Nimesh Patel is CFO at Spirax-Sarco Engineering, a FTSE 100 industrial engineering company that’s a signatory to the Change the Race Ratio campaign.
Here he talks about why Spirax-Sarco Engineering signed up to the campaign, why it’s important to them as a business, and what he’d say to anyone who’s thinking about becoming a signatory in the future.
Becoming a Signatory to the Change the Race Ratio Campaign
For us at Spirax-Sarco Engineering, becoming a signatory to the Change the Race Ratio campaign was fundamentally aligned to our Values. Our Values reflect who we are as an organisation and they join us together, all of our people, across the world.
Signing up is the right thing to do, of course. But more than that, it will have an impact on our success if every single one of our people can be the best version of themselves when they come to work.
Diversity of thought delivers better outcomes
I speak from personal experience, because I've been given the opportunity in my career to contribute to the various organisations I've worked for.
And I'd like to think that through those opportunities I’ve been able to bring a different perspective, a different way of thinking… essentially a diversity of thought which has helped the team to deliver better outcomes.
That’s what we want to harness in our organisation, across our thousands of people working right across the globe.
The changes we’re making as part our commitment to the pledges in the campaign
Of course, to deliver against the goals that we've set ourselves, which are consistent with the Change the Race Ratio campaign, we've got to make changes.
The first of those is going to be embedded in the rollout of our inclusion plan for colleagues, right across the world. We want to encourage our people to feel comfortable at work and we want to create the right environment for them to thrive.
We're going to improve our data collection so that we can report against ethnicity pay gaps. And we want to develop talent within our organisation which means finding the right talent and investing in that talent so that they can develop within a supportive culture to take on leadership positions within our Group in the future.
We've also announced the establishment of an Education Fund for inclusive access to education. This will allow people to gain greater access to opportunities and hopefully promote social mobility around the world.
Why the Change the Race Ratio campaign is important to Spirax-Sarco Engineering
It’s important to us because it highlights the challenges that all businesses face.
But more importantly, it's bringing us together, as organisations right around the country and around the world, to collaborate on how we solve our shared common challenges.
What are those challenges? Making sure that we're identifying talent. Making sure that we're investing in that talent and promoting that talent. But most importantly, how do we encourage people to really trust that talent, particularly when people look different or they think differently, or they behave differently, or they come from different cultures? For me, this is critical, because it's only through trust and openness that we get true diversity of views.
Having a diversity of views creates better places to work. It makes businesses more successful.
We are by nature a multicultural, diverse country here in the UK. The Change the Race Ratio campaign is harnessing the power of this as an asset and turning it into real outcomes that deliver real value.
Becoming a Signatory to the campaign
So here’s what I’d say to anyone who’s thinking about becoming a signatory to the Change the Race Ratio campaign.
If you're thinking about it but you're not sure whether to take that next step, I'd encourage you to think about people like me within your organisation.
Sometimes they need help to be noticed or they need help to be considered for the next opportunity. Not everyone, but there are definitely people in your organisation who might feel a little bit marginalised because they're a little bit different to everybody else that they work with. They may hide that difference and not bring all of themselves to work every day.
What the Change the Race Ratio campaign does is to bring us together to highlight just how important this issue is for all of us.
To learn more about Change the Race Ratio, click here.
