{"id":10591,"date":"2023-07-19T09:44:38","date_gmt":"2023-07-19T09:44:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diversityproject.com\/?post_type=resource&p=10591"},"modified":"2023-08-10T16:31:35","modified_gmt":"2023-08-10T16:31:35","slug":"early-careers-through-a-social-mobility-lens-an-interview-with-rachel-allan","status":"publish","type":"resource","link":"https:\/\/diversityproject.com\/resource\/early-careers-through-a-social-mobility-lens-an-interview-with-rachel-allan\/","title":{"rendered":"Early careers through a social mobility lens: An interview with Rachel Allan"},"content":{"rendered":"
Early careers through a social mobility lens: An interview with Rachel Allan<\/strong><\/p>\n Early careers recruiting is a much-discussed way of introducing a more diverse workforce into your organisation, but how do you ensure your early careers intake is diverse from a socioeconomic perspective? We caught up with Rachel Allan \u2013 an L&D and Inclusion HR specialist with over 15 years\u2019 experience in the Investment & Savings industry \u2013 to find out.<\/em><\/p>\n So how do you get started when you have the brief to recruit a truly diverse early careers cohort for your organisation?<\/strong><\/p>\n The first step has to be getting buy-in. Many leaders talk about the importance of hiring a diverse cohort but do they really know what that means? To recruit a diverse early-careers cohort, particularly from a social mobility perspective, you need to get rid of potentially long-standing barriers to entry \u2013 having a degree, graduating from a particular university, studying particular subjects, achieving a 2:1, achieving certain grades at A level and so on. You might need to approach this piecemeal \u2013 so for some roles the bar might be higher, but you need to be clear on the entry requirements for each role and leaders and hiring managers need to be briefed and fully bought in.<\/p>\n Your leaders are on board, great. What\u2019s next?<\/strong><\/p>\n You need to have tightly defined role descriptions for each position. This should focus on aptitude and potential, as well as be aligned to your organisation\u2019s values. You also need to have an agreed recruitment process. If you are asking for CVs, how will they be screened? Will you be asking candidates to provide a video of themselves outlining their interest in the organisation? And if so, what are the scoring criteria? Will there be any formal assessments? Formal assessments should be treated carefully as evidence is emerging that they can act as a deterrent to people from lower socio-economic backgrounds. Design your interview questions and then get them reviewed by hiring managers, former early careers participants and colleagues to check they aren’t disadvantaging anyone who might not have financial services experience. If there are individual or group tasks that form part of your assessment, review these to ensure they are accessible to everyone, regardless of their background.<\/p>\n What about the actual recruitment?<\/strong><\/p>\n Whether you are recruiting yourself, or working with an agency or partner (e.g., Upreach or Investment 20\/20), make sure everyone is aligned on what you’re looking to achieve as an end result. Make conscious decisions about where your adverts are going to appear and how you will drive traffic to them. Check the language and wording of your adverts (and job descriptions) to ensure they are welcoming to everyone, jargon free and don’t set the bar unnecessarily high. If you are recruiting graduates, think about the universities you would like to partner with and ask whether they are able to target students from lower socio-economic backgrounds. At each stage of the recruitment process, ensure you have robust and objective criteria to measure applicants against so you don’t arbitrarily rule out a quality candidate.<\/p>\n