Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Equality, diversity and inclusion

The role of leadership

by Personnel Today 23 Aug 2005
by Personnel Today 23 Aug 2005

The business

Lehman Brothers is a global investment bank with a history going back to the US in the 1840s. The company employs more than 20,000 people worldwide of which 4,100 work across Europe. The company is structured into four main businesses: equities, fixed income, investment banking and investment management.

The challenge

Both Joseph Gregory – president and chief operating officer based in New York – and Jeremy Isaacs – chief executive, Europe and Asia – began championing diversity at Lehman Brothers at the start of this millennium. Isaacs approached the head of HR to identify a practical way forward on this agenda for Europe and to ensure the work matched US initiatives.

They concluded that diversity required a full-time post and Fleur Bothwick was appointed as European director of diversity in September 2003.

A series of focus groups was run by Helen Turnbull, a consultant with Florida-based company Human Facets. These focus groups looked at diversity from the perspectives of gender, ethnicity, continental Europeans, expatriate staff, working parents and white men. In each case, members of the focus groups were asked to identify the most important issues affecting their work at Lehman Brothers and areas of contention which needed to be addressed.

“Conducting the research gave us a clear picture of employees’ views,” says Bothwick. “The fact that we used a third party gave credibility and structure to the findings. The final report provided the catalyst for going further.”

Rejecting the idea of setting up a number of network groups around the company, the issue was addressed as a leadership matter. The head of each company division was then asked to define diversity for their area of responsibility, to identify specific challenges with regard to the diversity agenda, and to draw up a business plan to move forward over the next 12 to 18 months. This agenda was discussed alongside the division’s overall business plan, ensuring the initiative was put in the mainstream from the outset.

The solution

A European diversity steering committee was established and it continues to meet once a month to discuss progress and deal with issues wherever they arise in the company. The committee is made up of two or three representatives from each division, and they feed into working groups in each division. In this way, Lehman Brothers has created an infrastructure which ensures diversity is addressed at every level of the organisation throughout every activity.

“Our approach was based on creating a programme that could be embedded in the organisation and would be sustainable,” says Bothwick. “It has to be part of the fabric of the firm and what people do on a day-to-day basis.”
In the past 18 months the steering committee has seen the appointment of disability, gay and lesbian champions, joining the established race and gender champions.

The outcome

Diversity has become an everyday part of Lehman Brothers’ operations. While there is still work to be done, Bothwick notes that requests for flexible working are virtually always accepted and company management reports are now broken down by ethnicity and gender as a matter of course rather than requiring a special request.

“We continue to talk about measurement – what we should be measuring and what success looks like,” says Bothwick. “We are not focusing on hiring quotas but we do look at year-on-year comparisons in our demographics.”

The company runs an annual global attitude survey which includes questions to track progress on diversity objectives. In 2004 the company won the Opportunity Now City Focus Group Award for creating an initiative that realises the economic potential and business benefits of women working in London.

Employee perspective

Sridhar Bearelly is the co-head of CDOs/structured credit at Lehman Brothers in Europe and one of the steering committee representatives from the fixed income division. “Being part of the steering committee can be time consuming, but it’s been worthwhile because it has transformed the way diversity is approached,” he says.

Bearelly recently became a father and took two weeks’ fully paid paternity leave. “In finance it’s very easy to become obsessed with achieving revenue targets,” he says. “People are now much more aware of diversity and there’s more of a community feeling in the workplace.

“Senior management has been actively involved in supporting and understanding how diversity benefits our workforce and business, so it feels like there’s no glass ceiling – no potential barrier to stop you being promoted or developing a successful career in the company.”

Learning points for HR

“You cannot over-communicate on diversity,” says Bothwick. “In our first year, we made great strides in implementing new initiatives, but still people wanted more information.”

She also notes the importance of tracking and monitoring progress on diversity throughout the year. There were a few mad panics when the end-of-year review approached and the company now runs a mid-year diversity review which involves the global heads of divisions.

Sign up to our weekly round-up of HR news and guidance

Receive the Personnel Today Direct e-newsletter every Wednesday

OptOut
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

The kind of impact delivered across Lehman Brothers was only achievable through the inclusion of senior executives and division heads at every stage in the process. This was crucial since it was agreed early on that diversity would mean something different for each division.

“You can’t rely on a small group of people to do this,” says Bothwick. “If you have only one person championing this, it is not enough. You need to take every opportunity to get people engaged. The more people are involved, the more sustained the work will be.”

Personnel Today

Personnel Today articles are written by an expert team of award-winning journalists who have been covering HR and L&D for many years. Some of our content is attributed to "Personnel Today" for a number of reasons, including: when numerous authors are associated with writing or editing a piece; or when the author is unknown (particularly for older articles).

previous post
Jockeys boycott race meeting over safety concerns
next post
Security staff threaten strikes over pay at Eurostar terminals

You may also like

It’s no secret – parity in the workplace...

10 Jul 2025

One in eight senior NHS managers from black...

1 Jul 2025

Progressive DEI policy is a red line for...

27 Jun 2025

BBC Breakfast bullying and misconduct allegations under investigation

20 Jun 2025

Finance professionals expect less emphasis on ESG and...

18 Jun 2025

Lack of role models a ‘barrier’ for people...

17 Jun 2025

Pride 2025: why corporate allyship still matters

16 Jun 2025

HR is second ‘most sexist profession’ survey suggests

13 Jun 2025

Racism claims have tripled and ‘Equality Act is...

12 Jun 2025

Fewer workers would comply with a return-to-office mandate

21 May 2025

  • Empower and engage for the future: A revolution in talent development (webinar) WEBINAR | As organisations strive...Read more
  • Empowering working parents and productivity during the summer holidays SPONSORED | Businesses play a...Read more
  • AI is here. Your workforce should be ready. SPONSORED | From content creation...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
OHW+
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2025

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2025 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+