diversity & inclusion
the importance of a diversity & inclusion strategy:
As a recruitment supplier we are committed to improving and promoting our Diversity and Inclusion Strategy through consistent training and attracting and monitoring D&I. We promote a culture of inclusion and one that empowers all of our people to be the best that they can be. This is reflected through our ongoing training and monitoring of our recruitment strategy both internally and for our clients.
our research capabilities:
As a specialist recruitment supplier, we can offer information and market intelligence to enhance the recruitment process and strengthen our partnership with our clients. Rutherford Briant has a team of very experienced search consultants, backed up by a team of junior resourcers. We can deliver insightful market intelligence on salary trends, recruitment market trends and demand hotspots.
As the Coronavirus situation has unfolded, we have proved ourselves to be adaptable and resourceful. We have developed new techniques of sourcing and interviewing candidates using video technology, as well as being able to promote the businesses that we are working with. We have also been able to overcome a more cautious candidate market, where some of the best candidates may be more reluctant to make a move due to the economic situation.
At Rutherford Briant, we have been extremely effective at continuing to identify and source the top performing candidates in our specialist fields and persuading them to explore dynamic opportunities with our clients. Our systems and procedures ensure that we are able to demonstrate and report on our efforts to deliver diverse shortlists and support our client’s social equality and inclusion targets.
our diversity & inclusion strategy:
Rutherford Briant have a clear policy regarding diversity and inclusion. We are passionate about promoting diversity and inclusion in all its forms, both in our own internal policies and recruitment strategies, as well as our operation methods to enable our clients to achieve their own equality goals.
The importance and benefits of our diversity and inclusion go beyond the legal minimum; the core basics of fairness and respect for difference, equality of opportunity and treatment across gender, disability mental and physical and different abilities, BAME and LGBT+ rights, championing those with caring responsibilities, including dementia care, part-time workers and more.
We want to provide an environment where our staff and consultants are comfortable in an inclusive, empowering work culture that allows people to have a voice about concerns and suggestions for continuous improvement in recruitment processes to enable our clients to consider the best diverse shortlists for our recruitment projects.
actions we have taken to implement our strategy:
We have given a commitment to ongoing staff training and team discussion workshops regarding our diversity strategy. This begins with our staff induction programme and goes beyond the legal minimum of non-discriminatory practices. The challenges for a recruitment agency are often finding ways to work with our clients to ensure that they are considering diverse shortlists and not practicing selection bias or unconscious bias in their recruitment procedures. Our own search and sourcing methodologies have been developed to be highly effective in delivering diverse shortlists. We have also worked with a number of clients to gather information to support our client’s diversity and inclusion statistical analysis data collection.
measuring our diversity & inclusion impact:
As a small business of 20 staff and 16 consultants, our management processes have been adapted to ensure that weekly job reviews take account of whether our diversity and inclusion strategy is being followed. The policy is also reviewed and discussed at our quarterly board meetings, with ongoing training and regular workshops.
some of the processes in place to measure and ensure our diversity are:
- Job description checklist as part of recruitment approvals.
- Better tracking of candidates for each job or promotion.
- Invested in diverse job boards to increase volume outreach.
- Bespoke shortlists and market mapping.
supporting the diversity & inclusion strategies of our clients:
Where our clients have a clear D&I strategy, we work closely with the recruitment teams to ensure that our own polices are in alignment and that we are recording and reporting as requested as well as discussing any issues arising. Where our client has not got a clear strategy, we make our clients aware of our practices and offer suggestions as to how their recruitment strategies could benefit from our methodologies and ensure that we do not see any practicing selection bias or unconscious bias in their processes. Because of the inclusive and partnership approach that we take to this, we find many of our clients are very grateful for our input and have commented on how we have assisted them with reconsidering their own approach to D&I.
supporting our clients to attract and recruit diverse talent:
Our search and sourcing strategies are focused not just on attraction methodologies such as advertising, but also on targeting suitably qualified candidates who may not be actively looking for work. This means that we are able to build and enhance shortlist with diverse talent that may be unavailable through any other sources.
some of the processes in place to support this are:
- Every job is advertised.
- Every job must be managed via a formal process to allow diversity monitoring.
- All job descriptions to be reviewed (language and working patterns).
- Priority candidates must be considered (inc. homeworking).
- No hiring without mandatory interview and D&I training.
If you'd like to talk to us about diversity and inclusion within your own business, please do get in touch.
