In a joint interview with Recruiter last week, Neil Carberry, CEO of the Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC) and Ann Swain, CEO of the Association of Professional Staffing Companies, concurred that the recent, jointly conducted UK Recruitment Diversity & Inclusion Index opened the door to supporting their members in broadening the range of people recruited by clients.

The survey found that many recruiters were not recording their own D&I statistics to any significant extent. More than 100 corporate recruitment firms and 348 individual recruiters responded to the survey.

However, said Carberry, “members of APSCo and the REC are thinking about how do we broaden the pool, how do we use effective selection tools – so there is something about diversity and advice going into clients already. But this is where the two are umbilically linked where you don’t know what you don’t know. 

“So, the service that you’re offering your clients will be better if the team that you’ve got delivering it has a range of perspectives in it as well. And if the firms that are doing this now are getting 70% of the way there, then sorting yourself out internally is the thing that’s going to get you 100% of the way, to give a really top-notch service.”

Swain said: “I think there’s a real opportunity for the market to be a catalyst for change. And the big thing is, I think we’re part of that solution, rather than ever being part of the problem.”

Read more about the survey and the interview with Carberry and Swain in the July-August issue of Recruiter.

• Comment below on this story. Or let us know what you think by emailing us at [email protected] or tweet us to tell us your thoughts or share this story with a friend.