This guidance is designed to help Charter signatories to adhere to the monitoring and reporting protocol and follow good practice on monitoring and reporting diversity information
Obstacles to effective monitoring
- Lack of linkage to the business strategy
- Lack of clarity of the benefits to the business
- Failure to build confidence and understanding with clients and employees
- Too narrow a focus such as gender and race only
- Lack of clear accountabilities
What to monitor
- Work placements and internships
- Retention - who is staying
- Who is leaving and why
- Jobs applications and where they come from
- Who is being promoted and how long it is taking
- Training - who is receiving the opportunities and investment
- Performance assessment scores and profiles of those being assessed and those doing the assessment
- Salaries and Bonus payment
- Access to flexible and part-time working
- Involvement with grievances and disciplines
- Workforce and client perceptions
- Productivity
- Who you are doing business with
What data to collect
- Age;
- Disability;
- Ethnicity;
- Gender;
- Religion/belief;
- Sexual orientation;
- Socio-economic background; and
- Caring responsibilities.
For a list of classification in line with best practice, please refer to the charter signatory annual reporting template and the model questionnaire.
Collecting, using and storing the data
Monitoring analysis is only as good as the quality of the data you draw it from. Whilst it is unlikely that a full set of data will always be available, commitment to monitoring and clarity about how the data is used is a cornerstone of equality and diversity best practice.
Incomplete data can be particularly problematic if you are monitoring an activity or outcome that affects a relatively small number of people. It is important to consider a range of ways of measuring employee and client profile and perceptions.
Being able to make sense of your data by comparing it to profiles of the profession, workforce profiles of other firms, or national or regional census data, will be important and will influence the categories used in house.
Comparison of data against solicitors holding practising certificates can be made using the Law Society's 'Diversity of the profession - a short synopsis' report. This can be accessed online at: http://www.lawsociety.org.uk/advice/articles/diversity-in-the-profession
In addition to analysing workforce data specific audits can be carried out to examine in more depth peoples perceptions. For example, ACAS resources including sample questionnaires that can be used to explore attitudes to religion and belief, sexual orientation, sexual reassignment and age in the workplace.
Information on the diversity characteristics of individuals should be provided by them. This is called self classification, giving individuals a wide range of categories to choose from is more likely to gain a response from individuals.
Take care to ensure that individuals cannot be identified when publishing data where a very small number of people belong to a particular group. Data Protection considerations
The Data Protection Act 1998 regulates the processing of information relating to individuals. This includes the obtaining, holding, using or disclosing of such information, and covers computerised records as well as manual filing systems and card indexes. Firms should hold the minimum personal information necessary to enable them to perform their functions. All such information is confidential and should be treated with care, to comply with the law.
Summary of Data Protection Principles
Firms should comply with the Data Protection principles of good practice which underpin the Act. These state that personal data shall:
- Be obtained and processed fairly and lawfully
- Be held only for specified purposes
Be adequate, relevant but not excessive - Be accurate and kept up to date.
- Be held for no longer than necessary
- Be accessible to data subjects
- Be subject to the appropriate security measures
Not be transferred outside the European Economic Area (EEA )
Firms may from time to time process sensitive personal data regarding clients or individuals that they deal with. "Personal data" relates to living individuals that could be identified by the information. "Sensitive personal data" is information as to a data subject's racial or ethnic origin, political opinion, religious beliefs, trade union membership, sexual orientation or marital status, physical or mental health, offences or alleged offences and information relating to criminal proceedings. This information may be processed for equal opportunity monitoring or to meet the needs of individuals with disabilities, or for disciplinary proceedings or other legal obligations. Any personal or sensitive data held by firms should only be held for the purposes for which it was gathered.
In other circumstances where sensitive personal data is being processed or held, firms should seek the explicit consent of the individual involved unless one of the limited exemptions applies. All employees should be aware of and respect their obligations in relation to the confidentiality of sensitive personal data.
All employees are responsible for ensuring that data which they hold is held securely and that personal data is not disclosed orally or in writing or otherwise to an unauthorised third party and that every reasonable effort is made so that data is not disclosed accidentally.
Retention of Data
Firms will hold different types of information for different lengths of time, depending on the legal and operational requirements, following which they should be destroyed. Firms should keep some forms of information longer than others in line with Financial, Legal or Archival requirements.
Firms should have retention and disposal policies which set out a list of retention periods, for which different types of personal data records can be kept.