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00:09

right, hello, and welcome to Women at the top of telecoms and tech. And I am very excited today, I’ve got a brilliant guest with me, someone that was on my list for a little while that I really wanted to get on the podcast, and just share her real expertise, but also what she’s doing. It’s absolutely her purpose and passion, she just radiates the energy of it, which I absolutely love. And also ladies just back from maternity leave. So we’ve managed to get our date in the diary now, and I’m very excited that she’s here. And we’ve got Jenny basketball here today, who is Head of Diversity and Inclusion for KPMG. And today’s episode, we are going to be really focusing in on talking about diversity through the lens of kind of career progression, we’re going to look at diversity in relation to that. But specifically, we’re going to talk about socio economic diversity, which is a huge subject and I I’ve read there, there’s an amazing report called Mind the gap with K KPMG put together at the end of last year as someone that works, day in day out within these circles, it’s quite a shock to see some of the statistics and some of the things that were coming out, and some of the really key messages. So we’re gonna be focusing on that today, but also bringing in other areas diversity and how that impacts on career progression, what companies can do about it, and what actions to take some of this can feel quite scary when you’re talking about socio economic backgrounds. And, you know, how does that fit into what class do we kind of see someone else and those sort of things, it’s quite a difficult thing to, to face into and see what’s there. And then how to take action, how to measure it and take action on it. So I’m really excited for today’s conversation. So I’ll introduce Jenny and then she’ll introduce herself so Jenny Lisa, development execution of KPMG. US UK is inclusion, diversity and equity strategy. And Jenny is chair of the living wage Advisory Council and non exec director progress together a board trustee of East London Business Alliance and access accountancy patron group member. I’m not sure how she has time to fit it all in and be a mom, but she does. So welcome to the show. Say, Jen, it’s brilliant to have you here. Thanks, Nicola. It’s an absolute delight to be here as well. I’m very excited, right, so. So when you’re in your role now, and you’ve got this brilliant role, having an impact on the culture of the organisation, and just really not being a an organisation just pays lip service to diverse but really taking very clear and specific action that’s having results. So just give us a little bit of a shape to the story at some of the chapters that have bought you to be in that role now, because I expect to people, a lot of people look at your role. Wow, that’s just something is so exciting. Yeah, chapters that got you there. Thank you. Why do you say often that I have the best job at KPMG. There might be other people that disagree.

 

02:55

But I have a real privilege to lead a fantastic team and on an agenda that, as you’ve said, I’m hugely personally I’m sort of professionally committed to. So how did I get here I’ve had a bit of an interesting career. I asked the university, I went to something called the Electoral Commission, and was very focused on encouraging colleagues and people to register to vote. And then I joined KPMG. Actually, as a graduate in our public sector practice, I had like phenomenal clients like the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Royal College of Art, they were all really cool. And I trained to become a chartered accountant. And I really enjoyed the job. But actually, I much prefer the conversations with the people. And I started talking to my counselling partner at the time and said, Look, I’m not sure this is playing to all of my strengths. And he did amazing kind of facilitation for me and kind of reached out to colleagues across the firm, and had several conversations and landed on a common actually came into our corporate responsibility team managed a partnership with Barnardos a charity that I was passionate about on a personal level as well, and ended up staying in that team for five years. So that classic sort of, oh, it will be a temporary I

 

04:10

never went back and then ended up doing a whole variety of roles, particularly on education outreach. I think my mum was a teacher and I knew that social inclusion in that space was something I was always personally driven by and but just loved what I did saw the sort of depressing statistics around socio economic diversity and the lack of representation in organisations. So the made me head of social mobility, which was a huge privilege. We did lots of policy and government work on it. And then I was asked to co head up our inclusion and diversity and equity team. And since then, I’ve become the sole head I’ve had two lovely children and then on to me, at least several weeks back in Yeah, I’m getting my feet under under the table and getting stuck in on all of the all of the new challenges, but it’s been a sort of

 

05:00

for varying career, yeah, I’ve loved every role I’ve done and just kind of continue to follow with my passion. And now I’ve got this brilliant job that I just love every day. Yeah. And it really, it can really sense that energy from you as well as from since from when we first spoke, and I just, I love that because I think as a leader, that’s where you have the most impact. That’s where you have the most influence is just when you’re genuinely, you’re genuinely not beyond an interest, you’re actually you’re really committed. And it feels like I had a brilliant client session yesterday. And she said, it was the best money I’ve ever spent on myself. This is an amazing investment that I’ve made, I was quite scared often about like the investment. And, you know, am I taking that away from my family? And it’s that that goose bumpy moment of like, gosh, is what I get to do. And I get that real sense from you as well. So and just for people, I think that are listening in the audience, just to know that it’s almost that head versus heart kind of debate, isn’t it? If that makes sense to you almost around logically, yes, I can go and get my accountancy exams and follow this traditional route. And that feels good. But actually something in my heart is pulling me towards this. And this makes sense to me was was that kind of sense for you of almost listening to your heart and like this is what’s important to me. And this is where, where I think my purpose is? Yeah, absolutely. And I distinctly remember a conversation with my mom, actually, when I left university, and I had no idea at the time what I was going to do, and she just said, like, you don’t have to have everything in life in your job. She was saying you can still volunteer and you can you can find your purpose in other ways. And I was really fortunate to do a job in public sector to audit where I really cared about my client base, I wanted to make a difference for them. But there was still something niggling at me that just felt I wasn’t again, like really sort of playing to my strengths. And I wanted to, I wanted to kind of follow that path and just see where it took me. And I always thought this a common would kind of open my eyes, but I didn’t think I’d end up staying and then changing the my career path in the way that I have. And I’m really glad I did. And I often talk to a lot of people joining the firm and share that an organisation like KPMG with, you know, we’re fortunate to have those opportunities and colleagues that I mentor and kind of coach in that way that for some people, it will be the right path. But for others, you might want to just try something different. And you never know where it might lead. Yeah. So is that kind of like the key lesson? Before we get into talking about all the juicy diversity stuff? Would you would you say that’s a key lesson from your career, I think kind of following your passion, it’s, it’s really important. It doesn’t have to be in the day job. I just, you know, I’m really privileged that I have a job that I’m absolutely committed to in that sense. But if you’ve not tried it, or you know, reach out and have those conversations, then you’ll never know. So I really encourage people to kind of take that step where they can make those connections, and explore those opportunities. And it might lead to something that you, you know, want to pursue, but it may not. And that’s okay, too. But without sort of making those conversations and reaching out, it’s hard to know. Yeah, yeah. And for me, it would be around the energy of what feels exciting. What are you drawn to what, you know, time flies by when you’re in it? Versus what feels like, oh, I can do this, but it feels quite heavy. And it feels like quite hard work. It’s a difference, a slightly different energy. Yeah. And I know, we’re going to talk about the sort of the detail and the report that came out. Like, I feel like I’m glossing over in the sense that our job is, and certainly the job I have is hard, like, you know, we’re changing cultures, you know, it’s, it’s really tricky, and it can be really kind of wearing. But if I wasn’t committed to the cause, then you know, it would be hard to keep doing it. So it’s not always the easy decisions. Yeah, it’s were kind of your, you know, what drives you what gets you out of bed in the morning to kind of go make that change that, you know, pursuing that is really Yeah, definitely. And it’s almost that gives you more resilience, because you’re like, Well, this is the thing that I meant to do. So actually, the, the challenging times get you through to some real breakthroughs and some real changes that make it that check in yourself, no, this is this is more than worth it. Because I know I’m making a difference. I know there’s a bit of a legacy that I know that I’m, you know, things are changing because of what we’re driving forward. Exactly. And I always say to my team, let’s take the small wins as much as we can big changes, because in the work that we do, you know, it can take years to see an impact in some of interventions. But actually, there can be some, even some fantastic events, like we had one recently with all of our networks, collaborating and getting our colleagues excited. And I was like, you know, that’s just such a great example of, you know, something that is just really brilliant for our colleagues. And it was all led by our networks. It wasn’t so much by our team, but we took a moment to really celebrate that and enjoy it as much as you know, something like the report coming out and knowing that we are seeing an impact in some of these areas. There’s clearly still work to do but on gender and ethnicity. We were seeing some improvements. That’s really important. Celebrate as well. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So just about so I’ve read some of this. I’ve read this report. I’ve gone through it this morning. So this is essentially the Mind the Gap Report which is all around social mobile

 

10:00

Let’s see progression within KPMG. But using a huge number of very robust kind of framework to investigate and research, and also the support of an external organisation to pull all that together. So can you just give us some of the top line? Before we even get into kind of results? What was the kind of what was the intention behind it? What was the what was the need, of course, so we worked with an organisation called the Bridge group who we’ve been fortunate enough to actually work with for about 10 years, and they’re, you know, data led experts policy Association, looking at kind of all aspects of diversity, they’ve got a real sweet spot, if I can call it that on socio economic diversity, but they look at all aspects and in particularly look at like that intersectional challenges that that colleagues in organisations might face. So we actually had done some previous research with them back in 2018, where we looked at the progression of our colleagues, and we look to the ethnicity and socioeconomic background. And so effectively, we asked them to repeat that analysis. But we also added then disability and sexual orientation, we asked effectively to look at loads of data. So we looked at, you know, millions of data points, but looked at 16,000 colleagues, sort of five year periods, and effectively tried to work out how long it was taking a colleague to get from A to B,

 

11:23

junior grade to a senior grade, and then cut it by diversity characteristics to see if there was any variation in the time taken to get from A to B. And that’s where it starts to get interesting, because you can start to see if it is taking particular demographics, like longer or shorter amounts of time to progress. And you know, when you’ve taken away lots of other factors, it can feel quite blunt when you see and stark the analysis. So in a headline, it found that it was taking our colleagues from a lower socioeconomic background 90% longer to progress. Okay, effectively equative Someone’s progressing in five years, from a higher socio economic background, the lower socioeconomic background colleagues taking, I think, one year and eight months longer. So that’s quite a long time and a difference, just making us think about, actually what interventions do we need to be taking what’s happening on kind of promotions? whose identities?

 

12:23

I think pleasing me, because we’ve now done two sets of analysis, we did see some improvement. Yeah. For example, from a gender perspective, in the past, I think it was 8% slower if you were male to female, okay. Yeah. But now it’s 2% faster. So if you look purely at Wow, really, yeah, progressing faster than they were in 2018. That’s great. We’ve made some improvements that you then overlay that with other characteristics, like socioeconomic background, and our female population of a lower socioeconomic background, are at the bottom in terms of like the slowest to progress. So it’s, it kind of reminds you why it’s important to look at inclusion overall, I think all of us is multidimensional. We’ve all got our different barriers or our challenges, different aspects about us that will kind of make who we are. So we’ve really got to have that analysis when we’re looking at what the interventions need to be. But I think, to your point, it was quite a surprise to a lot of people, because socioeconomic background is not.

 

13:19

You know, there’s, there’s more and more activity on this, particularly in certain professions, but it certainly kind of prompted a lot of debate in the market and through press, because, you know, it’s not as well known or well versed as an area of diversity that organisations need to look at. And so most people think it’s a gender or an ethnicity.

 

13:37

Challenge, but here, we were saying socio economic background has to be counted, but you need to look at it with all all characteristics combined to really understand within your own organisation, what’s happening? Yeah, absolutely. Because I one of the headlines that I took out of it was, as someone who focuses very much on supporting organisations close the gender pay gap, and real practical interventions and ways of doing that. It was It came as a bit of a shock that that’s the biggest barrier to career progression is social economic background, which I think there’s a couple of things that came up for me immediately, it was like, first of all, how do you assess socio economic background for someone? Because it feels uncomfortable to talk about almost claps for want of a better word, or, you know, people’s backgrounds. And then the other part was almost the how to support those people kind of moving forward. And is it? Is it a structure? Is it a framework? Is it is it skills development, or is it actually, you know, is it looking at unconscious bias? I think those were the two things that immediately leapt out and that that really surprising stat of the biggest barrier to career progression. I wasn’t. I said, I certainly wasn’t expecting that. Yeah, it was really interesting analysis. And I think you know, you were not alone. A lot of people weren’t really interested in the research we’ve done just because there hasn’t been as much analysis, I think on social background in a business context and

 

15:00

So it was, you know, it was quite a surprise to a lot of a lot of people, and how do we measure it? So there’s a really kind of well agreed approach on measuring socioeconomic background. It’s around parental occupation. So effectively, what did your highest earning parent or carer do when you were age 14. And then there’s kind of different categories that are used to kind of, say, if you then fall into a lower socioeconomic background, intermediate, professional, or higher socio economic background category. And it’s not an exact science, that there are these categories that exist in it. And it’s kind of follows methodology that the Labour Force Survey uses is internationally recognised, academics effectively use it. So it’s definitely the best method, and like the social mobility commission, and others recommend it. But from a colleague perspective, we’ve had so much debate over how that feels, because, yeah, this much wrapped up in who you are as an individual who identify as, and we now have a social mobility network really thriving, but it’s prompt a lot of conversation around Oh, hang on, if I answer it in this way, which is right. I think it’s telling us I’m intermediate, but I associate as working class. So like, how does that work? Okay. Yeah, you know, lots of discussion around, we use working class terminology, when we published our pay gap at the time, and some colleagues didn’t like that language. Others did like the language. Yeah, it’s really emotional and evocative for our. So we’ve got to be really sensitive to that. And because again, it’s quite a new

 

16:30

thing in the diversity space, people are used to talking about gender ethnicity, but this is kind of really something that we’ve we’ve traded carefully with, but we’ve kind of really had to socialise, communicate, get feedback on, and always point to research, just so that I’m the academic side of things so that people fully understand the methodology. But we’re still evolving it like when we published our pay gaps, it was kind of, here’s an idea, this is what we’ve done with the bridge group, but actually, this is quite new. So we’ve welcome kind of other feedback from other organisations, because we’re sort of paving away as opposed to kind of having all the answers. Yeah. Which is exciting. But you know, can be,

 

17:09

can be tricky to navigate. Yeah, absolutely. And I think like you said, you just bring real connotations with you, doesn’t it from your, from your childhood, my, for example, my, my husband, he came over from Poland with his family when he was five. So, you know, he, in his terminology, what he would say he would describe himself as a Polish immigrant, but actually, he’s had a 15 year naval career, and he’s been an officer, and now he’s, he’s a dentist. So he’s, it’s almost like that contradiction, or most of, you know, he labels himself jokingly that sometimes it kind of district kind of, you know, in a, in a kind of humble way, but actually, it’s that it’s that difficult thing to almost, and the realisation that you know, what he went through with his family to kind of come over and when there was rationing Poland and start over again, and have that bravery of starting somewhere completely new in a new country, and learning the language and being, you know, someone very different in school, and, you know, all those kinds of things. So it’s very strange for him, and that will, so no, that will have imprinted on him in ways that a lot of us won’t be able to imagine. And you’re exactly, it’s exactly that, like people associate with so much around their own identity, and kind of their upbringing. And it can, you know, influence so much around their later kind of, I guess, life chances. And that’s the evidence out there on socioeconomic background. But also, what we found was really interesting is some people associate more with their ethnicity,

 

18:37

or their socioeconomic background. And sometimes that’s more a defining factor for them. Yeah. Or it’s something they say, that’s been the thing that’s held me back in ways that, you know, another characteristic of mine hasn’t. So it’s interesting how you described your husband’s like, you know, what’s informed him, and in his mind, he’s like, I’m slightly contradictory, because I had a career that people would say, it’s probably, you know, a more professional career versus kind of this background that has hugely influenced who I am. So actually, just having that dialogue with our colleagues has been really important. But providing, I think, a support network, we network that I set has been set up has been like pivotal to allow our colleagues kind of really open up share their stories, kind of say, oh, okay, you know, that’s what you experienced. Oh, that’s like, actually what I had as well as they listened to that. And for a while, I’ve not known how to talk about it in a work context.

 

19:30

It’s been really evocative, I think, for our clients and our colleagues who just kind of start entering into that discussion. Yeah, absolutely. And I love that with networks in different organisations, and I was fortunate enough to do some work with it. It is a mentorship programme. Yeah. And kind of like the community aspect of it. I’m not alone. I’m not the only one and I love and when I run coaching programmes and support different areas for women, so it might be around returning mums, we might be around menopause. It’s that sense.

 

20:00

So I’m not the only one feeling how I’m feeling. And I also love it when those those networks and broaden out. So rather than now women’s networks, for example, it might be some organisations move to gender focused, like gender. So yeah, exactly. So kind of how to drive diversity for agenda. But actually, it’s a self development kind of focus within that network. And it’s men and women together. However you recognise everyone’s welcome. But this is our focus, which is really exciting to see. And also I work with an organisation on returning mums. So that’s now broadened out to all returners because actually their paternity policies really increased. So, you know, if men are away from the business for three or four months, being dad full time, Dad, it’s that welcoming back? Or if someone’s been off being a carer? You know, it’s how do you come back? So I love those different pockets of support that you can have, depending on the conversations that have been had and how they evolve as well. Because to me, it was Women’s Network, but it’s like, actually, are we creating more separation through this? Because yeah, we’ve got this amazing speaker, they’re doing this brilliant workshop, I want to go. Yeah, we’ve been really, I think we’ve tried to be quite purposeful with that, like, in some networks, I’d say that there is a higher volume of allies that have like she has individually come forward. But in some instances, we’ve definitely tried to, like pull on allies in waste is kind of sure they’re coming forward in their part of the discussion. Because as I said earlier, it’s inclusion for everyone. And we need to make sure that, you know, if we’re changing structures, we’re changing. We’re challenging, kind of, in so many ways, you know, things that have happened for decades that, you know, we need everyone to be kind of contributing. And we had a really good example of that our Black Heritage ally ship programme, which has been running now for a couple of years. And it’s been absolutely about kind of bringing in our allies, to the debate to the conversation to be the sponsors to be the advocates declared by Black Heritage colleagues on that. So I absolutely agree, I think it’s really important that everyone is kind of part of that. But also, we’re learning as we, like, run these interventions, and we’re seeing what’s working, we’re seeing what’s not working. So, you know, in our kind of team, we always say we have to be agile enough to kind of admit when something’s not maybe having an impact. So be excited to kind of keep evolving and changing programme interventions, because, you know, it’ll, it’ll change over time where you need to focus your efforts. Yeah. Which is exciting.

 

22:22

But can be, you know, you do need to come up with lots of new ideas.

 

22:27

Yeah, yeah. And then I just want to go back to point you mentioned, so obviously, as an individual, every person will have elements of their socio economic background, gender, and how they identify sexual orientation, all of these different kinds of facets of them, if you like. So, when you said about what they identify with most, what tends to lead into actually this the most important out of those, for me, what, what kind of leads into that? Because I think that’s a really, it’s quite an important area for I think, almost, which is, which of those is that my biggest poll? Or it most important to me? I’d say, there’s no one answer, like, everyone is different. And everyone will be identifying, you know, will have multiple characteristics. But what will be the thing that they might be so focused on or lead with will be completely personal, I just know that I’ve had conversations with people, let’s say through our social mobility network, who are also an ethnic minority who said, actually, in the past, a lot of people thought is my ethnicity, that might be something that, you know, is, you know, really important to me, but actually, it’s, you know, it’s actually my socio economic background, that’s been more of a defining thing in terms of my kind of parents attitude to where I might work, or what I might do lecture. So it’s very personal, I wouldn’t I wouldn’t have a one answer. I think what we, we definitely try and do at KPMG, is make sure that all of our programmes are kind of considering the fact that everyone is kind of multi dimensional. You never like a one aspect, Trump’s and other. You know, there have been conversations where people say, oh, you know, that programme might have a negative impact in terms of that kind of population. Yeah, but we kind of phased into some of those before we kind of run any of our programmes to make sure that we’re sort of supporting all of our colleagues where we can.

 

24:16

And, you know, at least we’re kind of aware of that. And it might mean that we needed to develop another programme if you know, if it’s impacting, let’s say, on gender or ethnicity in a different way. But I don’t think I’d have one answer for it. I think it’s just so personal.

 

24:31

anecdote. Anecdotally, what I hear from everyone is it’s very different. So I think it would almost for me as well, from what from the work that I do. And also the work that I do my clients it would be is there is almost a big chapter of their life that relates to this. So almost around actually has it been a real challenges women within your particular industry to get to where you are has it been more challenging or actually

 

24:54

yeah, sexual orientation. It’s, it was a you know, really big thing for me to go through what I went through to kind of

 

25:00

be comfortable with that now. So it’s almost as if, if you’ve been through that a huge chapter that’s really formed who you are, as somebody.

 

25:08

What, therefore, is either the limiting factor for them or something they have not felt open about talking about the workplace or conversely is kind of who they are and who they present themselves as, yeah, you know, in the workplace, but you don’t know then other aspects of their life. And that’s, you know, really important too, like, we shouldn’t make any assumptions. And of course, so much of ID is non visible. And, you know, you don’t know and I feel like particularly post pandemic, we’ve taken a much more like human centred approach to getting to know your colleagues, everyone’s kind of brought down those barriers in a way of like getting to know each other a bit more. Yeah, one thing I hope that we carry forward is that, you know, really getting to know the individual knowing their situation. You know, I’m so open my tea this morning, I was like, everybody, Rory sick, this is what I can do, you know, and valleys, it’s really opening into, like, this is my life. And I’m not the person that comes in as head of

 

26:00

family. And we’ve been trying to kind of encourage that discussion, like, our team introduced inclusion ideas, which was, here’s something that I can document, which is about me, and I’ll share it with those colleagues I feel comfortable with, but also in some instances, because I don’t have to repeat myself, because sometimes it’s an awkward conversation, I don’t want to have to keep having. So it’s just trying to those ways that can bring the more of who you are to work in a sensitive, that kind of kind of full fashion. And I really hope that we don’t lose that. Because I think it’s really important. It’s allowed us to really get to know each other in a in a in a better way. Yeah, no, and I think I makes my heart so happy to hear that, because I think that’s, for me feel locked down and coming out the other side, it’s so I think world has cracked open, I think the corporate world needs to respond differently. And I think it’s brilliant to see organisations like KPMG stepping into that, but not all organisations are. And on the flip side of that, I have some clients that have been very senior in that role delivering really well, yet they’ve adapted to working in the office for two days, and then they’re at home for three days. Yeah, there still will be sometimes I need to eyeball you. But why I’ve set my whole life up with three children to work two days a week, and that works. He want me to do more. Like you need a reason. I haven’t, I haven’t missed anything, I haven’t not delivered, I’ve done my role and more. So it’s almost a bit of a contrast. But I think, for me, I in my company as well, what I feel is that I think I feel like my message needs to up level, which is to work for organisations that truly care about their employees, and are really committed and passionate about change, because they know focusing on their colleagues and their employees is going to be a point of competitive advantage. It’s going to be Yeah, actually, the happier we can, the more we can create that really safe environment, the more we can help people be who they are at work, the more we can help people to bring all of that work. And actually, it’s not you don’t suddenly not have home responsibilities, the moment you log on now or the moment you go into the office. So how do we support people to do that? Because we’ve asked so much for the last two years, we support people, you know, we’ve all had zooms where children have walked in or for me when Yes, so it’s like,

 

28:12

I was on a call the other day, and he said he was asleep.

 

28:16

I didn’t even know she couldn’t even hear the conversation, I have my headset on or stroking her head and ah

 

28:24

these it’s almost separate for me that separation needs to end. And I think it is back to really focusing on your employees creating that really safe space where you can have those really brave conversations. I love that idea of almost like, this is my

 

28:40

inclusion, like paraphrasing who I am and so just have that there. So I’m not having that same conversation.

 

28:48

But just give that gives the colleagues the opportunity to kind of own that narrative, I think, yeah. And like I said before, I think there can be so many assumptions made around people. And we just don’t know what’s going on in other people’s lives. So it’s up to them to tell us what they want, of course, I think that’s given the power to our colleagues to kind of then help narrate in the way that they feel comfortable kind of in their life. I’m quite an open book. So I’ve just, you know, I’ll share so much with my team. Yeah, I think that’s also allowed the team to kind of share in the same way back with me. Yeah. But I think it’s completely up to the individual what they choose to then share. But if we create a safe space, that kind of, you know, the words that was often referred psychological safety, we give that environment hopefully those that want to be able to kind of bring that element to the workplace, and they can, and they’ll be more productive as a result because they’re not thinking about it. And I was reflecting only the other day with a colleague that I because I had my first child during lockdown and then my second last, actually, I don’t even know how he was gonna go 2021

 

29:54

trying to think how old he is. I know I’m still getting used to the new year so I’m still

 

29:59

learning

 

30:00

Do you know Yeah, and I’ve never experienced the kind of the rush of like, pickup, but at the end of the day, because we’ve been working remotely ever since I’ve had my children or predominantly remotely. And that’s been a game changer for me, I can’t quite imagine the stress that somebody told me they used to kind of face. And it’s, it’s just completely changed a lot of the, you know, the parents, I’ve talked to them, they’re kind of working day and kind of that environment they have therefore, with their children. And I think that level of flexibility for whatever you want that time for, you know, in your personal lives is important to trust our colleagues, you know, they’ll get the job done. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And I’ve seen a few really good examples of that. So I think he’s Microsoft, I can’t remember.

 

30:46

I don’t need to check this. But there’s meeting an organisation that’s huge. It’s shifted to meeting free Friday, which policy across the whole organisation, so you can focus on your team self development, the big strategy work, not just, you know, being in it, and just back to back meetings.

 

31:03

Or there’s another organisation as well, where they’ve got their slack chat, and that you can just put on their setting, and one of them is I’m not okay today, or handled with care or something like that. So it’s almost that you don’t need to have that conversation every single time. It’s almost a bit of actually, my team know that today, probably not going to be 110%. So it’s almost that identity.

 

31:25

Yeah, giving kind of people that that forewarning. Yeah, yeah. And I’m a huge Brene Brown fan girl, and it might have, we’re going to be best friends at some point. But she would talk about the power of vulnerability. And I think for leaders to be able to, I’m I’m like you, I’m, I’m a complete oversharer.

 

31:41

But I’m very clear, when I’m running sessions, you share what you want to share. And just be really mindful of conversations that we have here in the wider context. So you know, this is a protective, safe space. So those are the things shared here on to share more widely in the organisation. So

 

31:57

think about Microsoft, because I certainly know that when I come back, after having my first child, there were lots of kinds of initiatives underway. So people were like, you know, very much encouraging walking meetings, my husband works in tech, and they do it all the time.

 

32:12

Just like a thing they do. But it was like very much encouraging people to have that as well as the breaks from the meetings, which you know, you do question, why do we have so many, and I always try for meetings before Friday, and so much gets added in. And I’m like, how I ended up here are things that you can do that will just help you like mentally working weak. And I think if the employer can kind of take, you know, lead on it, and particularly leaders within your organisation can role model. It’s really important, we like to do something called jumpstart, and it was, you know, a lot of it was like, Can you as a leader, make sure you stop early on a Friday, because then your colleagues will feel they can. And that’s really important. It’s not necessarily about you. It’s about your colleagues, knowing they have the ability and the permission, we didn’t have to give it to them. But you know, that shows you can do it, and then they can embrace that kind of flexibility as well. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I work with a lot of women who are very senior. So it’s, if you’re struggling to do it for yourself right now around setting boundaries, and not you know, logging back on in the evening, those sort of things, do it? What do you want to role model to your team? You know, you would if someone was working late and sending emails, you probably say, what, you know what, what’s going on? Do you need some help with that? Or we kind of do their insistently protect myself? Because it’s like, you know, you that instantaneous, like, Oh, I do I need an answer right now. And you just know, but as a team member, there’ll be like Gen Y emailing me at half past nine asking a question that I could just come back to you on tomorrow. So I’m definitely trying to be conscious of that. Because I know that my working pattern might not align to theirs. And it’s not fair for them to have to

 

33:44

kind of receive a message that probably feels a bit like stressful.

 

33:49

Because we’ve all got these work, you know, work phones now. And if they just happen to see it, and they might feel they have to respond. So I’m either really conscious of saying, absolutely do not look at this now. Or wait until the morning to send that. Yeah, absolutely. So if we, in terms of organisation, so I agree with, I love all of that around more human style leadership for one to better phrase. But if organisations looking at how do they create that safety? How do they create that environment of more, like I said, beyond the lip service of inclusivity, to actually this is so important, this is at the heart of what we want to do, and we know the impact it’s going to have on our profitability, where where can they start? So it feels like gender pay gap need reporting anyway, but I, I see some amazing reports that are very action focused, very honest. And I see some that are literally just numbers. So obviously, there’s that part, which is statute needs to be done. But where, where can organisations kind of start with this, especially social economic that might feel quite scary to start? Yeah, I think the Sibley on that point around gender pay gaps. I think the narrative that sits around is really important. And you know, we’ve certainly failed the whenever we think

 

35:00

communicating to our colleagues on this, you know, it’s so important to talk about the actions, we’re taking what we’re doing in this space, you know, our wider kind of strategy. Yeah. So that people can kind of buy into that know, that, you know, might be long term change we’re working towards, but there is, you know, there’s absolutely leadership buy in, we’ve got target, all of that sort of stuff. But I think even more simply than that, it’s about kind of talking to your colleagues and our employee networks are just incredible. We have 15, employee networks, and I have to say, the social safety net, which was sort of more recent ones have been stood, has just been a game changer, as I’ve said, for a lot of colleagues within the organisation just feeling like that sense of community. But they’ve really enabled, you know, they come up with ideas, they feed them into my team, and the strategy that we’re developing, you know, the, the eyes and the ears on the ground of kind of how it feels with an organisation, and you know, the things that they might be facing into, they can share that with us that for that to work, you know, we need to have leaders engaged with that sponsoring those networks involved in it kind of really kind of, and showing their recognition

 

36:03

for the effort that colleagues are making in this space. So I think all of that is really important. I think, particularly on socioeconomic background, I probably wouldn’t say this as working for an accountancy firm, but data is so important. And I just, I don’t just mean that hard data, like, you know, Id metrics that, you know, a self ID, they’re really important. But the qualitative data, the feedbacks, the kind of ways in which you’re talking to your colleagues basis are just as important. But we’ve got quite sophisticated data now on our employee base, and we use it really to just hold leaders to account but kind of track if we’re making progress, know, where we need to kind of focus our interventions. And that’s been a game changer in our strategy. I’d say overall, yeah, yeah, absolutely. So it’s that balance of quantitative and then qualitative, but also, and I love I love that I love the love letter. When I work with women organisations, you get to hear like the lived experience of people within it. And just, you know, when I

 

37:01

worked on a leadership, a women’s leadership programme, for example, last year, and that the this particular participant was working in a team that had been really impacted by headcount freeze, and budget cuts, and all this. So she gone from a team of 10, down to a team of two, including her. So her day was then saying no, and making trade offs, so that that was her lived experience that I’m sure you know, her her line manager was aware, but the impact on her as, you know, head of an area, suddenly, she’s one of her one other person. Yeah. You know, that big impact and lived experiences like that, that this is this is happening now? Yeah, absolutely. I think it’s just really understanding kind of the context in which your employees are working. And at KPMG, like, we’re a people business, and we have to, we have to get that, right. Because we are offering a service that in the function I’m in, we’re supporting our, our colleagues, they’re like our clients. Yeah, control function. But you know, fundamentally, you know, we’re only as good as the people within the company. And yeah, I won’t bore people with all the diversity kind of evidence out there. Like, of course, that’s absolutely important. But to be a sustainable business, you know, there’s so much about like, focusing on your employees thinking about kind of them and the contribution they can make and making sure that they can support and be like being the best they can be. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. My, my first ever role was a marketing assistant role for a research agency, and that,

 

38:29

that looked at service profit chain. So essentially, the tangible link between the happier you make your employees, the happier your clients or customers will be there for profitability and the direct link. So it’s almost like the power and impact of that is huge, because your employee experience it ultimately, really controllable. And it might take time to shift some of the big underlying legacies and frameworks, but actually, you know, policies are relatively quick to put into place to acknowledge that a change is needed or, like you said, a supporting network for a particular group that maybe it’s underrepresented at the moment, those. So it’s almost like those are really controllable, whereas actually things that the employer can exactly do. And they can help set up policies around well being they can think about all the things that help make that environment, you know, one in which he wants to work and do well.

 

39:21

And I think that feedback loop is really important. But then equally, you have to be able to show that you are making some changes. So, you know, we’ve absolutely kind of commit that with particular colleague groups where we’ve sort of said, you know, we hear what you’re telling us, and this is what we’re doing as a result, you know, we’ve got to kind of show that we’re then taking that feedback and doing something with it, even if it’s not immediate change, but we kind of have that communication channel to keep going. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And what’s the focus for this year building on all the recent work and the report? Well, so we set up quite a big strategy. Just before I went off on my last maternity leave, we set a strategy to 2030 So we’ve made

 

40:00

Did it you know, quite long in kind of vision? Yeah, we set new targets. So that sort of started to kind of begin last year when I when I was off. And this year, we’re kind of really building out I think, actually, again, our gender strategy. And yeah, you know, there’s a lot, there’s a lot we want to be doing in that space. So really dialling some of that art, and will continue doing a lot on socioeconomic background. But I guess just thinking about all of the different programmes, you know, where do we want to have a voice? I think, as a big business, we have a responsibility, but an opportunity to kind of be out there talking about, you know, sexual orientation disability, yeah, with our, with our boards, you know, clients, all of that sort of dialogue and policymakers. That’s a responsibility, and I get really excited by that stuff. So

 

40:47

yeah, it’s gonna be busy. Yeah. Welcome back. Jenny. Yeah.

 

40:53

Do you have a final message for our audience today, we were talking about that kind of like human centred approach, and just really trying to get to know who you work with, I found that’s really worked for me just, you know,

 

41:05

really getting to know the person behind the role and kind of, and then really helping on their development, I think through understanding who they are really get an insight into people and what makes them tick.

 

41:16

Really, how I like try and lead and I encourage, I guess, colleagues to do the same. Absolutely, yeah. We’re going to add to the show notes, a link to the report and a link to a couple of other things that I think are really, really important. But if people want to follow you, where’s the best place they can? follow you? I think I’m on lots of social media. So you can find me Jenny, basketball on LinkedIn. And then I’m at JK Baskerville on Twitter.

 

41:44

Yeah, I think they’re probably and then there’s obviously the KPMG. UK accounts, we push quite a bit out there just in terms of things like our reports and content. And we’ve got an R impact site, which is brilliant, and kind of contains lots of data and insights around what we do and what we’re committing to. So that’s worth a look as well. Yeah, brilliant. Well, thank you very much for today. It’s been absolutely brilliant. And we’ve covered such a range. I think it’s just been Yeah, so good to talk about. So thank you so much for your time, I really appreciate it. And that’s it for today. So if you’ve got any comments on today, we have gone through a whole range of subjects. But if you do have any comments or feedback, or any subjects you’d like me to cover in the future, all my details are in the show notes and look forward to hearing from you. Thanks for stopping by.

 

42:33

I is Nick here. I just want to take a moment just to say thank you for listening. When I’m sat recording the podcast in the deepest depths of Cornwall, it’s incredible to think it is reaching women across the world in 30 different countries and we have 1000s of downloads a month. So thank you so much for being part of that and be part of the audience means the world to me. But I do want to grow this audience, I would love you to help me reach more women like you so that we can really drive positive change in the corporate world. So you can do that one of three ways. First of all, you can subscribe to the podcast you never miss an episode. There’s always a new episodes always delivered straight to your inbox. You can review the podcast and leave us a rating and the more ratings we have, we also got the podcast charts. And finally, you can just share a favourite podcast with a peer with a colleague or on social media. So I would love you to do that. Thank you for all your help. I can’t wait for what’s next