Our Approach to Equality & Diversity

Commitment to diversity

At Veredus we believe that everyone has their own unique abilities, and we are committed to promoting equality and diversity both internally, as a model employer, and externally as a recruiter and a thought leader in the field. That’s why we’ve made sure our networks extend beyond the traditional parameters. It’s also why we’re recognised for our ability to reach a wide talent pool – and why our name is synonymous with diversity, inclusion and integration. It is this commitment that has enabled us to secure the kite mark of Investors in Diversity (IiD) accreditation from the National Centre for Diversity, making Veredus the first and currently the only national Executive Search and Selection consultancy to achieve this standard.

Internal awareness and compliance

Employee Handbook and Intranet: All employees receive a paper copy of the employee handbook when they join the company; the handbook contains copies of the Company’s policies and the appropriate procedures to ensure full compliance with all Race Relations, Disability Discrimination, Sex Discrimination, Equal Pay, Employment Equality and Age Discrimination. The handbook is also made available on the Group intranet (Capitaconnect). This is reinforced by further information on the relevant legislation and policies on their individual company intranet (Ergo in the case of Veredus).

Training: All new employees undertake local induction training to cover company specific issues including a review and compliance training of all the current equality and discrimination legislation. Depending on their role staff will also receive job specific training including staff with specific Equality and Diversity roles (e.g. managers, HR staff and members of the Veredus Diversity Steering Group). Each individual must also complete the Groups Diversity Awareness Training module introduced in 2008 which rates individual’s level of knowledge and identifies potential areas for further training and development.

Management and Office meetings: Each Veredus business Practice and Office hold regular meetings at which issues of Equality and Diversity are discussed and any changes of legislation are notified.

Diversity Steering Group: This Group is made up of representatives from all areas of our business and across all of our regional offices, and has responsibility for implementing and reviewing our approach to Equality and Diversity, including updates to legislation. The Group also publishes regular bulletins and company updates which cover issues of Equality and Diversity companywide. This process includes an audit of our approach to Diversity, our literature, training and our recruitment and procurement practices.

Equality and Diversity Questionnaire: Veredus conducts a regularDiversity and Equality questionnaires across all staff groups to gauge the level of understanding, employee satisfaction with the company approach and training need.

Policy Reviews: Capita Group undertakes a regular review of all Equality and Diversity policies in force, including the methods of meeting and ensuring compliance with UK legislation and statutory obligations.

Partners and Associates: As a business, we engage Interim Managers, Associates and Technical Assessors, who although are not direct employees of Veredus, are both representatives and ambassadors for us when working with client organisations. We expect all those who provide services on our behalf to share our commitment to equality and diversity and to reflect this in their behaviour. At its most basic, we require adherence to statute; however, commitment to equality and diversity is about more than mere compliance and we expect all individuals acting on our behalf to act as a role model in exemplifying best practice in this regard.

External promotion and compliance

Compliance with discrimination legislation

Veredus operates a number of elements in our client’s recruitment processes to ensure that we are fully compliant with discrimination legislation. We monitor diversity statistics of all applicants at all stages of the process from initial application, to longlist, shortlist and final appointment. Areas we monitor are religion, disability, ethnic origin, gender, marital status, age and, upon client request, sexual orientation. Also at the request of a client, we will operate a guaranteed interview scheme, where any disabled applicant will be offered an interview providing they meet all the essential job criteria. We also encourage any candidates with disabilities or for whom English is not the first language to advise us of any adjustments we need to make for them, and act accordingly. Diversity statistics are provided at each stage of the process.

But diversity and inclusion is more than complying with legislation.

We also encourage and support our clients to consider candidates with a broad range of backgrounds and appropriate skills. In fact, we work closely with Ministers, Senior Civil Servants and Chief Executives in Local Government and NDPBs to achieve this goal – the result being several high profile appointments of minority ethnic, women and disabled candidates, as detailed below.

When advertising roles, and with our clients agreement, we actively seek out and use recruitment websites specifically accessed by minority groups. Our executive search also allows us target and directly approach individuals from underrepresented groups, and the organisations for these individuals work, to ensure a diverse candidate response. Our experience shows that we have been very successful in ensuring widespread inclusion of underrepresented groups in our longlists and shortlists.

External credentials

Our reputation for embracing the principles of diversity was underlined when we were awarded contracts to recruit the Chair and Chief Executive of the Commission for Racial Equality, as well as other high profile public sector appointments. We’ve also appointed Heads of Diversity to the Crown Prosecution Service, DCA, Transport for London, the Police Service of England and Wales, London Borough of Brent, The Prison Service, and Credit Suisse First Boston. We have worked with Sussex Police to roll out our diversity assessment tool and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport on improving diversity in public appointments.

Veredus is widely recognised as a thought leader in diversity and social exclusion. For example, we contributed to the Institute of Public Policy Research race equality report entitled The Benefits of Responsible Business and worked closely with The Employers Forum on Disability to develop standards for the recruitment industry. We also published another paper, Getting Women on Board: The Business Case for Diversity. Our findings were that recruiting more women at board level would promote greater representation as well as increasing productivity, innovation and leadership.

An integral part of our ongoing quality management activity is to ask our clients and candidates to complete satisfaction questionnaires at the end of each assignment we manage. These include questions related to equality and diversity, in order to ensure that our commitment is reflected in the experience of the organisations and individuals we work with.

Evidence of success in accessing appropriate networks

Our comprehensive database of over 130,000 candidates draws on the connections we’ve forged with groups such as Stonewall, Business in the Community, Race for Opportunity, Employers Forum on Disability and Age Positive. We always try to make applying through Veredus as easy and positive as possible via our website, a microsite or personal contact through a consultant at our offices throughout the UK. Each of these offices is fully accessible, and our staff are well versed in welcoming people with disabilities or for whom English is not the first language. Our candidate pool is further augmented by Job Hunting Workshops which we provide free of charge and include sessions on self belief and self esteem.

We support our clients in the assessment of candidates with a broad range of skills and backgrounds, encouraging and guiding them to see beyond the difference and embrace the unique qualities of the individual. We work closely with Ministers, Senior Civil Servants and Chief Executives in Local Government and NDPBs to achieve this goal – the result being several high profile appointments of minority ethnic, women and disabled candidates.

Our consultants are actively engaged in projects such as the Hothouse Programme and the Network for Black Professionals to develop a bespoke job hunting workshop which enables delegates to explore the range of assessment tools involved as part of these processes and the gaps that may exist within there own skills sets, together with the interventions that they are able to make to achieve their individual career goals.

We are recognised for our ability to connect with a diverse talent pool and are often retained for the specific use of those long standing relationships and networks that cross traditional barriers and forums.

We proactively take executive search to include under represented groups such as women in leadership, disabled, or minority ethnic candidates and often dedicate research resources to look specifically within identified communities.

We use headhunting as a tool to ensure you have a wide and diverse talent pool from which to choose. We keep an open and informed mind about where candidates might be found and this is why search can be such a powerful tool in advancing diversity.

Downloads

Group Plc Equality & Diversity Policy