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The Public Sector Executive Podcast is the new podcast bringing you closer to the public sector leaders in the UK. Covering everything from the environment to the economy to transport, our podcast will bring you the latest news, views and insight from the people responsible for shaping the country's future.
Stuart Love: Frankly, I do see the rest of the world is very quick to judge Africa and its leaders. Having established those relationships with faith, leaders with our communities, those mistakes are easier for us to talk to people about, to understand, to learn from. So there's everything from what's going on in terms of, cost of living, cris, et cetera, all the way through to. And this is really important. The decisions we make now affect people's pensions.
Voiceover: This is the public sector executive podcast bringing you views, insight and conversation from leaders across the public sector, presented by Dan Ben.
Dan Benn: Today I am joined by Stuart Love, CEO of Westminster City Council, to discuss all things to do with community engagement, diversity and, equality. So, Stuart, welcome to the show. Thank you for joining me.
Stuart Love: Thanks, Daniel. Thank you very much for having me.
Dan Benn: So, I want to kick things off by talking about engagement, within the community. When I was looking kind of at you and your work, that was something that really shone through. And I saw that researchers found that kind of satisfaction ratings amongst residents of Westminster are, increasing across the board, 94%, are satisfied with the way that the council are running things. How has that been achieved?
Stuart Love: I think if I can take this back a little bit, from those, pure statistics, which obviously we're very happy with what has been achieved, albeit more for us to do. But if I go back probably about six years to when I first came into this role, one of the things that I said to the politicians who employed me was I was going to have a real focus on the culture of the organization, and in particular within that, equity, diversity and inclusion, because I could see that there were real issues that needed addressing. And so over the last, six od years, we have been focused on driving our culture up, changing the culture of the organization. And through that, we've had a real focus on equity, diversity and inclusion. One of the reasons for that is, in doing that, we are now an organization that much better represents the communities we serve. And that absolutely is one of the reasons why we are seeing much greater levels of engagement from our residents, why our resident satisfaction has gone up. And I think this is a really important point, Daniel, to make, and I'm sorry, because I am broadening it out a bit. When we talk about equity, diversity, inclusion, the private sector can always point to the bottom line as a reason why this is important. The public sector is not very good at talking about why this is such an important thing. But if you look at the changes in our organization, the fact that our organization is now, as I say, much more representative of our communities. So the global majority, our organization, by the way, global majority is what our staff in Westminster have decided that they would like us to use that term, which is why we use it. The organization has increased by 10% in terms of our global majority staff over the last six years. And that means that we've gone from being sort of around about 32% to now 42% of our organization, which much better reflects the communities, that we serve in Westminster the same time as doing that. And I've said to you, we've had a real focus on culture. Our, staff engagement scores have increased by about 12%. So we have a workforce that feels that they're much more engaged with the work of the organization, and because of that, we have much greater resident satisfaction and residents feeling more engaged. So those things are all very directly linked, and it's one of the reasons why, setting aside the moral arguments from a business point of view, EDIs is so important to our organization and, I believe, to the public sector and all organizations.
Dan Benn: I want to touch on the residents research panel. How has that helped achieve some of those goals?
Stuart Love: What it's done is it means we're listening to a much wider set of voices than we may have been previously. And every voice matters. Every voice is important. What we've particularly tried to do with the residents panel is ensure that we have voices from across the board, those that will have engaged with the council previously, but particularly also bringing around the table those who may not have engaged with us for whatever reason in the past, and beginning to tackle some of those issues around communication, trust, et cetera. So that's what that panel has brought, and it's hugely important, and we've got more to do. Lots of other bits of local government are doing this really well. And so learning from them is really important to us as well.
Dan Benn: You mentioned a second ago that there's a wide range of voices, and that is not just in Westminster, that is across London. As know, community is so diverse, especially in London, but right around the country. How important is the fact that you've engaged with people like faith leaders as well, to help with community engagement?
Stuart Love: That's been critical, and we can see that now, particularly with what's going on in the Middle east, and that work with faith leaders has been really helpful. I mean, it's not to say we've got it right all the time. And it's not to say that, universally we're being held up as this fantastic example because we have made mistakes, but having established those relationships with faith leaders, with our communities, those mistakes are easier for us to talk to people about, to understand, to learn from, and to improve on. So, first of all, admitting we've made mistakes, but second of all, being able to work with our communities to be better is really important. But, yeah, those relationships with faith leaders, as I say, they particularly have been given the conflict in the Middle east, but they will be going forward as well.
Dan Benn: I think one thing is really important there that you've acknowledged is that people do make mistakes. It's not always going to be perfect. And accepting that and going, all right, where can we learn from? This is so important. Moving away from communities and engagement within those, I want to look at kind of within the council as well. So, you personally won CEO of the year at the inclusive awards at the end of 2023. How important was that award to you and to the rest of the council, obviously, as chief executive?
Stuart Love: yeah, I mean, for me, that award really is for the council, not for me. I know you said sort of, I personally won the award, but I didn't. The organization won the award. I do have a view that chief executive should never get awards, particularly not just for doing the day job, but that award, for a lot of people who've been working alongside me, in front of me, trying to help change our organization and other organizations that we work with for the better, really, I think, was a very helpful celebration of everything we've achieved. It's also, for me, a reminder of what we still need to do. so, yes, we've come a very long way, but there is still a lot more for us to do.
Dan Benn: Definitely. And the day you stop always aiming for something better and to be better is the day that everyone else catches up and things start getting worse. Even things like, I'm looking at some of the stats here of kind of respondents, of members of the community, of residents who agree with what is going on, but also people within the council and the work being done. It's all good work. Another thing that came out of my research was the target that the council has of closing the pay gap by 2025. 1st thing, how is that being done? But also, why is that such an important thing to do?
Stuart Love: Can I answer the second question first, if that's all right? So again, going back, five or six years, when all large organizations had to publish their gender pay gap, and that coincided with us launching our approach to Edi within the organization. I asked to see the ethnicity pay gap at the same time. So the ethnicity pay gap was presented to me alongside the gender pay gap and it made horrific reading. I think at the time, our ethnicity pay gap was running at 18% and our, gender pay gap was running at 13%. So basically that told the story of an organization that valued white men more than, more than anybody else. And it's just absolutely appalling. The reason why I just want to mention this particularly is we then use that data and I use that data. There'd been things I've been trying to do in the organization before then, particularly around, ethnicity. Things like, we now have a positive, action approach to recruitment, which was based on, or is based on the Rooney rule, which is, in the states. And I'd been trying to do that and I'd had one, hr lawyer off the next stuck in front of me saying, it's unlawful, you can't do it. And then the pay gas were presented to me and at that point I made it very clear the problem is evident. I'm not taking no for an answer. You're going to go and tell me how we can, implement this. And so much of this for me is about where my heart is. But that data is critically important because seeing the data, understanding the data, has allowed us to take action in order to address some of those problems. So going back, as I say, five or six years, we had those pay gaps and we have had a focus on them, for the five or six years. And as a result, we have seen a, reduction. The gender pay gap, has come down now, to, round about 6%. And by the way, I always use the worst out of the median and the mean. I can't help myself. and then, however, the ethnicity pay gap, whilst it's come down, has also stubbornly, for the last three years, stayed about, the same. And it's roughly now around about 13%. And in conversation with staff here, what was said to me was, if we keep going the way we are, in five years time, the ethnicity pay gap will be round about 8%. Is that okay? And the short answer to that is, no, it absolutely is not okay. So the two big areas we have in our organization that we have to tackle are gender and ethnicity. Ah, the data, ah, around other protected characteristics says actually we're doing fairly well in those spaces, whether that's around sexuality or ability, disability, et cetera. These are the two areas where we have significant problems. And the reason why it's so important is because people's life outcomes right now are being affected by those pay gaps. So there's everything from what's going on in terms of, cost of living, cris, et cetera, all the way through to. And this is really important. The decisions we make now affect people's pensions. So it's not okay, it's not right that I'm stood in a room, and as a white man, my outcomes are going to be better than a global majority woman or anybody else, simply because I'm a white man. So those are the reasons why we've committed to closing the pay gaps by, 2025, rather than every year, sort of almost hoping that they were going to go down. We now have a much more intentional, focused approach that runs through everything we do. So we're now looking at it through talent and progression in our organization, taking a much more, professional approach to that. We, have just kicked off a whole pay and reward review. And, part of the intention of the pay and reward review is to ensure that once we get ourselves to a position that we're more comfortable with by 2025, that those pay gaps don't come back. the way we remunerate people at the moment is, sorry, I don't want to get too technical about this, but people are appointed with it to bands, and then we have steps within those bands. I use the word discrepancy. The bottom of the band and the top of the band, there's a very wide gap, and we think we need to close that gap a little bit, and that will help us with the wider issue of pay gaps. so an absolute and relentless focus on the things that we need to do in the organization to ensure equal opportunity for all. And that ultimately, I spoke earlier about the fact that our organization has grown by 10% in terms of global majority, and it has. And what is really important to note is, when we started on this, again, going back five or six years, senior leadership in the organization, which we define as our, head of service, and above 5% of our senior leadership came from a global majority background. Shocking. I mean, at the time, the organization was 32% global majority. And just staying on that for a second, our organization is, and has been for all of that time, roughly 60% men, 40% women. Again, when you look at senior leadership, and you did six years ago, that was the senior leadership of 40% women, 60% men. So flipped on its head. And so, again, you can see why we have the pay gap. So we are now in a better place. Global majority. Senior, leadership is at 28%. and, actually, it's gotten a bit higher than that now. And in terms of women, it's about 50 50. So, again, improvements made, but a lot more for us to do.
Dan Benn: At the beginning of your m answer, one thing you said was where my highs, as well as looking at the data as a leader, within the public sector, as someone who makes big decisions all the time, how important is it to not only look at the data and the numbers and the engagement you're getting, but also to kind of follow your instincts and your feelings around things, especially things such as diversity and inclusion?
Stuart Love: For me, I think that piece around instinct, and again, where my heart is, has been absolutely critical in this. And I do wear my heart on my sleeve, as a leader, and that's not for everybody. I get that. I don't think that there is a one size fits all approach to this. The most important thing for me, though, is this has got to be led by the people at the top of the organization. The people at the top of the organization. Regardless of what you write on pieces of paper and acronyms around values, et cetera, the values of an organization reflect the values of the people at the top of the organization. The whole thing around EDI is not something that can be farmed out to somewhere else. it's not something that can be, a box ticked by having a staff network and then focus on doing it. It's got to be part of every conversation. It's got to be part of every decision. It's got to be part of who we are as an organization. I'm quoting, somebody else here, professor, Paul Miller, is an amazing person, in this space. And I used to say, we have to be relentless, and I'm sad that we have to be relentless. He talks about there being no respite, and he's absolutely right. There can be no respite. And that applies to me, I would say, more so than it does to global majority, particularly members of staff in our organization, because I'm at the top of the organization that needs my responsibility, and I have to be held accountable for driving the change that there needs to be. The public sector is still very much led by white men, and we have a responsibility to drive the change that there needs to be so that it is about equity and equality. At the end of the day, my.
Dan Benn: Next question for you was going to be that these are things that we all have control over, not just you, but me, as well as someone who can vote as people. We all have things we can do in this kind of area. But my question was going to be about how important it is that diversity is embraced by organizations across the public sector, not just local government, not just government agencies. How important is it that people are represented by people who are just like them?
Stuart Love: It's absolutely critical. And going back to where you started with this, it is one of the reasons why we've seen an improvement in engagement with our residents, with our communities. Why, we have 94% satisfaction with the services we're delivering. It's an unprecedented satisfaction rate. But there are absolute, for me, clear and direct links back to the changes we've made in the organization, to our culture and to our diversity. I guess another example for me that I always found quite stark was during the pandemic and looking at the pan london work that took place around the pandemic and the decision makers that were set around it. And there was a real lack of diversity in that, albeit we also knew that our most diverse communities were the ones that we were all struggling the most to talk, to, to reach out, to engage. So there is something here, as you've just said, for the entirety of the public sector, in terms of why this is so important, in terms of the outcomes for, our residents and our communities.
Dan Benn: So as a white south african man yourself, why do you feel so strongly about this matter?
Stuart Love: So, I grew up in South Africa. I, grew up during apartheid. I started working, during apartheid, and while I was at school, black children were denied an education. It wasn't just segregation. Denied an education by our, government at the. See, the rest of the world is very quick to judge Africa and its leaders by their own standards. But the rest of the world has been at best, complicit and in some cases, directly responsible for that, denial of education, et cetera. And I do feel a huge amount of guilt about that. I constantly feel like I have not done enough and been good enough in this space. I do understand that my experience, my upbringing, is one of the things that I bring to this job. And I was very helpfully asked that question when I was going through the interview process. The members said to me, what will your experience from South Africa bring to the role? And I spoke about the, ah, end of apartheid, about affirmative action, about the problem in this country being more insidious, and therefore, in some ways more difficult to tackle. A sledgehammer wasn't, necessarily what was needed. And I just also, if you don't mind, want to use that as a bit of a lead in. Into something that, I've struggled with for a long time. And that's the concept of being an ally. I struggle with the word ally because for me, ally denotes somebody who can sit on the sidelines and, dip in and out. Somebody who's supportive but not necessarily active. And, an american, Dr. Yaya blay, from memory is her name. I was sent a video clip of her talking about this. And I prefer to see myself as an accomplice. and I know that that word can be. It sort of gets associated with other things. But I do see myself as an accomplice. I have to be prepared to take risk and I have to turn up. Call me 02:00 in the morning. I'll be there. I'll be driving. So it's something that, again, I feel really strongly about going back to our responsibility here. we have a responsibility. People like me, particularly white leaders, have a responsibility to drive the change and to help drive the change that we need to see in our sectors.
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