Housing’s diversity challenge

Even if you widen the scope to look at all executives across these housing associations – the most senior managers in the business – a shockingly low 15 out of 331 are BME, or 4.5%.

That means nearly three-quarters of housing associations have an executive team that is completely white, and two are led entirely by white male executives.

No association told us it had more than two BME executives. Inside Housing contacted the two organisations entirely led by white male executives to find out if the limited demographics of their executive teams was on their radar.

North Hertfordshire Homes is one of them – the 9,000-home association didn’t offer anyone for interview, but in a statement its company secretary Molly Clark says this is partly because the team is small – made up of three executives.

The organisation is more diverse lower down the management scale, she says, and has “seven senior management roles that report directly to the executive team. Of the seven roles, there are five women, of whom two are of BME origin”.

Great Places Housing Group, another association that has an all-white, all-male executive, makes a similar argument.

Its chair, Tony Davison, says that the executives are supported by a team of 10 directors.

“Although the executive team is entirely male, the director.... team is comprised of a majority of women,” he says. “We are confident, therefore, that our governance and senior leadership teams promote equality and diversity in our decision-making.

“The board has recently adopted a new equality and diversity strategy and is committed to ensuring our succession planning for the board and senior leadership team recognise the need to make sure we promote opportunities in the right places to ensure we attract a diverse range of candidates.”

READ ABOUT OUR INCLUSIVE FUTURES CAMPAIGN

While some parts of the country are more white than others, the local demographics were not mentioned by any of the associations Inside Housing contacted for comment. In its report, Altair suggests using the demographics of an organisation’s tenants as a benchmark.

Boards – which are typically drawn from a wider pool of talent outside the housing sector – are slightly more representative than executive teams in terms of race, gender, disability, sexuality, and tenant representation (tenants make up just over one in 10 board members).

For example, 50 board members identify as BME out of 735 in total (or 6.8%). However, 18 associations told us they have all-white boards, and a further 10 associations were not able to say because they did not hold this information on all or some of their board.

These results show negligible change since the start of 2016, when Inside Housing first carried out this survey. At that time, 4% of executives were BME, alongside 7% of board members, compared to 4.5% and 6.8% respectively today.

Steve Douglas, co-chief executive of Altair, says: “The figures are a sobering reminder that our reality is different from our rhetoric. The talent is there – if it’s not getting through, we should recognise it’s our sector’s problem and address it urgently.”

Some associations are already taking action. Optivo, recently formed from the merger of Amicus Horizon and Viridian, has decided to set “aspirational targets” for appointments to the board in future, says its executive director of people and communications, Kate Dodsworth.

The aim is for half of new board members to come from “protected groups” – such as BME people, women, disabled people or the LGBT community.

“The figures are a sobering reminder that our reality is different from our rhetoric.”

“The world is awash with talented people from these groups,” says Ms Dodsworth. “First of all you’ve got to acknowledge there’s a problem,” she adds, but says that it is time “to move to action – we’ve been lamenting [the problem] for years now”.

When it comes to taking further steps, one idea is the ‘Rooney rule’ taken from American football, where it was used to ensure that at least one minority candidate was included on the interview list for recruiting coaches. “For the future, it’s something I would consider,” says Ms Dodsworth.

Altair’s report sets out the five steps that landlords should be taking on race, and this week Inside Housing’s Inclusive Futures campaign is calling for the sector to champion diversity more widely – and sign up to the concrete steps we set out. The blueprint for action exists – now it is down to the sector to respond.