Encouragingly we have continued to see a reduction in the median gender pay and gender bonus gaps year-on-year between 2019 to 2021, shrinking by 7% for median pay and 26.5% for bonus pay. Whilst between 2019 and 2021 there has been a reduction in the mean gender pay gap of 3.5%, there is a marginal increase between 2020 and 2021 of 0.5% and a further 3.1% increase in the mean bonus gender pay gap The strategies we are putting in place will ensure we continue to reduce the gap across both areas consistently.
For the first time the percentage of women receiving a bonus has overtaken men receiving a bonus in 2021. Whilst most permanent employees within our business regardless of gender are eligible for our annual bonus scheme, there are other bonus schemes relating to long service, performance and recognition which have varying amounts that may account for fluctuations in the percentage of employees that receive a bonus.
Whilst the male to female ratio of employees across Quartiles 2, 3 and 4 have remained relatively static or shown improvement towards increasing the number of female employees, Quartile 1 continues to demonstrate an increasing gap between men and women in the roles which fall into this quartile. Therefore, more work needs to be done to improve our attraction, hiring and retention strategy for women across these roles.
In 2021 as part of our Diversity and Inclusion Strategy we launched Aspire, our Women’s Leadership Programme, designed to support and enhance female performance at work, enable career progression and increase awareness of the impact of gender inequality at work throughout the business and develop strategies to combat this. This programme will be continued through 2022 and beyond.
We have additionally enhanced our Maternity and Shared Parental Leave pay for employees with over a year’s continuous service where they are entitled to 26 weeks at full pay* demonstrating our commitment to creating an environment that supports our employees to balance their work and family / home life commitments.
Future Objectives
Continuing to build on our 2021 objectives we remain committed to our five-year diversity and inclusion strategy, which places D&I at the heart of our company culture, this includes:
- Applying a core set of measurable diversity and inclusion KPIs across the six pillars of our inclusion strategy. The strategy reviews how to drive inclusive behaviour across all areas of our business from recruitment and employee experience to pitching and client engagement.
- Establishing a diversity mission statement, goals and values to champion diversity and inclusion within our business. This will feed into our company-wide communications strategy and link to our values.
- Ensuring all HR teams and managers and complete mandatory diversity and inclusion training for interviewing and managing employees.
- Embedding regular D&I updates at the staff summit and business reviews.
We understand that driving change can take time, but we are confident with the planned initiatives we will see further improvements in our gender pay gap results over time.
Gender Pay Gap Statement
We confirm that the information in this report is accurate and prepared in accordance with the Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017.
Charlotte Warrington
Head of People