The Diversity Forum is proud to launch the report “Inclusive Impact: a Comprehensive Review of Diversity in the Social Investment Sector.”  The report was written by recruitment agency Inclusive Boards and commissioned by the Diversity Forum. To help actors in the sector act on the report’s findings, Diversity Forum is also publishing a toolkit, which gives practical guidance on how to make a company more diverse. TSIC led the creation of the toolkit. The publication of the report and toolkit are made possible by the support of the Connect Fund.

The report indicates a clear lack of diversity in gender, disability, ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds. While the representation of women at Executive level has increased by 2% since 2017, it has fallen by 5 percentage points since 2017 within the growing social investment sector more broadly.

Bonnie Chiu, Managing Director, The Social Investment Consultancy and Board Executive of Diversity Forum said:

“2018 was the start of the #MeToo era and we saw a lot of progress for women. But this report highlights that progress towards diversity ebbs and flows. We cannot take progress for granted and the social investment sector needs more concerted efforts to achieve inclusion.”

The need for diversity is especially acute at senior and board level. The report shows that almost one in five Board directors (18%) in the sector attended Oxford or Cambridge universities. This compares to just 1% of the whole population. Black Asian Minority Ethnic (BAME) women are the least likely to hold directorship in the sector, accounting for just 16 (or 2.8%) of all Board Directors.

However, the sector is still in development and actors across the field recognise a huge potential for improvement and even the possibility for the social investment sector to become a leader in diversity.

Samuel Kasumu, Managing Director at Inclusive Boards said;

“The impact of social investment extends beyond simply providing financial capital to ensuring the finance has made a difference to society. The size and relatively young age of social investment means there is an opportunity to drive change and lead by example”.

We hope that the report and toolkit will be useful to anyone trying to promote diversity.

For further information or to arrange an interview with Diversity Forum about the new report, please contact Bonnie Chiu on +44(0) 208 004 6429 and [email protected]

Read the report

Read the toolkit