Insights Career Deflection Report

As a leading engineering business, we have a responsibility to design, deliver and operate lived environments that work better for all. This responsibility has led us to commission a report entitled Career Deflection: Exploring Diversity, Progression and Retention in Engineering to look at the barriers to progress within a career in engineering and how these differ based on gender, ethnicity and disability.

The research report, conducted by the Institute for Employment Studies, offers a fresh analysis of official labour market information to highlight how engineering fares on diversity measures against other progressions. Through this report, we explore the factors which can help us unlock the necessary diversity of talent to meet the challenges of tomorrow.

Over the course of time, it appears that career progression for many is being deflected away from what they as individuals, and we as employers, require to make the most of their exceptional talents. The result is diversity declines dramatically at higher levels of seniority. Such ‘career deflection’ is not unique to engineering, but as our report shows, it is more pronounced and obstructive to individual and collective progress within our industry than any of the other professional careers considered in the report.

What is holding back these exceptional talents, and how can we as an employer and industry act to effectively tackle barriers to their progress? As this report explores, good intentions are far from enough, indeed certain interventions may even be counterproductive.

As an organisation, we are dedicated to addressing underrepresentation across our industry and workforce, and that the findings of this report will inform and lead change.

Our recommendations:

To effect real change to address career deflection, our report makes seven key recommendations for the sector:

• Improve the collection, analysis and sharing of diversity data across all stages of the employee lifecycle.
• Undertake in-depth interviews with underrepresented individuals to further understand the barriers to progression.
• Promote and normalise alternative working patterns.
• Ensure equal access to developmental opportunities across training and development, experience exposure and transparent progression procedures.
• Provide mentoring and network support.
• Tackle discrimination through greater understanding, company-wide commitments and procedures and improved impact monitoring.
• Remove any macho culture.

You can view a summary of the report here.

“Engineering will continue to be a critical part of how we create a better future for the planet and its people. A fundamental part of this will be attracting talent from a diverse range of backgrounds – and then retaining them by ensuring there are opportunities for all. We hope the findings of this report serve to accelerate the great work that has been happening over the past number of years and we call on the industry to work together to help affect that progress.”
Richard Robinson, CEO of AtkinsRéalis UK & Europe