Sift is dedicated to the elimination of unlawful and unfair discrimination across the whole organisation. It values the differences that a diverse, equal and inclusive workforce brings to our organisation and society as a whole.
In recent times, the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement has highlighted once again the vulnerability that people from minority backgrounds suffer in modern societies. This has led to a needed revision of the inclusion and zero tolerance policies within most companies and as a business we thought our policies needed a reevaluation too. We will do more to reinforce our ongoing commitment to driving better diversity and inclusion, specifically but not exclusively, in the workplace.
As a Bristol business, with significant reach and influence to 2m business professionals via our publishing sites – AccountingWEB, HRZone, TrainingZone, MyCustomer & UK Business Forums – and 600+ clients via our digital agency PracticeWeb, we feel we can make a greater contribution to this ongoing work.
As such, we have taken the following actions and commitments as a business over the last few weeks:
- Formed a dedicated internal team to take real action and focus on ensuring a framework is agreed to achieve greater diversity in the workplace.
- Committed to attract a more diverse workforce over the next three years, with a review of our hiring and recruitment processes.
- Committed to conveying better representation across our publishing titles and ensuring our clients, suppliers and wider ecosystem actively support this.
- We’re adding ‘Be Inclusive’ as a new company value, to become a key part of the DNA of Sift.
- Delivering a comprehensive education programme to all our teams – appropriate training, sharing resources/articles and the celebration of key events.
- Building relationships with and listening to local communities, with a commitment to learn and better understand how our business can be more inclusive.
Sift is against discrimination and it’s reflected in a diverse workforce, formed by people from diverse ethnical backgrounds. However, we recognise that we can do more to ensure our teams integrate people with all protected characteristics; age, gender, disabilities, religion, belief, sexual orientation, gender reassignment, marriage & civil partnership and pregnancy & maternity. We believe these actions will have a positive impact, specifically with attracting people from diverse backgrounds and with protected characteristics to the workplace.
We are especially keen to engage in new ideas, new ways of working and speak to people who can help shape this project.
For further questions about diversity and inclusion in Sift please get in touch at: sift-diversity@sift.co.uk.