The ABC will try to address its struggle to retain Indigenous staff and employees from diverse backgrounds and get more diverse candidates in front of hiring managers as part of its diversity and inclusion plans for the next three years.
The commitment was made in a three-year “Diversity, inclusion and belonging plan” released by the ABC on Tuesday, a little over a month after managing director David Anderson and news boss Justin Stevens were criticised for failing to adequately supportΩ Q+A host Stan Grant over racially charged attacks.
Anderson said the ambitions outlined in the plan build on the “strong foundation for diversity” already in place at the ABC, and lauded the broadcaster’s progress in recent years: “But there is more to do.”
The plan focuses on increasing diversity in the ABC’s ranks, and keeping the diverse staff already employed. For years the ABC has struggled to retain staff from Indigenous and diverse backgrounds. As recently as May, ABC employees told The Age that a lack of diversity among senior ranks had contributed to worsening retention rates of Indigenous staff.
The ABC said it would “continue to work with external organisations, such as Media Diversity Australia, Bus Stop Films, and Australian Network on Disability” to improve diversity at all levels. As part of that, the ABC will establish an internship program for Indigenous and culturally and linguistically diverse candidates and people living with disabilities.
It will also engage a “specialist recruitment adviser” to focus on getting more diverse candidates in front of hiring managers. The adviser will “develop strategies and initiatives” and also focus on boosting diversity among ABC leadership.
A “retention framework” will also be introduced by June next year, with the aim to assess “the experience of employees” over their careers. The ABC said it hoped to “better understand” why staff from Indigenous and diverse backgrounds “may choose to leave”, and take “action” to address the problem. It hoped to see turnover rates among diverse staff at the same level as for employees overall.
The ABC employs 4419 staff. Of them, 55.4% are women and 44.1% are men. Indigenous representation totals 3.3% overall, and 5.4% of the total workforce lives with a disability. Employees from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds make up 25.7% of the total workforce.
As part of its three-year plan, the ABC will also try to boost diversity across its workforce, with aims to increase Indigenous representation to 3.4% of the total workforce, and increase staff representation of people with disabilities to 8%.
The ABC also wants to see 50% of its executive roles filled by women, and 30% of content maker and executive roles filled by staff from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.
On the content side, the ABC has committed to engaging in more community and First Nations strategic partnerships, with a view to lock in at least eight First Nations media and community-based media partnerships by December 2025.
The promise builds on broader diversity commitments across the ABC’s content, which includes hiring a string of cultural guidance advisers by June next year who will be made available to journalists and other content makers to ensure cultural advice is consistent.
The ABC has also drawn up “content accessibility” targets, including captions on all video content “regardless of platform”. It will also provide transcripts for all podcasts and radio programs and alternative text for all images, and create audio descriptions for “at least 14 hours” of TV and iview programming a week.
The ABC employs 4419 staff. Of them, 55.4% are women and 44.1% are men. Indigenous representation totals 3.3% overall, and 5.4% of the total workforce lives with a disability. Employees from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds make up 25.7% of the total workforce.
How does this compare with the proportions in the general population? I would guess not very far off the mark.
For some aboriginals its about family issues as a certain AFL club recently found out. The usual script is that the newly waged recruit gets requests from relatives to help out with a few bucks. Pretty soon that turns into a flood and becomes unbearable. He/she doesnt have enough to meet all requests so he/she has to reduce some payments and maybe pick and choose who gets what. Then justify that to the ones missing out. Horrendous. So the person resigns.
Its an age old situation created by the culture of sharing in hunter gatherer societies. Its their version of social security and our families have all been through it at some point in our history. It gets a particular mention in Jack Londons books about the inuit in Canada over 100 years ago. So its not new nor is it restricted to aboriginals. Jarrad Diamond also covers it in his books. The solution in the Jack London books was to seperate the wage earner from his family by thousands of kilometres. This was the AFL clubs solution too and it went belly up. In the age of instant and global communications and bank transfers I havent got any suggestions. But there must be a solution.
Even Balanders in the NT get “humbugged” if they’re seen at the ATM. In a way it’s attractive, but it’s a disincentive to individuals “getting ahead.” I don’t know what the solution is.
Its a consequence of a hunter gatherer society attempting to mingle with a complicated modern western economy so its no ones fault and has to be managed.
One possible solution would be to make sure everyone had their basic needs met and didnt have to impose on family members. Or maybe this isnt a possible solution given the prevailing neoliberal attitudes.
But I don’t think the sharing culture is only about meeting basic needs. It’s a clash of cultures, and something’s got to give.
Competent talent should be the priority supported by a competent management as that’s what gone AWOL.
You know, like, back in the olden days when we had Mark Colvin and Monica Attard and the programmes they presented.
diversity! ? What about upholding good journalism ? Like putting neo cons aja Blokes from Netflix eho wanna flogg it off to monetise down track – bad decisions terrible ramshackle stuff – tied up in the “platitude wr are doing diversity …rubbish ; id prefer an elder of any creed who believed in honouring culture and putting docial interests first let alone our freedom ; communication and a public live voice on Q&A… btw they are selling our food bowls to INVESTORS offshore today ! Neo con piracy call it free trade ? Rot