Socio Economic Diversity - why who you are is so much more important than where you’re from

I have attended a couple of events in recent weeks with a focus on socio economic diversity. Coming from a non-professional background it is a topic close to my heart. The first was a joint FCA / PRA event for firms on the Skilled Person Panels. It was interesting to hear the Regulators list out areas of focus for the coming years – areas that may well feature in s166 requirement notices – namely diversity and inclusion, culture, ESG and consumer duty. Just yesterday the FCA put out a Diversity & Inclusion paper stating that they want “an inclusive industry where the most capable are able to progress, no matter what their background, and where diversity of thought is valued.” The second event was a culmination of two years work by the Socio Economic Diversity Taskforce to promote socio economic diversity in financial and professional services. The high-level conclusions were broadly the same – there are huge benefits to a more socio economically diverse workforce.

It is a topic I’ve often thought about as my career has progressed.  My Dad worked in a car factory and when we were kids my Mum cleaned offices in the evenings. I went to the local comprehensive school in Coventry. What was important to my parents was that you had a job and worked hard – it didn’t necessarily matter what the job was – you just needed to be in employment. And this is not a criticism of my parents. They are a product of their own environment – baby boomers who grew up in a city flattened in the war. This combined with a school whose careers programme consisted of filling out a form of five questions with an automated answer that I should be an “archaeologist” was not conducive to understanding the art of the possible. Quite simply, as a lad, I had no idea what financial or professional services were – so how can you ever know that it might be something of interest?

An incident in my first job in London working for the National Criminal Intelligence Service also had an effect on how I approach this matter today. I was talking to a colleague who was well spoken and educated at boarding school. We were discussing holidays and he advised that he was off to the family estate in Scotland for a week of salmon fishing. Inexplicably I found myself resenting him, telling myself I didn’t like him (I was off on a lads’ holiday to a Greek island). And the reason was that it was totally alien to what I knew. I’m embarrassed to admit it. We carried on working together, played for the cricket team together and it soon became apparent that I did like this guy, and actually in many ways we were very similar. Both driven, hardworking, humble, bright guys – we’d just taken completely different paths to get to where we were.

So What?

I can hear Richard asking me the so what question – so here’s the answer:

For society - more needs to be done to educate parents of pupils at state schools as to the sort of careers that are open to their bright kids. And in a similar vein, state schools must be pushed to educate pupils on things like – what the financial services sector is, and what skill sets are valued in the sector. This can help kids join the dots and conclude “I can do that”. A number of us at Avyse have volunteered for the Education and Employers charity which connects schools with volunteers from the world of work.

For Financial Services Firms - there are two main reasons as to why socio economic diversity should be important to them – (1) it’s good for business. Different perspectives tend to lead to more engaging working environments and better outcomes for customers (2) Regulators will be asking you what you are doing about it. Better to have demonstrable outputs as opposed to lip service.

For Avyse Partners - I am an employer now. What I have come realise is that what is most important is hiring people with similar values and characteristics to us. I think there is a bit of a tendency when talking about socio-economic diversity to only associate it with gritty working class stories. For me this is only part of it. When I employ someone I’m looking for hungry, hardworking, humble, loyal, bright, fun people. In many cases these traits are found in people with a similar background to me – and if it’s a 50/50 call, I will always lean towards the person from a non-professional background. However, experience has taught me that the values and characteristics I covet are not exclusive to those from non-professional backgrounds. Each person must be assessed on merit irrespective of how they speak or where they went to school. Isn’t this what we should all be aiming for?

Go well.

David.