VANRATH are committed to maintaining an inclusive and diverse workforce for our clients, and we recognise the importance of best practice in recruitment and selection processes. UK legislation covers age, disability, race, religion, sex, and sexual orientation among others as minimum standards within an effective inclusion and diversity strategy. However, it is now well known that a well-designed Recruitment and Selection processes goes beyond legal compliance and seeks to add value to an organisation, contributing to employee wellbeing and engagement. We recognise that not every hire made will be entirely diverse due to an inequity of opportunity, we strive to ensure that our processes are well equipped to ensure that fair practices are maintained. Diversity recruiting is not about meeting a quota to be a “diverse employer”, and it is not a reason to hire less qualified. There is a misconception that you can’t hire the most qualified candidate if you hire for diversity. Diversity is a factor and a consideration during hiring decisions, and not the sole factor that determines the hiring decisions.
As such;
VANRATH rewrites all job specifications received from clients, to reflect our diversity standards. For example, by reducing experiential focussed terminology such as ‘10+ Years’ Experience’, we revise personnel specifications to include language such as ‘Proven Experience’ or ‘Demonstratable Experience’ to allow for no age limitations to be pertinent to a candidate’s application decision process.
Our access to our application process is streamlined via our job board postings which is a one click application and CV submission experience.
At interviews, we advise our clients to include a diverse panel for interviewing.
Candidate profiles are scrubbed of all personal information before sending to hiring manager review stages. This includes address, and DOB to remove any unconscious bias related to socioeconomic locations, as well as the age that may be displayed.
VANRATH employs a 'mixed mode' approach when sourcing candidates for any vacancy. This approach includes contacting candidates on our database which would include people from many different races, religions, and minority groups.
Alongside contact with our database, all vacancies are advertised on NIJobs, NIJobfinder and our company website with an Equal Opportunity Employer Statement included in all vacancy posts/advertisements. Prospective roles are also advertised to our diverse and extensive social media following.
We believe our approach-
Maximises the openness and inclusiveness of the candidate attraction process which may, in turn, potentially serve to attract underrepresented groups and attract those candidates to those roles where the candidates pool has historically been lower; and
Places focus on ensuring that the most suitable calibre of potential candidates is aware of the recruitment opportunities that are currently available in the marketplace.
All candidates registered with VANRATH complete an equality monitoring form at their initial registration meeting. These forms are held in a secure file by our monitoring officer and saved in a confidential fashion. When requested VANRATH is able to provide this information to the client in the relevant format requested.
As a services-based company, VANRATH has a relatively small supply chain. To ensure our suppliers comply with our ED&I and equal opportunities we request that they provide a copy of their policy statements at the beginning of our working relationship
VANRATH is proud to be the only Northern Ireland based recruitment agency to have implemented accessibility software on our website. We have partnered with Texthelp to introduce their ReachDeck product onto our company website.
At VANRATH we are committed to inclusive recruitment so finding a product such as ReachDeck allowed us to have inclusivity for visitors with visual impairments as well as visitors with limited English language skills. We want to be at the forefront of accessibility in the sector and help other organizations improve their offering too.
Attracting a wider talent pool to job applications was the main reason for looking for an accessibility toolbar, but another function that we wanted was customizable as everyone has their own unique capabilities.
This feature provides support to candidates within minority groups, allowing website users to customize their toolbar to suit their own specific needs such as translating content into different languages, reading aloud, and styling assistance. This includes adjustments to colour, font type, and size.
