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Written by Sophia A. - Director of Sky Mobile
Sky has been named by Stonewall as one of the best places to work for LGBT+ people in the UK. This is a proud moment for everyone at Sky. It’s our first time in the top 100, and I thought I would share some highlights from our journey to becoming the top media company for LGBT+ inclusion and no. 29 in the index.
In the summer of 2015, I was talking Al, our media controller at the time, who shared with me the Stonewall employee survey. He asked if I could circulate it around our department, to gather feedback on how we were doing on LGBT+ inclusion. I had never heard of it before. As I answered each question in the survey, I realised that there were many aspects of inclusion that had never crossed my mind. As a muslim female, who has always found Sky to be an inclusive and supportive environment, this surprised me!
I spent some time with the employee network, run by Mark Tittle, which was delivering a huge amount of positive activity, in spite of having no dedicated budget. I went to the Stonewall Workplace Conference, where I heard devastating stories from people who had suffered from depression, suicidal thoughts and a range of mental health issues, from not being able to be themselves. Like many people from ethnic minorities, I have experienced racism. It never occurred to me that it is a gift that I wear my ethnicity and gender on my sleeve. That I never had to choose whether or not to tell people that I am a muslim woman, knowing the discrimination that can happen as a result. The bravery of members of the LGBT+ community, to share their truth, knowing the discrimination they may encounter, remains hugely inspiring.
So I thought, how can I help? The employee network had lots of active support, but they didn’t have two critical things – money and senior sponsorship. So I became the senior sponsor and Stephen van Rooyen, our UK & Ireland CEO, became the Executive sponsor, with the aim of becoming a top employer for LGBT+ inclusivity and expanding the reach of the network.
Stonewall helped us to determine the most important actions we could take, which included:
We are working with Stonewall on what’s next for Sky for LGBT+ inclusivity. There is so much more we can do, I can’t wait to see what’s next!
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