Corrinne Burns
The Royal Pharmaceutical Society (RPS) will publish its ethnicity pay data, Paul Bennett, chief executive of the Society, announced at the RPS’s 2019 annual conference.
Bennett told delegates at the event that the public commitment to sharing the data is part of the RPS’s inclusion and diversity strategy, which launched in August 2019.
The Society must “walk the talk” when it comes to inclusion and diversity, Bennett said.
A spokesperson for the RPS said that the data would be published in mid-2020.
At the conference, held in London on 17 November 2019, Asif Sadiq, chair of the Society’s inclusion and diversity strategy, asked delegates to “look beyond boxes” in order to achieve true inclusion and diversity in the workplace.
Sadiq said that putting people into “boxes” based on protected characteristics, such as gender or ethnicity, carried an inherent risk of making assumptions about the needs of individual people.
“To really engage with people, and get the authentic self — do not look at people as boxes. Look beyond that: what is important to individual people; what makes them tick?” he asked.
While it is crucial to support those who are under-represented in the workplace, Sadiq emphasised that there is no single, overarching definition of what ‘underrepresented’ means.
“It looks different depending on sector or location: look for the gaps,” he added.
Sadiq also advised attendees not to worry about making mistakes, or inadvertently saying the wrong thing, while building their own inclusion and diversity strategy. “We must get over this fear. There is no glossary of terms: what offends me may not offend someone who looks like me.”
“Diversity is not about getting it right every time. It is about making mistakes, learning and doing better.”
The RPS will be publishing its inclusion and diversity strategy in the first quarter of 2020, Sadiq said.
