It’s the time of the year that many businesses, including ourselves, swap their corporate logos with rainbow-themed ones to signal their support to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, or asexual (LGBTQIA+) community.  Some of you might be sceptical or think of it as ‘pride washing’; are we making a ‘real’ difference within the business or a wider society? Let’s take this opportunity to review our journey so far in progressing equity, diversity, and inclusion at 4C. 

We believe allyship is extremely important in supporting people who are in the marginalised community, so we’ve asked our colleagues what allyship means to them. 

What other words come to mind when you think of Allyship?

According to We Create Space (WCS), an ally is “someone who supports people who are in a minority group or who are discriminated against even though they do not belong to that group themselves.” The team at 4C strives to be ‘active allies’ who can stand up to discriminatory or unfair situations rather than passive allies who are sympathetic bystanders. 

WCS recommends the following approach to becoming an active ally: (i) Acknowledge—respect different experiences and avoid making assumptions; (ii) Listen – learn and educate yourself about differences and your own biases; (iii) Lead – empathy and compassion to build trust and continue the conversation; and (iv) Your Role – take action and be an advocate. Show support for others’ ideas and work, give credit where it’s due, and don’t condone biased behaviour. 

We are proud to be part of B Corp, and the key mission of the B Corp movement is “to build an economy that is more inclusive and equitable for all people on our shared planet”. With that in mind, we launched 4Impact, our internal organisational transformation programme, encompassing the following projects: (i) Home for Talent – attracting, retaining and creating a home for the best talent; (ii) Platform for Growth – enabling the growth of individuals as an organisation; (iii) Tilt to Market – Laser-focused on our clients and the industries in which they operate; and (iv) Focus, in all we do – the right balance between rigour and pace, and execute relentlessly. As part of the 4Impact programme, we aimed to improve inclusivity and equitability as an organisation by addressing the wheel of power (as pictured below) whilst transforming our ways of working and policies, our operating model, organisational culture, recruitment, resourcing, employee experience, and recognition and reward mechanisms. 

Source: Click Here

We will continue progressing our allyship journey and measuring its success through workforce demographic information captured in our continual voluntary ED&I survey. We are open to supporting other organisations considering being part of the B Corp community and can recommend self-assessing your organisation using the allyship continuum, defined by WCS, below: 

  • Apathy – No understanding of the issues 
  • Aware – Building basic knowledge and awareness, but no real action 
  • Active – Committed, championing inclusion, taking consistent action 
  • Advocate – Well-informed, actively seeking out understanding and diverse perspectives 

 Happy Pride Month from the team at 4C – let’s work together to achieve a more inclusive and equitable workplace every day.