Abstract

Diversity’ refers to all significant differences between individuals including sex, age, race, ethnicity, religion, physical and mental ability, educational achievement and occupation.

In 2013, as part of the Equality and Diversity work plan it was decided to survey staff’s views and perceptions of equality and diversity in the hospice. It was agreed to use a standardised tool - Diversity Climate Survey – developed by Prof Robert Bean, an Australian business consultant and with his agreement some questions were slightly modified to reflect ethnicity and religion relevant to the UK.

The Diversity Climate Survey is intended for use across an entire workforce and provides data on individual, work group and organisational factors relating to the ways individuals perceive and feel about the presence and management of diversity in their workplaces and the influences that aspects of diversity and diversity management may have on their career development. The results of the survey can evidence themes around values and belief providing a baseline to target future training and policy in relation to issues of equality and diversity

Farleigh Hospice scoring was positive achieving Level 4 with a score of 60.97 out of 69. and demonstrated that respondents felt the hospice was managing diversity well and they felt positive about workforce diversity. To improve scores the aim would be to target questions which scored the lowest and these would identify also if the areas needing attention related to individual, department or organisational issues. An action plan was develop to address the lowest scoring areas.

The survey was completed again in 2015 demonstrating similar positive results achieving Level 4 again with a score of 61.05 out of 69.