
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