Continued adoption of diversity targets and improved reporting of race, disability, and gender identification is found to be helpful in improving the performance of telecom companies, according to an analysis of UK leading service providers to enterprise customers conducted by GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.
Robert Pritchard, Principal Analyst, Enterprise Technology & Services at GlobalData, says: “Quite notably, the proportion of female employees versus males is growing, particularly at the C-Suite level, and the proportion of ethnic, disabled, and LGBTQ+ employees is more closely reflecting the broader population. With women in charge at the likes of BT, Colt, TalkTalk, and Vodafone, the glass ceiling has truly been broken.”
GlobalData finds that the broader trend towards a more diversified workforce is slower due to lower turnover of staff below the C-Suite, but the direction of travel is clear.
Pritchard adds: “Numerous studies and academic analyses have underlined the value of a diversified workforce. Diversity helps avoid the perils of groupthink and better reflects customer demography – even in the enterprise segment. It also leads to greater innovation and helps to attract younger employees with highly sought-after skills.”
GlobalData’s analysis found that diversity is also playing a more important commercial role between companies, with service providers including diversity targets in their assessments of supplier proposals. This is expected to continue to extend along the value chain to customers, where meeting diversity targets could be the difference between a supplier winning a contract or not.
Analysis of just one of the major service providers in GlobalData’s ‘Workforce Diversity: UK Telcos’ report finds that its diversity requirements in contracts equate to €950 million a year. This is serious money.
Pritchard concludes: “Despite some scaling back of diversity programs following earlier overexuberance and cynicism amongst some politicians and investors, the fact is that diversity has a demonstrable positive commercial impact. As with everything in business, you need to make an effort and an investment to maximize your market opportunity.”
