Dear Clare
We did two trawls initially and combined it with a personal information
update - (address, next of kin etc.) We explained what it was for, the
monitoring requirements are in our policy and set a returns target of 80%.
We had a very small number of people (half a dozen?) who refused to supply
the information on race on grounds of principle - our Head of HR replied to
those and attempted to persuade them that it was for above board purposes.
We only improved the return by 1% the second time around to 56%, which was
very disappointing, but upon analysis it became apparent that a whole
section of staff (casuals) had not yet been recorded and that in all other
categories except one we had made the target.
We are therefore concentrating on meeting our target of 80% across all
categories. We have yet to make a decision about whether to collect on
sexual orientation or religious belief and will probably wait until HESA
require it. Alternatively, we are thinking about using a whole different
mechanism to collect that as it is so much more sensitive (via an online
survey hosted by a third party so that we don't actually hold the info on
file/database and it is not linked to an individual.) Obviously this means
we wouldn't be able to carry out much analysis across functions etc. and
there are cost implications.
regards
Clare Martlew
Human Resources Manager
Tel: (01782 58)4376
Email: [log in to unmask]
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-----Original Message-----
From: HE Administrators equal opportunities list
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Clare J Baird
Sent: 10 May 2004 15:29
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Employees' ethnicity data
Dear All
We have recently completed the second round of data collection for all
employees.
Unfortunately there are still returns outstanding from a large percentage
of employees.
I would be interested to know how other HEIs are encouraging employees to
return this information, how they are explaining why this sensitive data is
required and how they are reassuring employees about confidentiality of the
information. I would also be interested to know what percentage of returns
could realistically be expected!
many thanks
Clare J Baird
Employee Relations Officer (Diversity and Engagement)
Queen Mary, University of London
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