Do you work for a company that is an Employer of Choice for Gender Equality (EOCGE)? If not, perhaps you’ve heard of the Federal Government’s Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA). Last Thursday, we were lucky enough to host Julie Burton from the Agency, who presented us with our fifth consecutive citation.

Julie offered fascinating insight into the inner workings of the WGEA, what really goes into assessing a company’s application for the EOCGE citation and what it takes to meet the Agency’s requirements.

Not surprisingly, Julie was incredibly passionate about both her role and the role the Agency performs in improving equality in the workplace, emphasising how particularly important a similar passion from senior management within any organisation is to achieving true change.

To be successful, she advised, requires true commitment to incorporating gender diversity into the overall company strategy. The benefits of doing so far outweigh the effort, however, and deliver significant competitive advantage through;

• Differentiation
• Intrinsic candidate attraction (lots of people want to work for employers who have the citation)
• Financial advantage (there is a proven Return on Investment (ROI))
• 
  

This level of commitment from a company can only be generated if there is significant “buy-in” from the CEO and Julie was particularly pleased with our CEO Peter Acheson’s efforts to promote gender equality through his role as a WGEA Pay Equity Ambassador.

Peter has also played an enormous part in establishing our wide range of programs to promote gender equality, including;

• The Next 100 Women in IT
• The Peoplebank Women in IT Scholarships at RMIT University for disadvantaged women
• Our ongoing support for charities which empower and/or support women, including Dress for Success, UN Women and IWDA
• Pledge for Parity
• Our internal Diversity Council

Julie was quick to comment that continuous improvement is fundamental to achieving the citation, as each year the “bar is raised” through more demanding criteria (which this year stood at 62 questions, of which 52 were pre-requisites for qualification).

In 2016, this meant that of the 12,000+ organisations that reported into the WGEA on gender equality, only 106 received the citation (less than 1%).

Julie closed by presenting us with the 2016 award and urged us to continue as leaders within the recruitment industry for gender equality to make sure we achieve a sixth straight citation in 2017.