ISG: Making positive change in the construction industry

Created for ISG by VERCIDA

Nicke Harrison, Head of Inclusion and Wellbeing at ISG, talks about the importance of respect at work, and how working in partnership with employee networks can change the perception of the industry. 

I’ve had an interesting career journey to my current role with ISG. After completing my master I moved to London to work in the charity sector, initially in youth participation and policy work for the NSPCC.

From here, I ended up doing quality assurance before moving into the diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) at a housing association, then Cancer Research before finding myself in the construction industry, which is somewhere I hope to stay for a long time. 

When I took the job with ISG, plenty of people were sceptical about doing DEI work in construction, especially with the stereotypes about men on building sites, but when I started with ISG, I soon discovered how open people were to having conversations about DEI and how wrong those stereotypes can be. There is a lot of energy and enthusiasm for tackling these issues. 

In the 17 months that I’ve been with ISG, one of our biggest achievements has been the Respect At Work flagship campaign. This campaign aims to change the culture by promoting respect at work, whether it’s on construction sites or in our offices.

Respect At Work focuses on combating the male-dominated perceptions of construction, addressing the lack of diversity and, crucially, the prevalent issue of workplace banter crossing the line into disrespect. We engaged a communications company to create a video that featured employees sharing their lived experiences of disrespect at work. The video was rolled out globally with teams across the company watching it together and agreeing on how they will address disrespectful behaviour as a team.

This approach aimed to empower individuals to appropriately challenge inappropriate actions – anything from having a quiet word, explaining the impact of the behaviour, and where necessary – using employee relations policies. We’ve received so much positive feedback from this campaign, with increased awareness across our teams.

As well as this campaign, we have been able to make positive changes to our policies, such as our family-friendly leave, menopause support, developing a talent pipeline and setting up employee-led inclusion networks. 

"When I took the job with ISG, plenty of people were sceptical about doing DEI work in construction, especially with the stereotypes about men on building sites, but when I started with ISG, I soon discovered how open people were to having conversations about DEI and how wrong those stereotypes can be."

Networks are crucial as they act as a critical friend, bringing the lived experience to the fore and identifying the key areas of focus. Our networks are key to delivering the DEI roadmap. For example, I-NoW, our global gender equity network, will be working with our Early Careers and Social Value teams in their outreach work with young people so they can see people who look like them working in construction and be inspired to consider it as a career path. If you can see it, you can be it! 

As well as I-NoW, we now have the Race and Faith Network, the Pride Network and a network of Menopause Champions.

So much great work has already been done by these networks. I-NoW has been supporting the #PPEThatFits campaign that aims to make inclusive PPE available to all; the Race and Faith Network is focusing on increasing representation and celebrating cultures and histories; while the Pride Network focuses on allyship, visibility and education to overcome homophobia and transphobia at work. 

The Menopause Champions provide support through monthly coffee mornings and our networks have a Board sponsor to champion their work at the highest level. Our Menopause Sponsor is our Chief Commercial Officer, Tom Smith, who has been great at not only championing the network, but at taking the time to learn and encourage other men to understand their roles – as colleagues and managers – in creating an inclusive environment. 

We have exciting plans for the future, especially when it comes to growing our networks and looking at more ways to provide support at ISG. This year, the focus will be on establishing a disability network and potentially supporting employees with caring responsibilities. Whether it’s a new toolkit to provide guidance or positive policy changes, there is still work to do. Another of our big plans for this year is to build on the Respect At Work campaign, to make sure the campaign continues to enable people to challenge and change behaviours.  

Find out more about working at ISG

Explore current career opportunities at ISG