Equality, diversity and inclusion

IPEM is committed to promote proactively  a culture of equality, diversity and inclusion within our discipline as a professional body and as an employer.  Our new EDI policy and Action Plan were approved by the Board of Trustees in January 2022 and  our new EDI policy can be found here.  If you have any comments or resources which you think would be useful to share with our members please contact Eva McClean.   

Inclusiveness is one of our three main strategic values and we want to include this commitment in everything we do.

Our commitment

Diversity and Inclusion Framework

As part of  this commitment we were actively involved in the development  of and are participating in the  Diversity and Inclusion Progression Framework for professional bodies.    Developed by the Science Council and the Royal Academy of Engineering, this framework is a tool for professional bodies to assess and monitor their progress on diversity and inclusion. The first version was launched in 2016 and our previous CEO, Rosemary Cook, was involved in the project from the start. A summary benchmarking report of all participating organisations is here. In 2019 a new steering group was formed which included IPEM EDI Manager Eva McClean to develop a second extended and improved version which was launched in January 2021.

IPEM has started using the framework to evaluate all areas of our organisation with input from trustees, staff and members in the relevant areas: 1   Governance and leadership 2   Membership and professional registration 3   Meetings, conferences and events 4   Education and training, accreditation and examinations (delivered by IPEM) 5   Accreditation of education and training  (delivered by others) 6   Prizes, awards and grants 7   Communications and marketing (promotion of IPEM, its activities and services) 8   Outreach and engagement (activities to engage and increase interest in STEM) 9   Employment 10  Monitoring and measuring 11 Publications  Each of areas are to be assessed on a 4 level scale:    1. EMERGING, data and insights just being gathered, action tends to be informal, isolated, bottom-up, one-offs. 2. TRANSFORMING the culture and systems of the organisation with clear evidence of change. 3. CASE FOR CHANGE is clear, Responsibility and accountability being formalised, guidelines being developed 4. WELL ESTABLISHED change, sustained senior level support in place, clear signs of change. Once this is completed we will submit our analysis to an independent agency who will benchmark us against other professional science and engineering bodies and provide us with a report to help us identify areas that require improvements.   Click here for more information or contact Eva McClean .

Examples of specific action taken

• Created blogs and documents to highlight special days like LGBTSTEM Day and the International Day of People with Disabilities  (See our "Creating Inclusive Documents" publication here)
• Sponsored the All Party Parliamentary Group on Diversity and STEM and participated in their consultation 
• Contributed to the EDI Section on the Healthcare Science People Plan 
• Encouraged female members to apply for Fellowship, to redress the gender balance in this area of membership which currently has only 10% female members.
• Featured members of different ages, gender and ethnic backgrounds in our careers and other materials and videos.
• Provided all staff with training on good equality and diversity practice, and undertaken diversity monitoring of all staff and job applicants.
• Communicated relevant research and information to our members, for example the reports for employers listed below.
• Promoted relevant events and activites such as WISE and National Inclusion Week.
• Invited members to form networks for any specific groups within the membership, if they wish to do so.  Read an article from our Disability Network Mentor here
  
  

Understanding unconscious bias

As part of IPEM’s continuing policy of promoting a culture of equality, diversity and inclusion, the Board of Trustees have undertaken training on recognising and dealing with unconscious bias.

We have put together a  Training Document (based on a similar one of the Royal Society) and encourage all members who take part in selection, interview or awards panels to complete this training (can be used for CPD), which will help them to recognise their own unconscious bias.  The link to this is here.

"I'd like to say that as a member of the LGBTQ+ community the fact that IPEM is taking these issues seriously is quite assuring"

"The unique challenges that are put in our paths, which reflect our backgrounds and individuality, most certainly differ and we are grateful they are being addressed by IPEM.”

	An analysis of the diversity in STP applications  Courtesy of the BAME Clinical Scientist Trainee Network
	UK Government National LGBT Survey 2019
	LGBT in Britain - Health Report  Produced by Stonewall following a YouGov Survey
	Report from the Royal Academy of Engineering:  Creating cultures where all engineers thrive
	A House of Commons and InterEngineering Report:  Engineering Action:  Tackling Homophobia in Engineering
	A report from the Royal Academy of Engineering: ncreasing diversity and inclusion in engineering – a case study toolkit - See more at: http://www.raeng.org.uk/policy/diversity-in-engineering/bis-programme/employers#sthash.Eeb9SNVM.dpuf Increasing diversity and inclusion in engineering – a case study toolkit - See more at: http://www.raeng.org.uk/policy/diversity-in-engineering/bis-programme/employers#sthash.Eeb9SNVM.dpuf Increasing diversity and inclusion in engineering -  a case study toolkit
	A report from NHS Employers about Diversity and inclusion The Power of research in driving change: How to use research and data to promote inclusive workplaces
	A Stonewall report from a YouGov Survey on  "Unhealthy Attitudes" in Health and Social Care

Royal Academy of Engineering - videos

The Royal Academy of Engineering, InterEngineering and Mott MacDonald have produced a series of videos profiling lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) engineers. On 1st February 2017 Fiona Wall, IPEM's VP External, attended the video launch event on our behalf.   To read Fiona's blog click here

The findings of the report on "Creating Inclusive cultures where all engineers thrive" were also summarised in a video.