EDI Strategy Interim Report

We are pleased to introduce our interim progress report which covers the first two years of our strategy (2020 to 2022) and describes some of the actions we have taken, successes we have had and the challenges we have faced.

All Great People

INTERIM PROGRESS REPORT 2020 - 2022

EQUALITY, DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION STRATEGY

Contents

3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Foreword from Joanne Conway Chair and Adam Green CEO

Introduction

Targets

What will All Great People mean for FM Conway?

GOAL 1 - GOAL 2 - GOAL 3 - GOAL 4 - GOAL 5 - GOAL 6 - GOAL 7 - GOAL 8 -

Maintaining an inclusive organisational culture

Increasing diversity through ethnic minority groups Increasing diversity through the LGBTQIA+ community Increasing diversity through the disabled community Increasing diversity through the female community

10 12 14 15 16

Developing inclusion & respect

Increasing diversity in our supply chain

Communicating our performance, impact and sharing best practice

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Foreword from Joanne Conway Chair and Adam Green CEO

In 2020, we launched our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) strategy ‘All Great People‘, which outlined our eight goals, focusing on establishing an environment that allows everyone to do their best and maintaining an inclusive organisational culture through our own workforce, our clients, suppliers and the communities we serve. Over the last two years, colleagues from across FM Conway have been turning our plans into a reality and we are pleased to introduce our interim progress report which covers the first two years of our strategy (2020 to 2022) and describes some of the actions we have taken, successes we have had and the challenges we have faced. We are enormously proud of the hard work we have put in so far to deliver our targets and move us forward in our quest to ensure everyone who interacts with us, both internally and externally, feels valued and respected.

However, there is still much to be done over the next two years, and we look forward to delivering upon our ambitions during the next year and beyond.

Joanne Conway

Adam Green

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Introduction

We recognise that a diverse workforce is a more productive one; understanding our people enables us to ensure that our support networks, services, and forums are adequate and accessible to everyone. As part of our strategy, we set ambitious targets against each of the eight goals that we planned to reach by 2024. When developing the key performance indicators, we were aware that we needed to refresh our data and give all employees an opportunity to declare their personal information using the most current accepted terminology. We had a high number of ‘prefer not to say’ in our original data set and we were keen to give our people a safe environment to record their information confidentially. Internal consultations also identified that not all of our people were familiar with the new, or indeed, some of the existing terminology being used for equality, diversity, and inclusion. Our data collection form also required updating and reformatting, and also needed to be added to our new eSignature tool “DocuSign.” As a result, a new form was created which included comprehensible explanations on how to complete it and clearer definitions alongside the traditional data capture lists to explain acronyms of categories. For example, alongside disability we listed some very common hidden disabilities.

We launched our new strategy and data collection form together and a new toolbox talk was created and delivered by specially trained EDI individuals. The goal was to ensure everyone attending was:

• Aware of the new strategy and shown how to access it • Given an overview of equality, diversity, and inclusion terminology, with an explanation of acronyms • Given the opportunity to become a champion of, or join one of the new EDI employee forums • Made aware of the new data collection form, the importance of capturing accurate data and a clear explanation of how their data would be used positively, adhering to GDPR guidelines • Informed of client and community EDI expectations

All new employees also complete the new data collection form automatically and are invited to attend an EDI talk during their first three months.

Our data collection exercise has been so successful that just by understanding the makeup of our workforce better we have met our targets. Our missing data for sexual orientation accounts for only 5% of our employees and ethnicity is only 2% .

Two years into our four year strategy we have completed almost 60% of our actions, with a further 16% in progress.

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n Planned

27%

n In Progress 16% n Completed 57%

Targets

In many cases we have exceeded our targets beyond expectation, so have re-scoped new targets for 2023 & 2024.

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What will All Great People mean for FM Conway?

• We will create an environment where we can all be the very best of ourselves and prosper • Our leaders will cultivate a supportive and inclusive environment • We will have the privilege of being attractive to all people • We will create a place of respect and understanding of each other’s differences • We will establish a platform where our people can express ideas and be comfortable with respectfully challenging each other to deliver the very best outcome • We will show that being diverse creates a more successful business than one which is not

Underpinning each of these goals is a set of initiatives and priorities that we are pursuing.

GOAL 1 -

Maintaining an inclusive organisational culture

GOAL 2 -

Increasing diversity through ethnic minority groups

GOAL 3 -

Increasing diversity through the LGBTQIA+ community

GOAL 4 -

Increasing diversity through the disabled community

GOAL 5 -

Increasing diversity through the female community

GOAL 6 -

Developing inclusion & respect

GOAL 7 -

Increasing diversity in our supply chain

GOAL 8 -

Communicating our performance, impact and sharing best practice

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GOAL 1 - Maintaining an inclusive organisational culture

Our objective:

To create a culture where under-represented groups participate and contribute to our EDI strategy. We must review all instances where unfairness could exist and create inequality, and where we find an opportunity to do better, we must act immediately.

Actions completed:

• Reviewed 54 People policies and policy statements to ensure they meet the needs of our strategy • Introduced a kickstart programme that provided opportunities for 30 young people, many of which were from under-represented groups • Reviewed the recruitment and selection process to ensure that our advertising, application and selection processes are inclusive and accessible to all • Reviewed our careers website to ensure our images fairly represented the diverse workforce that we engage • Rolled out EDI talks to 1092 of our employees ( 62% of our workforce) • Improved our performance management process by moving it online, thereby allowing us to identify disproportionate performance results in our various communities and put actions in place to better understand and address them • Developed our leadership capability through our new Great Leaders career development programme • Continually promoted our ‘Your Voice’ apps to allow concerns to be raised and then addressed sensitively and successfully

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GOAL 2 - Increasing diversity through ethnic minority groups

Our objective:

To strengthen the talent from ethnic minority groups at all levels.

Actions completed:

• Set up an ethnic minority employee forum and invited members from both ethnic minority and white British communities to actively engage and encourage discussion, to better understand barriers to recruitment and progression, and learn about how to disrupt and break through said barriers • Strengthened our talent attraction and selection processes to combat unconscious bias by encouraging diverse interview panels • Improved the photography on our website to promote and demonstrate our diversity • Rolled out unconscious bias recruitment and selection training to over 100 of our recruiting managers • Ensured that emerging talent initiatives such as our Apprenticeship programme created stretch opportunities to nurture young people from ethnic minority groups. These employees currently make up 47% of the Apprentice population • Supported and developed high performing individuals from ethnic minority groups through our Great Leaders career development programme, which includes mentoring and support activities. 14% of our successful candidates were from these communities • Calculated our Ethnicity pay gap to identify any issues or concerns

Apprentices from ethnic minority groups

n

47%

n Apprentices who are white British

53%

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GOAL 3 - Increasing diversity through the LGBTQIA+ community

Our objective:

To create an environment where LGBTQIA+ community members can confidently be their authentic selves in our business. This confidence will be evidenced by capture of declaration data to enable us to understand levels and to manage and support effectively.

Actions completed:

• Set up a LGBTQIA+ employee forum and invited members from the LGBTQIA+ and non LGBTQIA+ community to actively engage and encourage discussion to better understand barriers to recruitment and progression and to learn how to disrupt and break through said barriers • Investigated the reasons why there are high ‘prefer not to say’ rates with respect to sexual orientation and rolled out EDI talks to encourage the capture of gender identify information so that we can better understand needs in this area and guide actions in support of increasing representation and inclusion of trans people • Continually promoted our SpeakOut app to allow concerns to be raised and then addressed sensitively and successfully

SPEAKOUT

GOAL 4 - Increasing diversity through the disabled community

Our objective:

• To strengthen the talent pipeline of people with disabilities at all levels by 2024 • To increase representation at senior levels • To improve understanding of the importance of mental health and wellbeing • To improve access and support for mental health and wellbeing for those employed by our business

Actions completed:

• Set up a disability employee forum and invited people with disabilities and without, to actively engage and encourage discussion to better understand barriers to recruitment and progression and learn about how to disrupt and break through said barriers • Introduced our 10-year Mental Health Wellbeing strategy, Healthier Together, which seeks to implement an environment that understands, supports and takes action for the needs of every single member of the FM Conway family • Reviewed and audited our recruitment process to ensure it is accessible and inclusive to all, and ensured all candidates interviewed are given the opportunity to make reasonable adjustments • Maintained our network of Mental Health First Aiders across the organisation and provided access to training to assist managers in improving their capability to address colleague mental health and wellbeing issues and make necessary adjustments. We currently have over 100 Mental Health First Aiders in our business • Strengthened our links with external providers such as Kent Supported Employment and the Lighthouse Charity to ensure that there is adequate provision for all colleagues who need support on mental health related issues • Introduced a new Disability Awareness e-learning module on our online learning portal • Trained key employees in policy, safeguarding and mentor training • Amended our data collection forms to allow new starters the opportunity to ask for necessary adjustments to support individuals better • Collected data from existing employees using the above form in case individual circumstances had changed since starting • Built line manager confidence in dealing with disability issues through training and myth busting

communication, including information about non-visible disabilities • Calculated our Disability pay gap to identify any issues or concerns

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n Female Apprentices 43% n Male Apprentices 57%

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GOAL 5 - Increasing diversity through the female community

Our objective:

• To raise awareness of the Construction industry as a career choice by promoting opportunities to females • To identify role models and provide mentoring for those interested in advancement • To offer work experience, traineeship and apprentice opportunities

Actions completed:

• Set up a female employee forum and invited all employees to actively engage and encourage discussion to better understand barriers to recruitment and progression and learn about how to disrupt and break through said barriers • Improved the photography on our website to promote and demonstrate our gender diversity • Reviewed our flexible working policies and ensured all roles (where possible) are offered on a flexible basis • Amended our job adverts to ensure they use inclusive language that attracts women • Reviewed and enhanced our maternity package and included a new ‘back to work bonus’ which has resulted in 100% of our females returning to work since having a baby • Audited our welfare facilities to ensure they were safe and suitable for women • Made women’s PPE available in our stores with a range of sizes • Increased our visits to female schools to encourage young women to enter our industry • Signed up to the Inspiring Women in Construction and Engineering Pledge which supports initiatives and aspires to change areas such as the attraction, development and promotion of women in our company and industry • Continued to focus on addressing gender balance at a senior level and used our gender pay gap results to identify areas for improvement • Ensured that emerging talent initiatives such as our Apprenticeship programme created stretch opportunities to nurture young women. Female employees currently make up 43% of the Apprentice population • Supported and developed high performing females through our Great Leaders career development programme which includes mentoring and support activities. 35% of our successful candidates were female

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GOAL 6 - Developing inclusion & respect

Our objective:

To demonstrate our appreciation of this contribution and to pursue activities that constantly evaluate our performance and representation in these areas.

Actions completed:

• Set up an employee forum which encouraged all ages of employees to join and understand the generation differences and the support required for the different generations • Studied the four generations that we currently employ and the differences in outlook and work requirements and reviewed the number of individuals we had in each area to further develop how we could support them and ensure they felt valued • Presented to senior leaders on the generational differences • Set up coaching and mentoring schemes through our Great Leaders career development programme which aims to support individuals of different ages, socio-economic backgrounds and at various stages of their careers • Won the ‘Inclusive Employer’ award at the Better Society Awards in 2021 by demonstrating that our workplace, employment practices and recruitment policies are fair, equal and inclusive for all

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GOAL 7 - Increasing diversity in our supply chain

Our objective:

To use local suppliers who recruit locally for a diverse workforce.

Actions completed:

• Ensured that all new suppliers complete the newly updated supplier portal which captures the EDI data of our suppliers • Established a methodical approach to capturing the data of our existing suppliers through the new portal • Hosted supply chain events and have presented our best practice approaches for innovation to clients such as National Highways, TfL and Civil Engineering Contractors Association

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GOAL 8 - Communicating our performance, impact and sharing best practice

Our objective:

To deliver regular, transparent and accurate reporting and sharing our progress in creating an equal opportunities environment that allows every member of society the same chance to be their very best by contributing to our story.

Actions completed:

• Set up an EDI Champions meeting where the forum leads and other key stakeholders such as HR, Marketing, Procurement & Corporate Social Responsibility review any issues highlighted at the forums, our targets and any lessons learned. There have been 16 EDI champion meetings to date • Established a baseline to determine our current position against our goals and report regularly on the efforts we employ to reach the goals, our success and the challenges we face • Set up employee forums to give our people a voice to share concerns or challenges and come up with ideas to make our business better. There have been over 24 EDI forums to date • Delivered a Mental Health week with different initiatives for employees to join, which resulted in the business winning the CECA Southern’s Workplace Wellbeing Award • Worked with external ‘subject matter’ experts who helped advise on objectives and actions • Taken part in collaboration and sharing best practice events with peers and clients. We have taken part in 6 EDI specific events to date • Participated in industry data collection exercise with the Supply Chain Sustainability School

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We must not only learn to tolerate our differences. We must welcome them as the richness and diversity which can lead to true intelligence.

Albert Einstein

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EQUALITY, DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION STRATEGY 2020 - 2024

THE INTERIM PROGRESS REPORT 2020 - 2022

EXCELLENCE Great people delivering great work, always

CARE As a family business we act with care and compassion

INNOVATION Our passion is to always find a better way

INTEGRITY A business committed to doing the right thing

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