Deloitte publishes its Black Action Plan

Deloitte UK has published its Black Action Plan. The plan, launched today via a firmwide webinar to 20,000 of Deloitte’s people hosted by Richard Houston, UK CEO, and Dimple Agarwal, deputy CEO and managing partner for people and purpose, is based on five key commitments that align to the firm’s global shared values of inclusion and taking care of each other.

Deloitte has responded to the Black Lives Matter movement by hosting a series of listening sessions for its people across all parts of the firm. These sessions included hearing from and understanding the experiences of Black colleagues. A firmwide working group was formed to work closely with the leadership and develop the actions.

Dimple Agarwal, deputy CEO and managing partner for people and purpose at Deloitte, said: “Over the last month we have listened, learned and started an important journey with people across the firm and with our Black colleagues. The stories, feedback and comments have brought home the difficult truth that bias and racism are widespread in our society.

“While we’ve made progress on our wider inclusion agenda over recent years, it is absolutely clear that we need to do more. Today we are going beyond listening and we are committed to the lessons we have learnt. This is a considered plan that will deliver concrete actions.”

The Black Action Plan is based on five key commitments. Each action comes with meaningful and measurable objectives that ensures Deloitte will:

1. Provide equal opportunities: Deloitte will review every step of the employee lifecycle – from how it attracts and recruits talent, through to promotion and pay processes to ensure Black and Ethnic Minority colleagues are treated fairly.
2. Focus on developing people to succeed and thrive: Deloitte will design and deliver development programmes that support its Black and Ethnic Minority colleagues to thrive and become leaders of the future. 
3. Drive and evolve culture and behaviours: Recognising that achieving real and meaningful change requires everyone to think and act differently, Deloitte will implement cultural change that starts with education and understanding. This will include rolling out a mandatory training programme on ethnicity and race, and launching a Black Allies programme within the firm.
4. Influence change: Deloitte will continue to use its network to help bring about social change – working with clients, industry peers, charity partners and suppliers. This will include developing a relationship with a new Black charity partner and expanding the portfolio of Black-owned social enterprises it works with.
5. Measure and report on targets and outcomes: Deloitte is committing to 12% of Ethnic Minority and 3% of Black partners by 2025. The firm will also commit to targets across other grades to create the future pipeline. Leaders will be held accountable for these targets.
   

“The impact of all of these actions together will be bigger than the sum of their parts - such as race training for all of our people focusing on micro-aggressions and conscious inclusion,” added Agarwal. “Not only will it add up to a fairer and more positive overall experience for our people but for the communities in which we work.”

Deloitte’s Multicultural Network was created 14 years ago along with 10 other diversity networks. The network supports the firm’s focus on ensuring that it provides an inclusive culture that is underpinned by respect.

Nadine Dyer, co-chair of the Multicultural Network at Deloitte, said: “This action plan is an important step in the right direction. We have listened and talked, discussed and planned and now it’s time for meaningful action. All of our people across the firm will have the responsibility of taking this plan forward and bringing it to life.”

Agarwal concluded: “I want to personally thank my colleagues who have shared their stories so courageously and provided honest feedback to me. I have been humbled, saddened and shocked by what I’ve heard. We are deeply committed to this action plan and the wider commitment by the firm that we can, and will, make a change.”

-Ends-

Notes
Find out more about The Black Action Plan.

Deloitte’s latest Ethnicity Pay Gap Report was published in November 2019 and Deloitte has voluntarily been measuring and reporting on this pay gap since 2017.

Ethnicity employee data at Deloitte UK:

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