Stonewall Workplace Equality Index
Emma Turnbull
Managing Consultant, Boost Awards
Stonewall Index
Diversity is about recognising difference. Inclusion is where people’s differences are valued and used to enable everyone to thrive at work. Equality means all people will be treated fairly, irrespective of differences. All three are essential in the modern workplace. Diversity, equality and inclusion cover every aspect of life from age to ethnicity, religion to gender, gender identity and sexual orientation.
Stonewall’s aim from the outset (30 years ago now) was to create a vibrant global movement for transformative change, made up of LGBTQ+ people, allies, families and friends. Since day one, they’ve fought for freedom, for equity and for potential, both in work and in daily life. Lesbian, gay, bi, trans, queer, questioning and ace (LGBTQ+) people bring value to organisations by providing a different set of experiences and perspectives.
The reasons for building a diverse, equal and inclusive organisation go far beyond the idea that welcoming people of all types is “the right thing to do.” Diversity, equality and inclusion are essential for competitive advantage as they are tied to better business performance and greater levels of innovation.
The Stonewall Workplace Equality Indices – What you need to know
The Stonewall UK and Global Workplace Equality Indices are the definitive benchmarks for employers to measure their LGBTQ+ workplace inclusion achievements and progress.
Participating employers demonstrate their work across all areas of employment policy and practice. The entries are beasts with the potential to be over 35,000 words, plus a plethora of supporting material to show your policies, inclusion activity and more.
In terms of the entry forms, The Stonewall UK Index and Global Workplace Equality Index consist of multiple sections, each of which contain numerous open and closed questions examining your business. These questions are updated on a cyclical basis – this year sees new questions and a revised structure for the UK index.
The UK Stonewall Index 2024 will open on 5th September 2023 and close on the 29th November, while The Stonewall Global Index has now closed for 2023 with a 22nd March 2023 deadline.
Things to bear in mind….
- Start early – the earlier you are thinking about collecting examples and supporting evidence, the better – ideally on an ongoing basis annually.
- Get the business on board – you will need input and support in terms of time and information from all areas of the business to complete.
- Don’t underestimate the time it takes to complete the form – it may seem like the time from applications opening to the deadline is plenty, but as I said, if you can provide responses to the majority of questions, it can be over 35,000 words – that’s more than most dissertations!
“Participating employers demonstrate their work across all areas of employment policy and practice. The entries are beasts with the potential to be over 35,000 words, plus a plethora of supporting material to show your policies, inclusion activity and more.”
- There is help available! My colleagues and I at Boost Awards are highly experienced when it comes to these applications, having both advised on and completed successful applications for major multinational companies. We can take away the stress and strain of the somewhat formidable process involved, while increasing your chances. Contact me today to discuss further.
How to enter the UK Workplace Equality Index
An anonymous survey is sent to all staff to complete, and the results of these questions will make up 10% of your final score. The questions ask employees about their experiences, opinions and attitudes to inclusion in your workplace – examining both LGBTQ+ and non-LGBTQ+ responses.
For the UK written entry form, the sections are:
- Policies & Benefits
- This section examines the policies and benefits you have in place to support LGBTQ+ staff. These questions inspect the policy audit process, content and communications.
- Employee Lifecycle
- Examining attraction, recruitment and development within your business. Looking at your engagement and support systems through the employee lifecycle.
- LGBTQ+ Employee Resource Group
- The function and activity of your LGBTQ+ network within your business.
- Empowering Individuals
- Inspecting how you engage and empower LGBTQ+ and non-LGBT employees to step up as change makers and allies within the business.
- Leadership
- How do you engage your leaders (both at Board, Senior and Line Management levels) plus how they themselves encourage and empower LGBTQ+ initiatives and actions.
- Monitoring
- Understanding your data collection methodology, analysis and outcomes taken.
- Supply Chains
- Examines how you affect change within your supply chain to ensure LGBTQ+ inclusion within suppliers and tender process.
- External Engagement and Service Delivery
- This section comprises of three parts.
- Part 1 – Community Engagement – examines outreach activity and how it supports wider LGBTQ+ communities.
- Part 2 – Sector Engagement – examines how you promote LGBTQ+ equality to other organisations in your sector.
- Part 3 – Service Delivery – looks at how you ensure you meet the needs of service users or customers.
- This section comprises of three parts.
Additional awards
This year will see Stonewall also award additional awards for Change Makers of the Year and Network of the Year – highlighting the individuals and networks that are making a real difference in their workplace and communities for LGBTQ+ inclusivity.
Another change to this year’s format is that to provide employers with a more transparent, fixed path of progression through the Index, Stonewall are introducing Gold, Silver and Bronze Employer awards. The Gold, Silver and Bronze Employer awards will recognise and celebrate the different stages of LGBTQ+ inclusion that an employer has reached and the progress they have made.
Employers must meet nine specific, fixed requirements that are highlighted throughout the application. Gold, Silver and Bronze Employers will be announced alongside the Top 100 with no additional application needed. You can still win one of these, even if you are not quite scoring high enough to feature in the Top 100.
The Top 100 Employers list will feature the 100 employers with the highest overall scores.
How to enter the Global Workplace Equality Index
Organisations that operate in different countries globally are faced with varying challenges in each. This uneven playing field makes direct comparisons difficult, so to counter this the global entry assesses how you approach sexual orientation and gender identity equality from a global level and also within operating countries. To do this, countries are grouped into three zones based on whether sexual acts between people of the same sex are legal and whether there exist clear national employment protections for lesbian, gay and bi people. There are questions specifically relating to each zone in eight of the nine sections. In country activity must not include activity in the UK.
For the global form, the sections are as follows:
- Employee Policy
- Examining the policies in place that guarantee the equal treatment of lesbian, gay, bi and trans employees.
- Training
- Scutinises your sexual orientation and gender identity training materials and practices. This section does not ask for zonal examples.
- Staff Engagement
- This section looks at how you engage with all staff to raise awareness on LGBT+ issues, the networking opportunities and if you consult and gather feedback
“LGBTQ+ people face discrimination in every country, and same-sex relationships are criminalised in more than 70. This poses serious legal, ethical and practical challenges to global employers. The Global Equality Index is free to enter and is open to any multinational organisation, enabling them to navigate these challenges and make progress towards LGBTQ+ equality, no matter where in the world they operate.”
- Leadership
- What does your leadership do to advance LGBT+ equality across your global operation and also how it promotes and establishes diversity within the leadership teams themselves.
- Monitoring
- Where and how do you monitor sexual orientation and gender identity of all global staff and the forms used to collect and analyse it.
- Procurement
- Looking at how you engage and promote LGBT+ with existing and potential suppliers on a global scale.
- Community Engagement and Understanding Local Context
- Here we are looking at how you engage with the wider LGBT+ community, your external facing strategy and steps taken to understand the local context for LGBT+ people.
- Global Mobility
- What steps do you take to support LGBT+ employees before and during international secondments and role moves.
- Additional In Country Activity
- A place to capture the over and above activity within the zones that may not have been mentioned previously within the form.
What’s in it for you?
Assess your progress
Assess what you are doing in terms of LGBTQ+ inclusion in your workplace. Regardless of where you are on your inclusion journey, the Index process and feedback can help guide your progress.
Understand employees
Understanding your employees and their experiences is crucial. They should directly inform the changes. The Index provides insight into staff experiences through the survey. If you are one of Stonewall’s Diversity Champions then you will receive full results benchmarked against sector and region.
Show your commitment
Entering the Index is a fantastic way to show your commitment to LGBTQ+ equality. It demonstrates that making your workplace, services and products LGBTQ+ inclusive is a priority.
Promote your progress
If you achieve a coveted Top 100 spot, you’ll be able to use the Top 100 Employers logo to promote your achievement.
Look to the future
Through the feedback you receive and potential gaps within your submission, you can use it as a developmental framework.
Next steps?
I hope you have found this article helpful as an introduction to the application requirements for either of the Stonewall Workplace Equality Indices. If you would like to maximise your chances of achieving a top 100 position or moving up the league, while minimising the disruption to your workload and workplace, then I recommend you get in touch with us here at Boost. One of our team of experts (mostly full-time payrolled award entry consultants) will be able to help. We’ve been helping businesses enter The Stonewall Index for many years, and we are more experienced than any other agency in the world when it comes to these awards.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Emma
Useful links:
To contact Emma personally about The Stonewall Workplace Equality Index: emma.turnbull@boost-awards.co.uk
The Stonewall UK Workplace Equality Index
The Stonewall Global Workplace Equality Index
We also have a useful article about entering Diversity and Inclusion Awards
Boost – a helping hand entering awards
Boost Awards is the world’s first and largest award entry consultancy, having helped clients – from SMEs to Multinationals – win over 2,000 credible business awards. Increase your chances of success significantly – call Boost on +44(0)1273 258703 today for a no-obligation chat about awards.
(C) This article was written by Emma Turnbull and is the intellectual property of Boost Awards.
Stonewall Workplace Equality Index
Emma Turnbull
Managing Consultant, Boost Awards
Stonewall Index
Diversity is about recognising difference. Inclusion is where people’s differences are valued and used to enable everyone to thrive at work. Equality means all people will be treated fairly, irrespective of differences. All three are essential in the modern workplace. Diversity, equality and inclusion cover every aspect of life from age to ethnicity, religion to gender, gender identity and sexual orientation.
Stonewall’s aim from the outset (30 years ago now) was to create a vibrant global movement for transformative change, made up of LGBTQ+ people, allies, families and friends. Since day one, they’ve fought for freedom, for equity and for potential, both in work and in daily life. Lesbian, gay, bi, trans, queer, questioning and ace (LGBTQ+) people bring value to organisations by providing a different set of experiences and perspectives.
The reasons for building a diverse, equal and inclusive organisation go far beyond the idea that welcoming people of all types is “the right thing to do.” Diversity, equality and inclusion are essential for competitive advantage as they are tied to better business performance and greater levels of innovation.
The Stonewall Workplace Equality Indices – What you need to know
The Stonewall UK and Global Workplace Equality Indices are the definitive benchmarks for employers to measure their LGBTQ+ workplace inclusion achievements and progress.
Participating employers demonstrate their work across all areas of employment policy and practice. The entries are beasts with the potential to be over 35,000 words, plus a plethora of supporting material to show your policies, inclusion activity and more.
In terms of the entry forms, The Stonewall UK Index and Global Workplace Equality Index consist of multiple sections, each of which contain numerous open and closed questions examining your business. These questions are updated on a cyclical basis – this year sees new questions and a revised structure for the UK index.
The UK Stonewall Index 2024 will open on 5th September 2023 and close on the 29th November, while The Stonewall Global Index has now closed for 2023 with a 22nd March 2023 deadline.
Things to bear in mind….
- Start early – the earlier you are thinking about collecting examples and supporting evidence, the better – ideally on an ongoing basis annually.
- Get the business on board – you will need input and support in terms of time and information from all areas of the business to complete.
- Don’t underestimate the time it takes to complete the form – it may seem like the time from applications opening to the deadline is plenty, but as I said, if you can provide responses to the majority of questions, it can be over 35,000 words – that’s more than most dissertations!
“Participating employers demonstrate their work across all areas of employment policy and practice. The entries are beasts with the potential to be over 35,000 words, plus a plethora of supporting material to show your policies, inclusion activity and more.”
- There is help available! My colleagues and I at Boost Awards are highly experienced when it comes to these applications, having both advised on and completed successful applications for major multinational companies. We can take away the stress and strain of the somewhat formidable process involved, while increasing your chances. Contact me today to discuss further.
How to enter the UK Workplace Equality Index
An anonymous survey is sent to all staff to complete, and the results of these questions will make up 10% of your final score. The questions ask employees about their experiences, opinions and attitudes to inclusion in your workplace – examining both LGBTQ+ and non-LGBTQ+ responses.
For the UK written entry form, the sections are:
- Policies & Benefits
- This section examines the policies and benefits you have in place to support LGBTQ+ staff. These questions inspect the policy audit process, content and communications.
- Employee Lifecycle
- Examining attraction, recruitment and development within your business. Looking at your engagement and support systems through the employee lifecycle.
- LGBTQ+ Employee Resource Group
- The function and activity of your LGBTQ+ network within your business.
- Empowering Individuals
- Inspecting how you engage and empower LGBTQ+ and non-LGBT employees to step up as change makers and allies within the business.
- Leadership
- How do you engage your leaders (both at Board, Senior and Line Management levels) plus how they themselves encourage and empower LGBTQ+ initiatives and actions.
- Monitoring
- Understanding your data collection methodology, analysis and outcomes taken.
- Supply Chains
- Examines how you affect change within your supply chain to ensure LGBTQ+ inclusion within suppliers and tender process.
- External Engagement and Service Delivery
- This section comprises of three parts.
- Part 1 – Community Engagement – examines outreach activity and how it supports wider LGBTQ+ communities.
- Part 2 – Sector Engagement – examines how you promote LGBTQ+ equality to other organisations in your sector.
- Part 3 – Service Delivery – looks at how you ensure you meet the needs of service users or customers.
- This section comprises of three parts.
Additional awards
This year will see Stonewall also award additional awards for Change Makers of the Year and Network of the Year – highlighting the individuals and networks that are making a real difference in their workplace and communities for LGBTQ+ inclusivity.
Another change to this year’s format is that to provide employers with a more transparent, fixed path of progression through the Index, Stonewall are introducing Gold, Silver and Bronze Employer awards. The Gold, Silver and Bronze Employer awards will recognise and celebrate the different stages of LGBTQ+ inclusion that an employer has reached and the progress they have made.
Employers must meet nine specific, fixed requirements that are highlighted throughout the application. Gold, Silver and Bronze Employers will be announced alongside the Top 100 with no additional application needed. You can still win one of these, even if you are not quite scoring high enough to feature in the Top 100.
The Top 100 Employers list will feature the 100 employers with the highest overall scores.
How to enter the Global Workplace Equality Index
Organisations that operate in different countries globally are faced with varying challenges in each. This uneven playing field makes direct comparisons difficult, so to counter this the global entry assesses how you approach sexual orientation and gender identity equality from a global level and also within operating countries. To do this, countries are grouped into three zones based on whether sexual acts between people of the same sex are legal and whether there exist clear national employment protections for lesbian, gay and bi people. There are questions specifically relating to each zone in eight of the nine sections. In country activity must not include activity in the UK.
For the global form, the sections are as follows:
- Employee Policy
- Examining the policies in place that guarantee the equal treatment of lesbian, gay, bi and trans employees.
- Training
- Scutinises your sexual orientation and gender identity training materials and practices. This section does not ask for zonal examples.
- Staff Engagement
- This section looks at how you engage with all staff to raise awareness on LGBT+ issues, the networking opportunities and if you consult and gather feedback
“LGBTQ+ people face discrimination in every country, and same-sex relationships are criminalised in more than 70. This poses serious legal, ethical and practical challenges to global employers. The Global Equality Index is free to enter and is open to any multinational organisation, enabling them to navigate these challenges and make progress towards LGBTQ+ equality, no matter where in the world they operate.”
- Leadership
- What does your leadership do to advance LGBT+ equality across your global operation and also how it promotes and establishes diversity within the leadership teams themselves.
- Monitoring
- Where and how do you monitor sexual orientation and gender identity of all global staff and the forms used to collect and analyse it.
- Procurement
- Looking at how you engage and promote LGBT+ with existing and potential suppliers on a global scale.
- Community Engagement and Understanding Local Context
- Here we are looking at how you engage with the wider LGBT+ community, your external facing strategy and steps taken to understand the local context for LGBT+ people.
- Global Mobility
- What steps do you take to support LGBT+ employees before and during international secondments and role moves.
- Additional In Country Activity
- A place to capture the over and above activity within the zones that may not have been mentioned previously within the form.
What’s in it for you?
Assess your progress
Assess what you are doing in terms of LGBTQ+ inclusion in your workplace. Regardless of where you are on your inclusion journey, the Index process and feedback can help guide your progress.
Understand employees
Understanding your employees and their experiences is crucial. They should directly inform the changes. The Index provides insight into staff experiences through the survey. If you are one of Stonewall’s Diversity Champions then you will receive full results benchmarked against sector and region.
Show your commitment
Entering the Index is a fantastic way to show your commitment to LGBTQ+ equality. It demonstrates that making your workplace, services and products LGBTQ+ inclusive is a priority.
Promote your progress
If you achieve a coveted Top 100 spot, you’ll be able to use the Top 100 Employers logo to promote your achievement.
Look to the future
Through the feedback you receive and potential gaps within your submission, you can use it as a developmental framework.
Next steps?
I hope you have found this article helpful as an introduction to the application requirements for either of the Stonewall Workplace Equality Indices. If you would like to maximise your chances of achieving a top 100 position or moving up the league, while minimising the disruption to your workload and workplace, then I recommend you get in touch with us here at Boost. One of our team of experts (mostly full-time payrolled award entry consultants) will be able to help. We’ve been helping businesses enter The Stonewall Index for many years, and we are more experienced than any other agency in the world when it comes to these awards.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Emma
Useful links:
To contact Emma personally about The Stonewall Workplace Equality Index: emma.turnbull@boost-awards.co.uk
The Stonewall UK Workplace Equality Index
The Stonewall Global Workplace Equality Index
We also have a useful article about entering Diversity and Inclusion Awards
Boost – a helping hand entering awards
Boost Awards is the world’s first and largest award entry consultancy, having helped clients – from SMEs to Multinationals – win over 2,000 credible business awards. Increase your chances of success significantly – call Boost on +44(0)1273 258703 today for a no-obligation chat about awards.
(C) This article was written by Emma Turnbull and is the intellectual property of Boost Awards.
