For more details on the WISE Ten Steps programme
The WISE Ten Steps forms a unique and evidence-based tool proven to improve diversity at all levels of an organisation, resulting in an inclusive and innovative culture. The programme is designed to drive performance and long-term competitive advantage.
How the WISE Ten Steps programme can help you
attract the talent you need
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This 2020 KSE, entitled Addressing The Cyber Security Skills Gap In The UK, saw speakers from BSC Women, Tessian, and other companies discuss diverse recruitment methods and why a career in cyber security might be a good fit for women looking to retrain.
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Case study*
Share your success stories and lessons learnt with other organisations and listen to the experience of others. Benefit from networking at WISE events such as the annual Measuring Progress Event. WISE is here to help you facilitate your introductions.
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Recognise that different companies are at different points in their journeys. Some have been tackling the problem for years and are further along the path than others.
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Top Recommendations
Improving gender balance is a challenge and a business imperative, across the entire STEM industry. It is not a problem just for individual companies. Sharing successes both within and outside organisations though interactive sessions such as the WISE Knowledge Sharing Events brings many cross-industry business benefits.
Share learning and good practice
Find out how technology company Capgemini’s D&I programme Active Inclusion set clear targets, provided training in inclusivity, and reviewed recruitment practices among other things. This programme significantly increased female applicant numbers as well as the intake of female apprentices.
Capgemini:
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Case study*
Identify what practical elements are needed and provide the resources and support to make it happen.
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Develop and agree a strategic, structured approach as you would for any other project, with senior sponsors, targets and deliverables.
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Top Recommendations
Success in improving diversity is not a side issue: it is critical to the business. It needs to be understood and championed at the most senior level, as well as adequately resourced and promoted throughout the organisation.
Approach this like any other business improvement project
Construction firm Bechtel told us how its women@bechtel programme led to a 13% increase in its female graduate intake and reduced the number of female resignations from 20% to 9% of the total per annum.
Bechtel:
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Case study*
Recognise that women may feel uncertain about their place in largely male-dominated industries – especially on returning to work after a career break – and support them.
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Let skilled women know the organisation values and wants to develop and retain them.
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Top Recommendations
It is not enough to have diversity and inclusion policies in place. You need to send out clear messages to women that the business needs their talents and skills and that you want to help them realise their potential.
Demonstrate to women that you want to retain and develop them
Find out how green energy company Ørsted have increased the diversity of their apprentices by using women’s-only career days, diverse interview panels, working with charity Teach First in local schools and encouraging candidates to express their personalities in interview.
Orsted:
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Case study*
Give talented women a senior sponsor, mentor or coach. This can help raise their profile in the organisation and prevent their careers from losing momentum.
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Find out from women themselves what support they need to succeed. This may be women-only networks or more general career development support. Beware of making assumptions.
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Top Recommendations
In industries where men so often have the advantage in terms of visibility and traditional expectations, women may need specific encouragement to progress to leadership roles. Talented women and men need to have genuinely equal opportunities to realise their potential.
Sponsor female talent to the same extent as male talent
Sky’s Women into Leadership programme aims to create the strongest possible pipeline for promotion. They offer a Get into Tech initiative comprising a 15-week part-time course (full-time and immersive for the first week) open both to external and internal candidates.
Sky:
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Case study*
Encourage women to put themselves forward for new opportunities. Career progression should be an integral part of a performance review.
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Push for full transparency about development opportunities, attractive projects and stretch assignments.
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Top Recommendations
Your organisation must be open and inclusive. If women are to get the same career chances as men, they have to know what’s on offer and feel confident about putting themselves forward. That may not happen if opportunities are promoted solely through traditional networks. It is important that everyone knows what’s available and has the support necessary to plan and advance their careers.
Increase transparency of opportunities for progression
In 2018 engineering firm Black and Veatch offered flexible working arrangements to staff facilitated by IT support; 21% took up a formal flexible working arrangement as a result.
Black and Veatch:
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Case study*
Strive to create a culture in which employees feel confident when asking for flexible working, without any fear that their careers are being jeopardised.
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Be open to a variety of arrangements, formal and informal. Recognise the potential of IT for facilitating home-working.
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Top Recommendations
Flexible working choices can increase the pool of potential recruits and stem the loss of skilled employees mid-career. If you are serious about diversity and inclusion, you have to go beyond the statutory requirements and treat flexible working as a natural and positive option – and one that is no barrier to progression.
Make flexible working a reality for all
Canterbury Christ Church University uses a number of practices to improve gender balance in recruitment. These include using gender neutral job adverts, gender balanced interview panels, a new assessment criteria, unconscious bias training for staff and more.
Canterbury Christ Church University:
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Case study*
Strive to create a culture in which employees feel confident when asking for flexible working, without any fear that their careers are being jeopardised.
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Be open to a variety of arrangements, formal and informal. Recognise the potential of IT for facilitating home-working.
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Top Recommendations
Recruiting in the same way you always have won’t bring in fresh talent. What’s needed is a more creative and open-minded approach. Thinking differently about the way STEM jobs are designed and advertised will attract a wider talent pool and find the best person for the job.
Be creative in job design
This case study explores this engineering company’s top-down, bottom-up approach to D&I messaging. It identifies how their senior leadership team communicated the
D&I message and provides a step-by-step guide to running a D&I workshop for staff.
IMI:
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Case study*
Review systems and processes to eliminate unintentional bias in recruitment and progression, particularly at senior levels. Avoid all-male shortlists.
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Ensure that those at the top of the organisation set examples through their own behaviour and language. Support them with training.
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Top Recommendations
Changing the way people think and behave is a long-term challenge. Creating a culture that genuinely values and promotes diversity and inclusion requires not only a thorough review of company policies but zero-tolerance of bias and sexism at all levels of the company.
Change mindsets by challenging bias and sexism
Reverse mentoring – this case study looks at how HS2 secured management buy-in, selected its mentors, chose themes for discussion, and managed and incorporated feedback.
Network Rail:
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Case study*
Provide support for managers to lead change. Reverse mentoring programmes can help male executives understand female colleagues and the challenges they face in STEM.
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Incorporate diversity and inclusion into the company’s fundamental values, approved and communicated by senior leaders.
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Top Recommendations
Senior managers must understand how
a improved gender balance will benefit the business as a whole and how the culture needs to change to achieve this. They should visibly support and communicate the need for this and be held accountable for performance.
Educate your leaders, give them accountability for change
This WISE case study examines Network Rail’s D&I projects to date. It looks at the types of data collected and how often, as well as the many ways in which the numbers have informed the company’s targets.
Network Rail:
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Case study*
To understand why so few women choose a career in tech.
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To explore any skills or training gaps in the tech and digital technology sector.
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Top Recommendations
Organisations need data to solve problems. This is essential for tracking progress – if you don’t know where you were, you won’t know how far you’ve come. Companies have to identify specific hurdles so that they can start working on solutions and measure the progress being made.
Understand the starting point so you can monitor progress
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*Case studies are restricted to WISE members only, for access to these or more information regarding membership please click here.
The WISE Tech research was sponsored by Jacobs and supported by DarkTrace.
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