Ethnicity and multiculturalism

We know the benefits a diverse workforce and inclusive culture bring. Our industry as a whole has a long way to go to achieve better ethnic and cultural diversity and inclusion. At abrdn we’re focused on actions that are sustainable and systemic and improve outcomes for Black and ethnic minority colleagues. We’re seeing results, and we’re determined to continue to make progress.

What we’ve done in 2021-2022

Attracting, retaining and developing

We use inclusive recruitment practices, including a diverse interview pool, and augmented software to make language in job adverts more inclusive – so that they’re more easily understood by people whose first language isn’t English. And we partner with organisations to reach ethnic minority candidates who might not have been attracted to work in asset management – including #10,000BlackInterns, Black Professionals Scotland, Catalyst After Schools Program and SEO London – Her Capital.

Data insight

We believe transparency helps drive progress in our industry. We’ve shared our first target to increase representation of ethnic minority colleagues, and in 2021 we published our EEO-1 data in the US for the first time. We’ll set more targets when we have built more data. We’ve also committed to improving our data on the proportion of businesses in our supply chain that are owned by minority groups – to gain a better understanding of diversity levels within our supply base.

Understanding issues

Through workshops we’ve trained colleagues to work effectively and build teams across different cultures, as well as raising awareness and celebrating ethnicity and multiculturalism through events and initiatives. Our executive leadership team has also taken part in six-month reverse mentoring programmes with ethnic minority colleagues, and reverse mentoring is now expanded across multiple diversity characteristics to our wider leadership teams.

Supporting colleagues

We have safe spaces for colleagues to connect and learn - through our ethnicity and multicultural network Unity, ethnicity-related learning and development, and our ‘Talk about race’ discussions and self-reflection guide.

Our progress as at 31 December 2022

45%

Ethnic minority intern intake

2021: 43% (UK)

Early careers

Micro internship launched

New US programme for university students

6%

UK ethnic minority workforce

2021: 5%
2020: 4%

60%

Colleague diversity data shared

2021: 60%
2020: 55%

Race and ethnicity pledges and commitments

Race at Work Charter

We were one of the inaugural signatories to the Race at Work Charter in 2018, and following the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020, our Chief Executive Officer Stephen Bird became a signatory to the open letter on Black inclusion (by Audeliss and Involve).
Corporate Call to Action

We’re proud to be part of the Corporate Call to Action: Coalition for Equity & Opportunity (CCA) in the US - a corporate social justice initiative, launched in September 2020 by the Connecticut Office of the Treasurer, in partnership with the Ford Foundation.
Change the Race Ratio

In 2021, we joined the Change the Race Ratio pledge, a CBI/Investment Association collaboration of employers to make progress on ethnic minority representation beyond Board level.