SLR has signed up to the Race at Work Charter

At SLR we recognise we need to better represent the diversity of our employees. The recent launch of our 5B’s explains what our ‘One Team’ culture truly means to us and reflects SLR’s broader inclusivity aspiration. Two specific areas - Be Yourself and Belong - focus on the importance of being respectful, supportive and inclusive. It also reiterates the importance of recognising and valuing the contributions and differences of others.

To date, our focus has been on supporting the attraction, recruitment, development, and progression of women across our organisation, given our industry. Nonetheless, we recognise that there are individuals across our region who sit within other minority groups.

We’re now developing and shaping our plans for 2020/21, with the aim of broadening out our diversity and inclusion agenda to support those with other protected characteristics.

We want to pledge our commitment to this now, and as a starting point we’re pleased to announce that SLR has recently signed up to BITC’s (Business in the Community) Race at Work Charter in the UK.

More information on the Race at Work Charter can be found here, but fundamentally, the Charter has five key actions for the goal of race equality:

• Appoint an Executive Sponsor for race
• Capture ethnicity data and publicise progress
• Commit at board level to zero tolerance of harassment and bullying
• Make clear that supporting equality in the workplace is the responsibility of all leaders and managers
• Take action that supports ethnic minority career progression

We have spent several months trying to identify an organisation with which we could partner in order to make our pledge, strengthen our position and help develop our agenda in this important topic of race. Not only has the been brought to the fore by recent events and the Black Lives Matter movement, but we fundamentally believe that this is this the right thing to do.

We chose the Race at Work Charter as we felt our objectives closely aligned. Our aim is to improve equality of opportunity and better support the attraction and recruitment of new employees, whilst also supporting the development and progression of our existing ethnic minority staff. We want to focus on capability, not ethnicity, and benefit from the wealth of diverse talent on offer.

We understand that BITC is predominantly a UK based organisation, but hope you agree that the principles behind the charter are universal. Rest assured however, that we will continue to look at similar organisations across our other locations to champion race within these local communities.

We kick start our commitment to this Charter by announcing that Alban Forster, Infrastructure Sector Lead and European Management Team member will be our Executive Sponsor for Race. Alban’s role will be to champion this initiative across the whole region, garnering the support and consensus of our leadership team and help drive our actions to support race and ethnicity, and ethnic minority career progression across SLR. Alban will also work closely with our ED&I steering committee when it is launched later this year.

Speaking about this new role, Alban said, “I am delighted to input into this important initiative. We all have much to learn as we continue to strive to develop more inclusivity and balance within SLR. I look forward to listening, engaging and supporting as we progress and define our approach over the coming months and years.”

By signing this charter, we hope our colleagues agree that this is positive step forward, as well as a starting point for future initiatives supporting race and ethnicity across our organisation.