Staff Network Groups at Bank of England

The Bank of England has a number of employee network groups:

BEEM – The Bank of England Ethnic Minority

Open to all staff, the Bank of England Ethnic Minority (BEEM) Network represents all colleagues in this community.

BEEM aims are to ensure that:

• All staff feel fully included in the Bank family
• The Bank celebrates the cultural diversity of its staff
• Ethnic Minority staff are empowered in their roles and the Bank will help them develop, progress and realise their potential in their Bank careers
• Those outside the Bank perceive the Bank is inclusive and empowering for ethnic minorities

The Disability Network

The Network meets regularly during lunch to discuss all disability related matters. These could include:

• making workplace adjustments
• encouraging disability disclosure
• raising and maintaining disability awareness in the Bank
• improving accessibility
• dealing with any potential discrimination
• career development
• personal safety
• recruitment and induction processes.

LGBT Network

The Bank’s LGBT Network has the following aims:

• Offering support to anyone dealing with issues relating to sexual orientation (eg, either personally or with friends and family)
• Offering help with regards career issues (eg, buddying and mentoring)
• Reflecting the diversity of our organisation which may help and support existing staff or staff joining or considering joining the Bank

WIB – The Women In the Bank

The Women In the Bank network was created in 2007 and was designed to inspire and enable, supporting all women in their career progression at the Bank. The 5th anniversary saw the WIB network review its goals through extensive focus groups with women in all bands and as a result, a ‘Five Pillar’ approach was established, which:

• widens the network and activities
• groups the activities into more focused areas
• makes the network more relevant to all women in the Bank (including colleagues in the PRA)

MHN – Mental Health Network 

The Bank’s Mental Health Network (MHN) aims to raise awareness, improve understanding (and dispel misunderstandings) around mental health conditions and highlight the support available to staff.

It was launched in November 2012. By raising awareness and improving understanding we believe that this can help combat stigma around mental health problems.

This will lead to staff feeling able to be more open about mental health problems and seek help earlier, resulting in staff being less likely to end up in crisis, and more likely to be able to stay in work.

Faith Networks 

Christian Union: "We are a collection of staff looking to live and speak for Jesus both inside and outside the Bank.  We support Christians in the Bank by holding weekly meetings where we study the Bible, pray, talk or eat (or any combination of these!) together.  We have lively discussions on how our faith applies to our lives and in relation to topical issues."

Jewish Network: Judaism encompasses a wide spectrum of denominations and beliefs, such as Orthodox, Conservative, Progressive, Cultural and Atheist Jews, as well as those who are not affiliated. The Jewish Network seeks to ensure we are inclusive of all who are interested in participating in our events.

Muslim Network: Islam is a holistic way of life, which means we are not able to completely separate our religious requirements from our worldly obligations. One of the many qualities of being a Muslim is to strive for excellence and this is not limited in how we worship God, but also applies equally in how we earn a living. When we come to work we should not feel we have to compromise our spiritual needs in order to fulfil our work obligations. And through the Muslim network, the Bank supports our needs to achieve a balance between our religious needs and our abilities to perform our jobs.

Carers Network

This is a new network in the Bank which has been set up to help provide information and support to employees within the Bank who are in a caring role or those who wish to find out more about this particular area.

Caring is part of life and most of us will either provide care, unpaid, to someone else, or we will need care ourselves. This may involve caring for someone with a chronic illness, a disability, a mental health issue or someone who is frail. They may be a partner, relative, friend or neighbour. It may also include caring for young children as part of a family. Whatever the role, caring can be rewarding but can also be very demanding – requiring reserves of emotional and physical energy.