11 September, 2019

BAME 100 Business Leaders (2019)

ABOUT THE #BAME100

Green Park’s research has found a distinct lack of ethnic minority representation in senior leadership positions, as black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) professionals still face a number of challenges and barriers in and out of the workplace.

We want to inspire a shift in the attitudes and practices of leading organisations by banishing the age-old myth that diverse talent does not exist.

The BAME 100 Business Leaders index is designed to showcase the UK’s leading ethnic minority talent, still chronically underrepresented in boardrooms across Britain’s private, public and third sectors.

The annual index uniquely profiles one hundred ethnic minority leaders who any organisation looking for a board member, should be prepared to consider.

METHODOLOGY

Throughout the year, Green Park monitors and maps diverse executive talent across the UK’s private, public & third sector organisations, producing extensive and varied talent pools of ethnic minority leaders.

During this initial mapping stage, Green Park identified over 600 diverse leaders who made up the 2019 BAME 100 Business Leaders longlist.

To this longlist, a proprietary scoring methodology was applied, focussing on professional experience and governance expertise, with the top scoring individuals making our 2019 BAME 100 Business Leaders shortlist.

The shortlist was evaluated by an independent assessment panel, overseen by Green Park’s Chairman and the founding Chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, Trevor Phillips. Consisting of esteemed leading figures from some of the UK’s best-known and most highly successful private, public & third sector organisations, the panel identified the final 100 leaders whose experience and expertise they perceived as most suitable for a board role.

THE ASSESSMENT PANEL

  • Lord Victor Adebowale - Chief Executive |Turning Point

  • Peter Cheese - Chief Executive | CIPD

  • Chris Cummings - Chief Executive | The Investment Association

  • Colleen Harris - Deputy Lieutenant | Greater London Lieutenancy Ltd

  • Sir Kenneth Olisa OBE - Chairman | Restoration Partners

  • June Sarpong MBE - Co-Founder | The Wie Symposium

  • David Tyler - Chairman | J Sainsbury’s PLC

  • Iqbal Wahhab OBE - Chief Executive | Impact Dining

EXTRACT FROM THE FOREWORD

RAJ TULSIANI

CEO | Green Park

Even in less disruptive times, being part of the team at Green Park wouldn’t be a choice for the fainthearted. We set ourselves high standards and tough tests. The first letter in our CREED value set is “C” – for courage. And the final “D” stands for diversity. As we’ve discovered in our company’s short life it can take bucketloads of the first to deliver a thimbleful of the last. But that’s what our teams do, day in and day out, putting talented leaders from all backgrounds in front of our clients.

I’m incredibly proud of the several hundred names our practice leaders, their associates and researchers have assembled to be considered for inclusion in this list. This year, our assessors had to be more ruthless in their selection of our 100 finalists than ever before, due to the range of high-quality talent available. The truth is that today’s businesses and institutions simply have no excuse to say that they can’t find people of colour to approach.

The fact is that whilst this year’s survey results are encouraging for Green Park, the picture isn’t so great for our sector as a whole. Whilst the gender picture is improving, when it comes to minority hirings at senior level, the UK is flatlining at a moment when its international profile should be changing to suit our global ambitions. And without delivery of this vital quality – diversity - we don’t see how we can expect people to trust the top echelons of our society.

I hope that we never hear anyone utter the words “we’d love to have more diversity, but….” again. The talent is right here in these pages, ready to serve.

To download our 2019 BAME 100 Business Leaders executive summary, please click the green download button below. 

For a further discussion about our BAME 100 research, please contact Fiona McIntosh on +44 (0)203 145 3445 or Fiona.Mcintosh@green-park.co.uk.

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