LGBTQ+ Our well-established LGBTQ+ Employee Advisory Group works to maintain an inclusive culture for LGBTQ+ people at Severn Trent. Since 2017, the network has teamed up with Stonewall to help get us into the top 200 of the Stonewall Index. We have promoted diversity within the organisation and updated our policies and procedures to be more inclusive. In addition, our LGBTQ+ Allies programme offers training to help our employees understand the role they can play in creating a safe, inclusive workplace for everyone. The group also ran virtual webinars and awareness sessions to mark LGBTQ+ history month. Colleagues with disabilities or health conditions We support those with a disability, health condition or illness to ensure they can reach their full potential. If any employee becomes disabled during their time with us, we will re-train them and, where possible, make reasonable adjustments to their work environment. Our Disability Employee Advisory Group contains representatives from across the organisation who highlight opportunities to continue to create an accessible and inclusive environment for our colleagues. This year we signed up to the Hidden Disability Sunflower Programme, which aims to indicate discreetly that wearers of the sunflower have a hidden disability and may need additional support, help or more time. Family-friendly policies We offer all the normal policies expected of a major company – maternity, paternity, adoption, and flexible working (including early retirement). All go beyond statutory legal requirements other than our shared parental leave, an offer that has seen a very low uptake nationally. We aim to follow the best practice guidance provided to us by experts in their fields. In addition, we subscribe to Working Families to ensure we are benchmarking the policies, and work with Stonewall to ensure they are appropriate for LGBTQ+ colleagues. Some of our latest developments include special policies to support neonatal care leave, leave for fertility treatment and IVF, and emergency dependency leave. Tackling and supporting ‘taboo’ topics We’ve shown our public support for topics people often have difficulty talking about – the menopause, mental health and endometriosis, for example – with a series of informative internal communications as well as support for those who might need it. Future guides include those on living with cancer, and neurodiverse conditions. Active Leadership We need active leadership on diversity and inclusion, so we’re educating and equipping our managers. All 300 of our senior management team and business leaders are taking part in awareness training run by external experts. Recognition of our progress We’re pleased to report we’re doing well in working towards our diversity and inclusion goals. We constantly monitor our progress through a number of indices and rankings – and although we welcome the recognition, we also see these placings as opportunities to do more. The Hampton-Alexander Review We now rank second in this survey of female representation in senior leadership roles. Equileap Gender Equality Global Report We rated 5th best in the UK and are the only UK-based utility company to feature in the top 100. We also rated 31st globally out of over 4,000 organisations analysed. The Social Mobility Index We’ve been in the top ten for two consecutive years. The Stonewall Index In this listing that measures LGBTQ+ inclusion, we’ve moved in the past year from 414th to 175th place. The Tortoise Sustainability Index Also known as The Responsible Business Index, this ranks us fourth in the FTSE100 for equality and the highest ranking utility in sixth overall. The Diversity Leaders Ranked by the Financial Times, this index assesses companies for inclusivity by surveying their employees. We’re one of only six UK utilities to place in the top 200, coming 198th out of 15,000 organisations. Joining charters and campaigns We’ve signed up to a number of new charters, including the following: The BiTC Race at Work Charter, promoting racial equality and zero tolerance on racial discrimination The Dying to Work Charter, giving terminally ill employees options about how they want to work The Government’s Disability Confident Scheme, helping employers attract, recruit and retain disabled employees Stonewall Diversity Champion, helping organisations create inclusive working environments for LGBTQ+ employees Social Mobility Pledge founder member, which is one of the highest accreditations, signalling our commitment to social mobility Listening to our employees Although our rankings and memberships are clear indicators of our progress in diversity and inclusion, the true measure of success is having a diverse workforce and a culture of fairness where everyone feels included and can succeed. So we devote a lot of time to finding out our employees’ views on these matters – mainly through Quest, our annual employee engagement survey. Our highest-rated question in this is on equality, where we score 8.9 out of a possible 10, against a benchmark of 8. Building a better business Creating a diverse and inclusive environment continued Reverse mentoring Reverse mentoring We’ve matched several of our Executive team and senior managers with reverse mentors – the process of ‘more junior’ employees passing on their knowledge – and in this case, lived experiences – to senior employees including our Chief Executive Officer and Directors of Human Resources and Customer Operations.