During 2020 the conversations that I’ve had around diversity and inclusion in the workplace have moved from ‘Why is it important to include everyone?’ to ‘We know it’s important to include everyone, but how can we include everyone?

As a result of this, we've pulled together this report - 'Which diversity measures work?' - to better understand how Founders of early stage businesses can improve their inclusion practices when it comes to gender.

We've looked at 20 B2B software Unicorns in North America and Europe to understand not only what proportion of the staff are female, but also how many women there are in leadership positions and how long women stay in those positions. We've then analysed the relationships between those numbers and maternity/paternity leave policies, to understand how they relate, in Part One.

In Part Two - to be published later in November - we'll look at additional initiatives such as setting D&I goals, working with non-profit community groups, and setting up company-wide affinity groups.

Whilst there's still a really long way to go with understanding how truly inclusive teams can be built (particularly from underrepresented groups aside from women) I’m really hopeful that this research will be received as a guide to help leaders begin to answer the question 'how can we include everyone?'. The aim of this research is not to provide instructions for how to fix inclusion at work, but more so that the array of options that Founders have becomes easier to navigate in terms of linking initiatives to outcomes.

Please note that a link to the report can be found to the left of your screen on desktop and at the bottom on mobile.