We celebrate and embrace difference
Our culture empowers everyone to be themselves so they can do their best work and thrive.
Diversity and Inclusion is a key focus for us, and though we have set ourselves some challenging targets within these areas, we're proud to say making progress against each – including reducing our gender pay gap. We use contextualised recruitment tools to help widen our pool of Early Careers candidates and partner with key charities and organisations to help us engage with under-represented groups across our four pillars of Diversity and Inclusion.
We also have several staff-led community groups across Hymans (LBGTQ+, Neurodiversity, Race, Faith, Disability and Gender) that meet regularly to discuss topical issues and develop ideas for improving our approaches.
Like many businesses across the UK, we found women were under-represented at a senior level in the firm. We have been, and continue to, work hard to improve this gender balance through reciprocal mentoring, flexible working practices, technology to support agile working and support for those returning from maternity and shared parental leave.
We’re pleased to report that women now represent 35% of our partners. Our work is far from finished however, and we continue to challenge unconscious bias and out-dated perceptions of work and career paths to increase the number of women progressing to the top level in our firm.
Ignorance is diversity and inclusion's biggest enemy. We want everyone to understand and acknowledge the experiences of others, so that they can be the best agents for change. That’s why we have mandatory diversity and inclusion training, and run ‘diversity dialogues’ on many topics, most recently in relation to the experiences of our black colleagues. As part of our 100th birthday celebrations we hosted a series of webinars on the topic of diversity and inclusion.
"Ignorance is diversity and inclusion's biggest enemy. We want everyone to understand and acknowledge the experiences of others, so that they can be the best agents for change."
Achieving our goals requires ongoing dialogue and action. To make sure that every voice is heard, our Diversity & Inclusion group, made up of individuals from across the firm, seeks feedback and ideas from all areas of the business on a regular basis. The group discusses topical issues, shares knowledge and experience and makes recommendations to senior management, often sponsoring events themselves.
We are committed to achieving our goals of an inclusive, diverse, happy, fulfilled and productive workforce. Not only for the benefits to our people, but the benefits to our firm, our clients and wider society.
