AMORIA BOND ASCEND
Earlier this year Amoria Bond launched ASCEND, a network created by and for female colleagues across the business. In their last breakfast meeting of 2020, today was a very special ASCEND session, featuring an inspirational external guest speaker, and a really engaging review of highlights and achievements in 2020, goals for 2021, as well as the unveiling of the brand new ASCEND Mentoring programme which will kick off in January 2021!
ASCEND was co-founded by Amy Steel, Associate Director, and Natasha Crump, Board Advisor and Group Diversity and Inclusion Lead. Both Amy and Natasha are hugely passionate about empowering women and breaking down both the real and perceived barriers that can prevent women from achieving their full potential. With the full support of the company Founders and Executive Board, ASCEND reflects the company’s commitment to ensuring that female employees have access to the resources and support they need to enable them to progress. Our company purpose is Progressing Lives Everywhere, and ASCEND is an important strategic priority to ensure that purpose translates to reality for all employees
ASCEND aims to:
- connect and support women across the Amoria Bond Group offices
- provide networking opportunities with senior role models, both within the business and externally
- attract, retain and progress more women within the Amoria Bond Group
Women in Recruitment… we are already different, but we want to be the best!
Amoria Bond are active members of APSCo’s ‘Women in Recruitment’(WiR) membership organisation, and proud to be amongst the minority 26% of recruitment firms with specific initiatives aimed at attracting and retaining women.
WiR industry benchmarking confirms that Amoria Bond are ahead of most recruitment companies in terms of female representation across the business as a whole; companywide, women are represented at every level of the business. But, the company recognises there is more to be done to achieve and maintain a truly proportionate gender balance.
Why bother?
Going back to the company’s purpose; Progressing Lives Everywhere is only fully possible if everyone has truly equitable access to progression. Amoria Bond is a meritocracy in the truest sense of the word, the established 10-Steps programme is completely transparent, so everyone should know what they need to do to successfully progress to the next level. But, there are a range of well-documented factors that also impact if, and how, individuals are able to access and leverage the same opportunity. Equity and equality are much broader than purely a gender issue (hence Amoria Bond’s reinvigorated Diversity and Inclusion programme as founding signatories of the Diversity and Inclusion Charter). But, it is women in recruitment, and more specifically in Amoria Bond, that are the catalyst for ASCEND’s existence.
The business case for ASCEND
Number One – it’s the right thing to do. But, ASCEND hopes that sharing the ‘business case’ might inspire other companies to take action to support their own female employees and colleagues.
Profitability: Organizations with above-average gender diversity outperform companies with below-average diversity and engagement up to 58%.
Competitive advantage: Companies in the top quartile for gender diversity are 15 percent more likely to have financial returns above their respective national industry medians.
Attracting internal talent: 70% of job seekers consider workplace diversity an important factor when considering employment opportunities. 61% of women look at the gender diversity of a company’s seniors leadership team when deciding where to work. Ultimately, top talent is attracted to diverse companies with strong female representation across all levels.
Innovation: Companies with higher-than-average gender diversity benefit from up to 19% higher innovation revenues. The most diverse companies are also the most innovative, allowing them to market a greater range of products/services.
Market-share: Companies with more proportionate gender representation are 45% more likely to report that they had captured a larger portion of the market and 70% more likely to have entered into a new market in the past year.
*Sources: McKinsey; Forbes; Harvard Business Review; Researchgate
PROGRESSING LIVES EVERYWHERE