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Diverse ways of improving bottom line

Edel Harris is the new President at Aberdeen Chamber
Edel Harris is the new President at Aberdeen Chamber

Increasing the diversity of workplaces in the north-east will be top of the agenda at a conference coming up in October.

Edel Harris, president of the Aberdeen and Grampian Chamber of Commerce (AGCC) and the chief executive of a leading support organisation for people with disabilities, said embracing diversity was “good for the bottom line” of firms.

Ms Harris, chief executive of Cornerstone, said that while north-east firms benefited from the cosmopolitanism of the oil and gas industry, there was still work required to address a lack of leadership by women and the participation of disabled people in the workplace.

She said: “One of the reasons we are hosting the conference is because, as a chamber and as a chief executive of a disability organisation, we really want to put the diversity on the agenda so businesses start talking about it.

“On the one hand I think Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire – compared to other parts of Scotland – are actually quite diverse.

“We are quite a cosmopolitan city. Oil and gas brings all sorts of nationalities into the city

“On the other hand we still have a pretty male dominated business environment.

“I don’t want to make a big deal of this, but the fact I am the first female president ever in the history of Aberdeen and Grampian Chamber of Commerce makes a statement in itself.

“There is more we can do to get gender equality particularly on the boards of business and in leadership positions in business.

“If you take diversity in widest context – disability for example, I don’t think we are any different to any other part of the UK.

“Businesses still find it incredibly difficult to recruit people with disabilities – for a whole range of reasons.

“Some of it is ignorance, some of it is a lack of understanding – some if it is discrimination, sadly.

“Some of it is about not having the right resources within the workplace or the right access arrangements.

“There is a whole load of talent amongst the disabled population -which we have seen in Rio – that businesses are missing out on.”

Ms Harris said she does not see quotas requiring representation of women or the disabled in businesses as an effective strategy. And while the AGCC declined to sign up to a Scottish Government initiative to encourage companies and public sector bodies to commit to having women take up 50% of boardroom roles by 2020, she points out that the chamber has already achieved this benchmark.

“Actually saying you have to have 50% female wasn’t the best way to go about that.

“The chamber board is now 50% female. When I first went on the board eight years ago, the most at any one time there were two women.

“Things are changing, and they are changing despite campaigns and formal processes.”

Power of Diversity is a full-day conference at Ardoe House on Oct 5, looking at: Gender equality, disabled rights, ethnic diversity and sexual diversity in the workplace.

Speakers will include: Former Welsh rugby star Gareth Thomas, Dame Anne Begg, Director of Stonewall Scotland Colin Macfarlane, South African High Commissioner to UK HE Obed Mlaba and Heather Melville from RBS, recognised as one of the top 100 women worldwide who have made a difference to the economic empowerment of women.