Diversifying Our Workforce: Employee Equality Information At the core of the BBC s role is something very simple, very democratic and very important to bring the best to everyone. Wherever you are whoever you are whether you are rich or poor, old or young, that's what we do Everybody deserves the best. Tony Hall, Director-General, 8 October 2013. Our ambition is to be the most creative organisation in the world. Diversity of all kinds offers the BBC the opportunity to unlock even more talent and originality. Reflecting diversity across the UK through our content across all our platforms is a key mission for the BBC set by the Charter. The BBC s aspirations to broaden diversity on and off air are set out in our Diversity Strategy: www.bbc.co.uk/diversity/strategy/. In January 2013 we published our annual equality report which gives an account against our key equality and diversity objectives: www.bbc.co.uk/diversity/strategy/equalityreport2012/. This was the second annual equality report we have published since the introduction of the specific duty to publish equality related information as part of our responsibilities under the public sector equality duty. We will be publishing our third annual equality report in July 2014 alongside our corporate Annual Report and Accounts and we will report annually from that point onwards. There we will set out a full record of our activity across our equality and diversity priorities relating to all the BBC s activities and functions. In the meantime, we publish a brief analysis of equality related information on our employee profile and report on the diversity of staff within all BBC Divisions. This narrative describes the key points and specific highlights. 1
Workforce diversity targets The BBC has set workforce diversity targets from January 2013 to December 2017 which act as clear goals to increase diversity within the workforce both overall and in decisionmaking roles. Targets are in place to increase numbers of Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) staff, disabled staff and in certain departments, women: Ethnicity Average target across BBC divisions 14.2% Senior leaders target - 10% Disability Average target across BBC divisions 5.3% Senior leaders target - 5% Gender Technology and Future Media departments have a target for increasing female staff to 30% Gender The BBC continues to improve in relation to gender diversity. Women now represent 48.9% of all BBC staff and 41.1% of leadership staff (grade 10 & above). Several BBC Divisions have female leadership representation of over 60%, including BBC People, BBC Trust, Television and Marketing & Audiences. In the Future Media division, which has historically had lower female representation, a 1.6% increase in female staff to 24% has been noted relative to 22.4% in 2012. Another area of challenge for female representation is Studios & Post Production (25.7%). However, the data shows a 0.6% increase from the Annual Equality Information Report 2012. Disability The population of disabled staff is 3.7% BBC-wide. This shows a 0.2% increase from levels reported in the previous Annual Equality Information Report 2012. Currently, the BBC Trust, BBC People, Finance & Business have disabled representation of greater than 6%. 2
Some of the challenging areas in relation to disabled representation include Global News (1.9%), Public Affairs (2.6%), Radio (2.5%), Scotland (2.6%) and Worldwide (1.7%). The population of disabled staff at leadership grades (grade10 & above) is 3% BBC-wide. The Children in Need division is a notable exception, with disabled staff in leadership grades measuring 16.7%. English Regions also shows a higher than average proportion of disabled staff in leadership grades at 7.4%. Ethnicity The population of BME staff is12.4%, Other White staff 6% and Majority Ethnic staff 81.6%. The proportion of staff from BME and Other White groups remains consistent with the previous Equality Information annual report, with BME representation remaining static, a 0.2% decrease in Ethnic Majority representation and a 0.2% increase in Other White Staff. Future Media and Finance & Business have representation of BME groups at 15.4% and 14.8% respectively. The Global News division has a BME population of 49.5%. Some of the more challenging areas in relation to BME representation are English Regions (7.7%), Policy & Strategy (7.8%), Studios & Post Production (7.4%), Television (9.5%) and Radio (9.4%). BBC-wide, the population of BME leadership staff (grade 10 & over) is 8.5%, Other White 5.8% and Ethnic Majority 85.6%. Worldwide & Global News are notable exceptions with 14.1% and 28.8% BME representation respectively. BME representation at leadership grades (grade 10 & over), even where representation is higher than the BBC average figure, does not reach proportionate levels when measured against the all staff populations for the respective divisions. For example, 49.5% all staff representation for Global News and 28.8% BME representation within leadership grades (10 & over). Sexual Orientation The combined Lesbian, Gay, Bi-sexual (LGB) population of the BBC is 3.7%. This breaks down as Gay men 2.6%, Gay /Lesbian women 0.6% and Bi-sexual people 0.5%. Marketing & Audiences is a notable exception with 7.1% of staff being LGB. 3
The combined LGB population (grade 10 & above) of leadership staff is 4.2% BBC Wide. This breaks down as Gay men 2.9%, Gay/Lesbian women 0.9% and Bi-sexual people 0.4%. Policy & Strategy have the highest representation of LGB groups at 6.1%. Age The BBC continues to have a diverse workforce in respect of age, with the largest population of staff being 30-49 years old. This group represents 64.3% of the total workforce. Under 20 s represent 0.2%, 20-29 represent 15.9% and those aged 60+ represent 2.7% of employees. In the leadership grades (10 & above) the largest representation is found for employees aged 40-49 representing 44.7% of leadership grade staff. 30-39 represent 24.8%, 50-59 represent 26.2% and those aged over 60 make up 3.1% of the Leadership Grade population. Religion & Belief Christians remain the largest religious group within BBC staff at 23.5%. Non-Christian faiths represent 3.7%, Other represents 2.5% of BBC staff. A full breakdown of non- Christian representation is contained in the Annual Equality Information Report data pack tables. Atheists account for 9.8% of BBC staff, and those reporting no religion account for 17.4% of staff. Within the leadership grades (grade 10 & above) Christians represent 25.8% of staff. Non- Christian faiths represent 3.3%, Other represents 2.6% of staff. A full breakdown of non- Christian representation is contained in the Annual Equality Information Report data tables. It is worth noting that 37.7% of staff have not declared a religion or belief and 5.8% have indicated that they Prefer not to Say, therefore the data set is less complete than for other areas of the Annual Equality Information data tables. 4
Attrition Over the 12 month reporting period; Men, BME and Disabled leavers exceeded joiners. Retaining diverse talent remains a key challenge. In order to achieve our Diversity Targets, retaining and developing diverse talent is crucial. A number of activities have been undertaken in the preceding 12 months to improve our understanding of the attrition rates and trends and respond accordingly. These include: Leavers survey with diversity analysis Disabled staff engagement project Elev8 Mentoring scheme for disabled staff The BBC Black & Asian Forum Mentoring scheme for BME Network members Disability Employment Trend workshops for Divisional HR teams Divisional Employment Trend sessions for divisional HR teams Notes: a) A more granular analysis of diversity in every grade is available via the Annual Grade Data Pack. b) All staff data from the Annual Equality Information Report data tables 2012 included staff from Grades 2-11. All staff data from 2013 includes staff from Grades 2-9, therefore direct comparisons are more complex. c) No comparisons have been made to leadership grade data from 2012 as the leadership grades in 2012 were SM1 & 2 only, whereas since 2013, Grades 10,11, SM1 & SM2 are now included in leadership grade data. From 2014 onwards, annual comparisons will be available. d) Figures for Network News have been separated from Global News for the purposes of transparency and clarity. In previous EIR reports figures from Network and Global News and have been presented together. 5