Black Inclusion Week is fast approaching, and I’m proud to share that Inclusive Employers will be sponsoring this year’s program.
This year’s theme, “Every Voice United,” is a timely and necessary call to action. Racial equity for Black people isn’t just a responsibility for Black communities – it requires collective awareness, action, and accountability from everyone. If every voice is to be truly united, then the loudest voices must make room for the most silenced ones. Last year’s theme, “Empowered for Change: Building a Better Future,” laid the groundwork, but this year, we’re moving from hope to honesty and from inspiration to implementation.
Some critical truths from last year’s Black Inclusion Week:
- Until we acknowledge that many Western systems are built on racism rooted in colonialism, exclusion will remain our default.
- Allyship isn’t a badge – it’s a verb. It means challenging racism, walking alongside others, and actively using your power and influence to bring change.
- Intersectionality is the key to genuine inclusion. No one is ‘just’ Black – they may also be women, queer, disabled, neurodivergent, or hold multiple identities that shape their experience in the workplace.
One of the boldest takeaways? Organisations must stop debating whether racism exists and begin dismantling it.
As historian David Olusoga reminds us: “We can’t understand the world we live in without understanding the legacy of empire. To ignore that is to tell ourselves a false history.”
Ruth will be hosting a powerful panel session titled “Decolonising the workplace – Power, privilege and the path to inclusion” on Thursday, 15th May 2025, at 3 pm.
Book your space
Decolonising the Workplace
This year’s session is anchored in action. Our panel will be underpinned by the “Decolonising the Workplace: Your Active Role in Disrupting Racism” Toolkit – a reflective, practical guide we developed for Black History Month. This toolkit is grounded in the Inclusive Employers Standard, our evidence-based framework for measuring progress on inclusion. By anchoring the work in this standard, we’ve created a practical, strategic route for organisations to embed anti-racism across systems, culture, and leadership – not as a side project but as a core function of organisational health.
What does decolonising the workplace look like?
Decolonisation in the workplace is the intentional process of identifying, unlearning, and dismantling the structures, mindsets, and systems that were built without, and often against, Black people and other marginalised communities in mind.
It means moving beyond symbolic gestures and toward the redesign of policies, cultures, and power dynamics so that equity is not an afterthought but the default. Decolonisation challenges us to ask:
- Who is centred in our policies – and who is erased?
- Who holds power – and how is that power sustained or protected?
- What narratives guide our decisions – and which voices are missing?
It is both a personal journey and a collective, structural responsibility.
The toolkit is structured around three core principles: self-reflection, systemic awareness, and sustained accountability. It is built on six powerful pillars:
- Engage – Face the status quo through open dialogue and transparent data.
- Equip – Close knowledge gaps and build historical awareness.
- Empower – Actively create space and opportunity for Black talent.
- Embed – Make anti-racism part of your strategy, not a side initiative.
- Evaluate – Measure real impact – not performative activity.
- Evolve – Commit to uncomfortable, continual growth.
The toolkit also guides individuals to assess where they are (from fear to advocacy), reflect on their complicity, and set both personal and team goals. It turns reflection into responsibility, aligned with a standard that ensures accountability, consistency, and impact.
More than a calendar moment
As a Neurodivergent Black woman in the EDI space, Black Inclusion Week is more than a calendar moment. It is a week of reckoning – a time for organisations to move beyond celebratory posts and historical storytelling and instead confront the inequities embedded in their own culture.
This year’s theme, Every Voice United, calls everyone – regardless of race, gender, or seniority – to commit to anti-racism. To use their influence. To stand in solidarity with the voices that have been silenced for too long.
A top-down approach to anti-racism
Senior leaders set the tone. Until they understand that inclusion and anti-racism must be coordinated and modelled from the top, organisations will continue to stagnate – and lose the Black talent they so often claim to value. It’s time to get practical about the realities we face in our workplaces:
Pay gap
- Among British-born employees, Black British workers face the most significant pay gap, earning 5.6% less than white colleagues.
- For Black workers born outside the UK, the pay gap rises to 12%.
Perceptions of the pay gap
- Nearly 6 in 10 Black employees (57%) say that greater pay transparency would help close the gap.
- Yet over half of white employees (57%) believe there is no ethnicity pay gap at all.
Career advancement
- Over 60% of Black people say they’ve been passed over for promotion.
- 50% feel unable to talk to their line manager about career progression.
- 74% say career growth is essential to them.
Workplace inequities
- Black professionals are 81% more likely than white professionals to say their company is “not fair at all” or “only slightly fair.”
- 76% of Black professionals say they must work harder to advance – compared to just 30% of white professionals.
Source: Black History Month – Reclaiming the Narratives
Join us on May 15th at 3 pm
This isn’t just another panel.
It’s a challenge.
A mirror.
A manifesto.
It’s an invitation to look within, speak up, and commit – not once a year, but every single day.
Be part of a conversation that will stretch your thinking, challenge your structures, and equip you with tools for meaningful change. Whether you’re leading a team, shaping policy, or just starting your journey – this session will meet you where you are.
“The systems that we live under were not designed to serve us. But that doesn’t mean we stop showing up to redesign them.” – Afua Hirsch.