Businesses urged to create 'more inclusive workplaces'

15 May 2017

The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) has urged UK businesses to create ‘more inclusive workplaces’, and to not allow the creation of such workplace environments to ‘slip down’ their agendas.

In a report entitled ‘Time for Action’, the CBI discovered that employees are 83% more likely to innovate and are more than twice as engaged within both diverse and inclusive workplaces.

The business group argued that increased workplace diversity is not just a matter of fairness: it is a ‘hard-nosed business case’ standing in the way of major changes in demographics and technology. 

Commenting on the issue, Carolyn Fairbairn, Director General of the CBI, said: ‘Progress towards inclusive workplaces must pick up the pace. And I’m not just talking about gender. I’m talking about every kind of diversity – ethnicity, social background, sexual orientation, age.

‘At times of great change, and we are most certainly in one, priorities compete and things can go backwards. It can be too easy to let things slip down a list, perhaps even to seek comfort in the familiar, people like you and not different from you.’