At Q5, diversity and inclusion is the thread that underpins all our values. We are committed to creating an inclusive environment that allows all our people to thrive and for their potential to be realised. We believe in giving every person the opportunity to succeed and to feel confident about bringing their best self to work. Diversity of people supported by an inclusive environment pushes us to deliver the best, most creative and innovative outcomes for our clients, communities and societies we work within.
We have been working to ensure that we collectively educate one another, engage in difficult conversations and broaden our own awareness and perspectives. Alongside this, we continuously review and challenge our core processes to ensure we are working to mitigate risks of bias and provide everyone an equal opportunity to thrive.
We are proud to work in a multicultural society and we are taking action to become a more diverse and inclusive organisation.
We ran several workshops, open to all Q5ers, to collectively define what Diversity and Inclusion at Q5 means. We came out with some key features such as defining diversity in its richest sense, linking our definition to our values and acknowledging that we all have a responsibility in creating an inclusive environment.
We arrived at the following definition – diversity is any dimension that can be used to differentiate people. Inclusion is making the organisational effort so those differences are valued and used to empower everyone to soar to their strengths and bring their best selves to work.
We are committed to embedding sustainable and lasting change to ensure we foster, celebrate and allow diversity to thrive at Q5. In order to do this, we have defined a framework that considers the different levers we can pull to embed D&I into how we operate on a day-to-day basis. This framework encourages us to sustain momentum and continuously challenge all aspects of our organisation.
We have many Q5ers that are empowered to develop and lead initiatives across the four core groups and support through our D&I Steerco.
We have been working to put in interventions that go beyond just policies and conversations. We have created our own D&I survey which allows all Q5ers to share how they feel around topics relating to inclusion, D&I interventions and actions and anti-discrimination. We analyse the results by different demographics to facilitate leadership workshops and co-create actions to ensure we are supporting all our people. Some of these actions include:
Rolled out our D&I survey
This measures key aspects such as representation, inclusion, D&I actions and anti-discrimination. We run this every six months and it allows us to analyse how different demographics across Q5 feel and experience and forms the basis of our actions and interventions whilst allowing us to measure our performance and progress.
Created a reverse mentoring programme
This programme aims to create a ‘reverse’ relationship placing a more senior person as the primary learner whilst emphasising the experiences of the junior mentor. The aim is to create a safe space for stimulating and challenging conversations that broaden our thinking, our viewpoints and awareness.
Introduced our courageous conversation initiative
This is a monthly series which focuses on a different aspect of Diversity and introduces work-related scenarios that individuals may face. The aim is to pick scenarios that prompt difficult discussions and allow us to empathise with each other by understanding what it is like to walk and think in another person’s shoes. We have run conversations relating to women in the workplace, LGBTQ+ on client site and understanding neurodiversity.
Other actions include:
We have also taken conscious steps to review our recruitment lifecycle to ensure it reflects the fact we welcome people from all backgrounds and are strongly passionate about providing equal opportunities. Actions include:
To learn more about our recruitment process and job openings at Q5, click below.
