Background
Since 2017 global business news and information organisation the Financial Times has invested in diversifying its audience with signs of success, including female readership growing faster than male readership. But the group also realised that to succeed in this strategy it needed to ensure it had diversity of background, thought and voice internally.

So at the end of 2017 it launched its first global D&I survey, which showed that only half of respondents understood the D&I goals and perceptions of senior leadership commitment varied across departments. It was also clear that parts of the business had female under-representation.

"D&I objectives are part of personal objectives on which annual bonuses are based on"

Approach
Goals were put in place at board, company and departmental levels supported by the HR business partners. These included achieving gender parity in the FT senior leadership team by 2022 (at the time 37% female / 63% male), sharing quarterly progress reports with teams and ensuring they, and the senior leadership team, had a D&I objective as part of their personal objectives on which their annual bonus is based.

A comprehensive programme of sponsorship and development was implemented while it was agreed that all jobs can be worked flexibly and that managers are empowered to make decisions on requests, removing any formal process. Working with coding bootcamp Makers Academy, 67% of junior software engineering hires have been female. Meanwhile, a no ‘manel’ (all male panel) rule was established to ensure balanced representation at events where FT employees are speaking. To ensure inclusive recruitment practices 50/50 male/female shortlists for all roles are now mandatory.