Show the Salary campaign’s digital content promotes diversity in charity recruitment

The #CharitySoWhite campaign sent shockwaves through the charity sector last year, through its robust messaging around anti-racism.

 

This launched as a hashtag on Twitter to encourage charity sector workers from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) backgrounds to share their experience of institutional racism and discrimination in the sector. It has now mushroomed into a widespread charity sector equity campaign and kickstarted attempts by a raft of charities to tackle racism in their organisation.

 

Following #CharitySoWhite’s success, a fresh campaign has now launched – specifically tackling racism, gender inequality and lack of diversity in charity recruitment.

 

Called the #ShowtheSalary campaign, this also started as a hashtag on social media and has since grown into a widely used online resource for charities and charity recruiters to show their commitment to equitable recruitment.

 

 

The Campaign’s Message of Transparency

 

The Show the Salary campaign launched in September to encourage charities and recruiters to disclose salaries on offer for top roles, instead of advertising them as coming with a “competitive salary”.

 

The group’s message is simple: “Salary secrecy is a discriminatory practice that perpetuates wage gaps.”

 

It says that women and black candidates are particularly impacted by charities not revealing salaries on offer.

 

Latest figures show how action is needed to improve diversity in top charity roles. According to charity sector body ACEVO’s Pay and Equalities 2020 report the overwhelming majority (94%) of charity chief executives are white.

 

Just 1% are from Asian and Asian British backgrounds and 1% are from black, African, Caribbean and Black British backgrounds.

 

 

Challenging charities on social media

 

Just as #CharitySoWhite shocked the charity sector, #ShowtheSalary has made a similar impact via social media.

 

When it launched in September, it not only urged charities via Twitter to #ShowtheSalary, but publicly challenged those who are advertising roles with a “competitive salary”.

 

Among those to be challenged included the Woodland Trust, which ironically initially advertised its Head of Diversity and Inclusion role as coming with a “competitive salary”.

This public challenging of the charity, proved successful, with the Woodland Trust correcting the recruitment advertisement the next day to list the role as coming with a £45,000 to £50,000 a year salary.

 

en" dir="ltr">Hello, we made changes on our website to correct this previously. We now list the salary as £45,000 - £50,000 Per Annum on our jobs page: t.co/iE6bnMj6F2

— Woodland Trust🌳 (@WoodlandTrust)

Hello, we made changes on our website to correct this previously. We now list the salary as £45,000 - £50,000 Per Annum on our jobs page: https://t.co/iE6bnMj6F2

— Woodland Trust\uD83C\uDF33 (@WoodlandTrust) September 4, 2020

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Another charity to be publicly challenged via Twitter by #ShowtheSalary was the British Red Cross. The charity reacted swiftly within hours to ensure that it shared salary details on job recruitment. In addition it used social media to back the campaign’s messaging and align with its own ethical values around diversity.

 

This commitment was praised by #ShowTheSalary, which made sure British Red Cross’s commitment to the campaign was widely promoted on social media.

 

en" dir="ltr">And THIS is how you do it.<br><br>HUGE kudos to <a href="https://twitter.com/BritishRedCross?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@BritishRedCross: action taken within a matter of hours, an honest and open response. And problem solved.<br><br>This is how quick it can be. <br><br>We&#39;ll be expecting others to follow suit and, obviously, to always #ShowTheSalary in future. t.co/xjdg3DmDvp

— Show The Salary (@ShowTheSalary)

And THIS is how you do it.

HUGE kudos to @BritishRedCross: action taken within a matter of hours, an honest and open response. And problem solved.

This is how quick it can be.

We'll be expecting others to follow suit and, obviously, to always #ShowTheSalary in future. https://t.co/xjdg3DmDvp

— Show The Salary (@ShowTheSalary) September 3, 2020

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