You are viewing 1 of your 1 free articles
Yorkshire Housing managed to cut its gender pay gap to 1.15%. Nina Evison explains how a ‘work anywhere’ approach and paying the real living wage have contributed
The gender pay gap in the UK has been declining slowly over time. In 2020, the gap among full-time employees fell to 7.4%, from 9.0% in 2019. Among all employees it fell to 15.5%, from 17.4% in 2019.
At Yorkshire Housing we take diversity and inclusion very seriously and in the past 12 months we’ve cut our average gender pay gap by 8.35%, from 9.5% to 1.15%. The median (middle) gender pay gap, influenced by the distribution of men and women in roles with different levels of pay, has also been cut from 14.7% to -0.94%.
Work is something you do, not somewhere you go
We set out a number of actions that helped us achieve a positive impact on colleagues’ work-life balance and reduce the gender pay gap.
One step has been shifting our working mentality to ‘work is something you do, not somewhere you go’. We believe in giving our colleagues the choice of when and where they work and making flexible working genuinely flexible. This means moving away from a nine-to-five working day mentality and empowering colleagues to decide the best way to deliver their role to meet our business’ and customers’ needs.
This gives our people greater flexibility to arrange their working day around childcare or other caring responsibilities. We embraced new technology and fostered a culture designed to let us work at anytime, anyplace and anywhere.
Going beyond monetary value
Another action we’ve taken is paying at least the voluntary real living wage to colleagues. We recognised that making this contribution goes beyond monetary value, and it can have a positive impact on colleagues’ well-being, morale and mental health.
Research by the Living Wage Foundation told us that 75% of businesses paying the real living wage said it increased motivation and retention rates for employees, while 58% said it improved relations between managers and their teams.
“Although we have more women in senior roles, we know we still have to do more to encourage women into our trades roles, where we have only a few female engineers”
Breaking down the barriers
Another important step that helped us close our gender pay gap to just 1.15% was appointing more women in senior roles. For example, 52% of our board and committee members are female; traditionally male-dominated areas such as development, health and safety, and repairs and maintenance have female leadership; and in our ICT team 44% of managers are female.
We want to focus on breaking down barriers and give anyone the opportunity to have the career they choose, regardless of gender or any other characteristic.
Although we have more women in senior roles, we know we still have to do more to encourage women into our trades roles, where we have only a few female engineers. In traditionally male-dominated areas of our business, we have to work hard to break down stereotypes and recruit more women.
We will use our successful apprenticeship scheme to support this change. Fundamentally, it’s about creating an even workplace that brings benefits to everyone.
Understanding the issues
We want to make sure everyone at Yorkshire Housing understands their role in achieving a fair and equal workplace.
To help get a better understanding of the issues, we’re rolling out new diversity and inclusion training and we’re partnering with external experts like the Northern Housing Diversity Network and Inclusive Employers. This will ensure we keep learning and finding new ways to improve our approach.
Fairness, equality and respect
The move to a flexible working environment, paying at least the voluntary real living wage, breaking down the barriers and appointing more women in senior and typically male-dominated roles, and putting in place a strong focus on diversity and inclusion at work has helped cut our average gender pay gap.
We can do better and will continue to focus on employee experience and innovations to help us build a flexible and fair workplace. We will continue to improve how we recruit, retain and develop the best talent based on the principles of fairness, equality and respect for all.
Nina Evison, head of people, Yorkshire Housing
Already have an account? Click here to manage your newsletters