Grow your team
When you become an Inclusive Employers’ Member you grow your I&D team.
Your account manager works with you to understand your goals, your challenges and achievable next steps.
Do you need more support for your inclusive culture to thrive?
TransPennine Express, operators of regional and inter-city rail services in Northern England and Scotland, first started working with Inclusive Employers in 2021. The relationship started when they signed up to participate in the Inclusive Employers Standard for the first time.
In this blog, Inclusive Employers talk to Harriet Harbidge, Diversity and Inclusion Manager at TransPennine Express. Find out how taking part in the Inclusive Employers Standard drove the organisation to turn their inclusion ideas into impact, journeying from Committed status to Silver award in just two years.
What were your motivations for seeking an inclusion accreditation?
In 2021, we were at the start of our journey; inclusion was new to the business. The reasons we signed up for the Inclusive Employers Standard (IES) included:
- To benchmark our progress.
- To understand our EDI maturity.
- To understand how our maturity compares to other organisations our size and in our industry.
Why did you choose the Inclusive Employers Standard as your accreditation provider?
The Inclusive Employers Standard asks questions that allow us to demonstrate how inclusion is a part of our organisation, at all levels. It looks at EDI activities in a way that feels authentic.
The questions consider the needs of our individual business, allowing for its complexities and acknowledging the good work that is being done. It doesn’t feel like a one shoe fits all approach.
The Inclusive Employers Standard assesses inclusion, diversity and equity in a way that is non-performative. It asks questions that aim to understand the impact of our inclusion activities. For example, it considers positive cultural changes, leadership, learning and development, recruitment, and more.
What was the outcome of your first submission for the Inclusive Employers Standard?
TransPennine Express received ‘Committed’ status in 2021. This means exactly as it sounds – it acknowledged our organisation’s commitment to inclusion and diversity.
We knew that we were just at the beginning of our journey. Inclusion-based activities had been happening at TransPennine Express for many years, but there wasn’t a strategy behind them; there wasn’t a role specifically responsible for overseeing and implementing inclusion.
The Diversity and Inclusion Manager role was new in 2020/2021, at a similar time to when we took part in the IES. Whilst this created a great opportunity to start collating the good work that was happening around the business and document it in one place, it also highlighted how leading in a more strategic way would be helpful to the organisation overall.
One of the most valuable parts of the IES process is the feedback we received on our submission. It helped us to shape how we progressed our Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion plans. My predecessor did an amazing job of developing a strategy and really laying the foundations for EDI following feedback from the report.
In our submission in 2021, our answers highlighted our ambitions for inclusion. For example, our plans for learning and development programmes, ideas for networking groups, and ways we could increase disclosure rates to improve data. Although we had put some parts of this into action, we weren’t at the stage where we could demonstrate the impact of our efforts.
Since receiving our Committed status in 2021, we have developed a variety of inclusion initiatives, including:
- Developed a Diversity and Inclusion strategy with targets and clear actions.
- “Behaviour & Bias” training that covers unconscious bias and inclusive recruitment for all hiring managers.
- Setting up three colleague networking groups (Women at TPE, Neurodiversity Network Group and LGBTQ+ Network).
- Hosted our first ever TPE Week of Inclusion which launched our Unity train wrapped in the progress flag.
- Trained over 500 new starters in a diversity and inclusion session covering how to be an inclusive colleague.
“If we had not received the ‘Committed’ status in 2021, we would not have received the feedback that helped to drive the progress we have made. With the support of the Inclusive Employers Standard, we have been able to focus on our inclusion and diversity goals.”
What happened when you took part in the inclusion accreditation for a second time?
We were thrilled to be awarded Silver in the Inclusive Employers Standard after our second submission in 2023!
TransPennine Express has worked hard to embed and establish inclusion and diversity across the organisation since 2021. In this first submission, we were able to talk about our ambitions for inclusion and diversity. In our second submission, it was fantastic to be able to demonstrate all the work that has been done since then, highlighting our successes as well as key learning points.
If we had not received the ‘Committed’ status in 2021, we would not have received the feedback that helped to drive the progress we have made over the last few years. With the support of the Inclusive Employers Standard, we have been able to focus on our inclusion and diversity goals and achieved so much for TransPennine Express to be proud of, in a short space of time.
How has TransPennine Express benefitted from the Inclusive Employers Standard?
The organisation has benefitted in many great ways from taking the Inclusive Employers Standard:
- Being awarded Silver has allowed us to celebrate our inclusion work with our colleagues and leaders.
- It creates the opportunity to thank and recognise all the colleagues who have been involved in our inclusion journey, so far. For example, networking groups, taking part in training, setting EDI objectives, and supporting learning and development.
- Celebrating this success creates the opportunity to involve even more TransPennine Express colleagues in inclusion.
- Focusing on inclusion through an accreditation like this allows us to have honest conversations about how we continue to progress inclusion and diversity in the organisation.
- The Silver award is the perfect balance; we can celebrate this fantastic achievement and have something to aim for. It allows us to demonstrate why it’s important not to stand still and continue to strive for greater inclusion impact. Taking the accreditation has given us the space to stop and collate our progress. There are very few opportunities to really do this when you work in inclusion, so this has been a brilliant outcome.
How has TransPennine Express’s relationship with inclusion changed since 2021?
Deciding to become a member of Inclusive Employers
We became members of Inclusive Employers in October 2023. We made this decision because the internal appetite to do more when it comes to diversity and inclusion was increasing, and having just one person leading can be overwhelming at times.
As a member, we have monthly account manager meetings, which are great for sense-checking our plans and getting another perspective. As Diversity and Inclusion Manager, I am working on my own on inclusion. Now we are members, I have somewhere to check and challenge and get an external perspective. It is also valuable to have a perspective from outside our industry.
One of the other fantastic benefits of membership is the Members’ Resources. They save me so much time and I now have access to good quality inclusion resources. I cannot put a monetary value on how much time and money they have saved me!
Upskilling our people
Another way Inclusive Employers has also helped is when it comes to upskilling our people. The live webinars allow for colleagues to learn about topics that apply to their roles or that they are interested in, and we share the calendar of events with our colleagues weekly.
In addition to this, Inclusive Employers offer fantastic training. I enrolled in the CMI Level 6 last June which teaches “Leading Diversity and Inclusion”. The course has taught beyond the basic practices of EDI and really allowed me to think at that more strategic level. It’s covered organisational culture, coaching and how to lead EDI in a sustainable way. This has really allowed me to develop my thinking when it comes to how we embed diversity and inclusion here at TPE and I’ve really taken so much away from the course.
We are now exploring other courses we could offer colleagues including the CMI Level 4 for some of our network members.
“We know what areas we need to invest more time and effort into. The feedback report, as well as our account manager meetings, is helping us to establish short and medium-term goals.”
What are the next steps for inclusion at TransPennine Express?
We are ambitious about our inclusion impact and would love to be awarded Gold in the Inclusive Employers Standard, in the future.
It feels as though we are on our way to doing this and the feedback from our Silver IES report is invaluable. It means we can be more focused and structured in our approach to progressing inclusion and going for Gold!
We know what areas we need to invest more time and effort into. The feedback report, as well as our account manager meetings, is helping us to establish short and medium-term goals.
Are you inspired to take part in the Inclusive Employers Standard?
Thank you so much, Harriet Harbidge, Diversity and Inclusion Manager, for sharing TransPennine Express’s journey with the Inclusive Employers Standard. Congratulations on everything that has been achieved!
If you have been inspired to review your inclusion work, it’s easy to find out more about the Inclusive Employers Standard. Emily Pattinson, Senior Inclusive Employers Standard Programme Lead, is available to answer any questions you have and explain the process in more detail. It’s easy to get in touch using the form below. If you’re a member you can also talk to your account manager in your next catch-up.
Grow your team
When you become an Inclusive Employers’ Member you grow your I&D team.
Your account manager works with you to understand your goals, your challenges and achievable next steps.
Do you need more support for your inclusive culture to thrive?
Learn more about the Inclusive Employers Standard
Inclusive Employers awards inclusion accreditation to over fifteen organisations in the latest round
Inclusive Employers Standard case study: Teach First