Equity, Diversity and Inclusion

Our Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (ED&I) work is a powerful tool in creating a positive culture where people feel they can contribute, problem-solve and apply a creative lens to their work. We welcome and encourage candidates from diverse and underrepresented backgrounds.

This includes:

• people with disabilities
• people from ethnically diverse communities
• people of faith
• people from lower socio-economic backgrounds
• LGBTQ+ people
• underrepresented age groups
• women and non-binary people. 

We know that people don’t get the same chances or opportunities in life - whether in the workplace or healthcare. We see addressing health inequalities as an important part of our work here at Sue Ryder, and so it’s crucial that our staff and volunteers reflect the diversity of the communities we support.

We’ve made progress, but we know there’s lots more to do. Moving forward, we’ll continue to assess our policies, structures, and ways of working to ensure we are creating positive change for marginalised and underrepresented groups.

• Developing a Race Equity Action Plan that specifically looks at the needs of people of colour within Sue Ryder and guides us to look at our ED&I work through a race inclusion lens.
• Developing an accessibility action plan to understand the accessibility considerations for each department and develop a plan to tackle the priority areas. 
• Leading a project that ensures our ED&I work reaches all employees and volunteers in a meaningful, relevant and impactful way.

At Sue Ryder, we believe in the power of our ED&I networks. We have four networks that bring together communities with shared lived experiences and shared identities, plus allies. 

Over the past year, we’ve worked closely with our network leads, making changes to how our networks are run. The focus has been on making our networks more effective and sustainable. In doing so, we offered our staff and volunteers more ways to engage, show support and be part of the communities. 

In March 2023, each network established a leadership team. This is a core group of people, where everyone has a clearly defined role, to drive forward network activities and projects.  

Alongside this, we are growing our community networks. Community members will be invited directly to upcoming events, including educational masterclasses and informal network catch-ups. They will also receive updates on ED&I work, including our ED&I newsletter, which includes news from the networks. And we are proud to say that all our networks are now inclusive for our volunteers too.  

• help us to understand the communities we serve
• challenge and nudge the organisation to always strive to do better, creating opportunities to make change
• support our staff and volunteers, create safe spaces and encourage people to come together.

We want our networks to be created and developed based on the needs of our staff and volunteers. We are open to new networks being established and any new networks will get full support from the organisation.

In a celebration of excellence and commitment to employees, Sue Ryder has been crowned as the Retail Employer of the Year at the prestigious People in Retail Awards 2023.

The Retail Employer of the Year award, judged by a panel of 19 industry experts, is the pinnacle accolade for retailers striving to showcase their commitment to employees across all levels.

“Sue Ryder is a true people-centric, inclusive and forward-thinking retail organisation. It has initiatives and outputs that any private sector business or PLC would strive to achieve,” said Natalie Fresen, Chief People Champion for PIRA 2023.

Find out more about the benefits of joining our award-winning team