As US companies roll back diversity programmes they were once eager to promote, many British HR chiefs are determined not to follow corporate America’s lead, triggering a battle with senior bosses. The Telegraph has more.
At a recent dinner for the HR chiefs of Britain’s biggest listed companies, anger was stirring. Donald Trump’s crackdown on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in America was riling up many guests.
According to one of those in attendance, the prevailing mood in the room was: “We need to take a stand against this. We’re not going to bow down to Trump and move in that direction.”
As US companies roll back diversity programmes they were once eager to promote, many British HR chiefs are determined not to follow corporate America’s lead.
Divides are already emerging between the British and American arms of global businesses.
At Deloitte, staff in the US have been told to stop listing their pronouns at the end of email signatures as part of a broader retrenchment on DEI. Yet managers in the UK have reiterated their commitment to diversity targets, telling staff they will not copy the policy of Deloitte US.
Behind the scenes, many more similar battles are taking place. Splits are said to be emerging at major global banks, insurance companies and tech businesses.
“I have it on good authority that there are tensions between US and UK arms of insurance firms,” says one diversity adviser. “In response to the US arms shutting down DEI, one HR in the City here has said she will simply rebrand the work from DEI to culture and inclusion if that’s what it takes to keep going.”
For some British bosses, the pushback against DEI was overdue. Calls to offer gender-neutral bathrooms, include pronouns at the bottom of emails and spend more time and money on diversifying a company’s ranks were taking up more and more executive energy.
“You hear about a lot of people in my role feeling trapped between the person they brought in to lead the [DEI] agenda and their executive colleagues,” says the HR chief of a FTSE 100 company.
“On the one hand, you have someone [in charge of DEI] saying we need to go harder, further. And on the other hand, you have a board saying this isn’t a priority for us right now, this isn’t something we want to spend as much boardroom time on.”
A crackdown in America gives British boards the “cover of darkness” to make changes they had already been planning, the executive says. The need to cut costs post-Budget had already put so-called ‘nice to have’ initiatives such as DEI departments in the firing line for cuts.
“HR needs to be wise to the fact that boards are going to have a second look [at this] and where they can, reduce spend,” says Heeral Gudka, a consultant who advises companies on their diversity strategies. “Now they have a gold-plated reason to do it.”
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