"For our customers, we want to be the trusted market leader in accessible and inclusive products, services, and experiences."

Jasjyot Singh, OBE
and Rachel Osikoya
26 September 2024
8 min read

At Lloyds Banking Group, we want to be the best-in-class leader in disability and neuro-inclusion. With that in mind, we’re committed to creating an inclusive workplace – where our colleagues love to come and work, where they can be themselves and thrive. 

After all, evidence suggests that a diverse workforce that represents the communities we serve enables better decision making, and ensures our products and services are tailored and inclusive of the needs of all our customers too.

So as we undertake the UK’s largest financial service transformation, we have the perfect opportunity to leverage diversity, equity and inclusion to help Britain prosper.

Our 2023 commitments

In April 2023, we set a public goal to double the representation of senior colleagues with disabilities to 12% by 2025.

This was the first public commitment of its kind to be launched by a UK bank. And to achieve this goal we committed to improve the working environment and experience for our colleagues with disabilities, including making our recruitment processes more accessible and inclusive; supporting career development; improving the accessibility of our workspaces and technology; upskilling colleagues to reduce stigma; and taking work beyond our own organisation to champion the disability community. 

Reviewing our progress against our 2023 commitments: what have we achieved so far? 

We are recognised as a leading employer for people with disabilities by the Business Disability Forum and were awarded their Gold Standard Benchmark in 2023.

We were also re-awarded our Disability Confident Leader status with the Department for Work and Pensions in 2023. But whilst these are useful benchmarks for us, we continue to strive for excellence and to listen to our colleagues with lived experience to help inform our strategic plans.

"In April 2023, we spoke publicly about our ambition to double the representation of senior colleagues with disabilities – the first such public commitment by a financial services organisation."

 

Understanding our colleagues and representing the customers and communities we serve

As of the end of 2023, 12.4% of our senior management colleagues shared with us that they had a disability, meaning we’ve exceeded our original target earlier than anticipated. We continue to encourage our colleagues to share their disability data with us, to build a true picture of the diversity within our organisation as we continue to strive for greater representation. 

An estimated 24% of the UK population have a disability, so it’s important that as an organisation we ensure that our products and services are tailored and inclusive of the needs of all our customers.

Since launching our goal, we’ve had a significant uplift in colleagues sharing their disability data with us. This has increased from 24.7% in March 2023 to 55.4% as of August 2024. 

Our aspiration is to reach 60% data sharing by the end of 2024, and 80% by the end of 2025. 

Upskilling our colleagues

We know there is more to do to improve the experience of our colleagues with disabilities and neurodivergent conditions in order to create an environment in which we can all thrive.

This is why in September 2024 we launched our first ever upskill training programme focused on disability and neurodiversity. This includes an interactive e-module for our colleagues and line managers and a supporting toolkit, and optional facilitated workshop for our line managers delivered in partnership with the Business Disability Forum.  I'm pleased to say that we have pushed the boundaries when it comes to the accessibility and inclusivity of this programme. 

Our colleagues with lived experience of disability and neurodiversity have played a key role by providing input on design, content and functionality. For the first time, we have included an inbuilt text reader, zoom functionality, a British Sign Language interpreter and audio narration as part of an e-module. And we hope this will pave the way for future design at the Group.

This programme is built on the feedback we received from our colleagues, and will give our colleagues, line managers, and leaders the skills and confidence to have open conversations about disability and neurodiversity. Ensuring that disability and neuro-inclusion are core tenants of our culture.

But our ambition doesn't end there. We are committing to driving disability and neuro-inclusion beyond our organisation in order to ultimately help Britain prosper. That’s why later this year we will also be launching a public facing version of the module which any individual, business owner, or organisation can access. 

Helping our colleagues and future talent to thrive

In 2023, we launched a specific career development programme for colleagues with disabilities in partnership with APS Intelligence Leadership Consultancy. 

This nine-month programme was designed to provide colleagues with the tools, resources and support to achieve their career aspirations. 

Victoria shares the impact the programme had on her:

“Participating in our Career Programme was transformative, allowing me to network effectively with colleagues and address barriers to progression. A key takeaway for me was learning to set boundaries and embrace the ‘uncomfortable no’ instead of a ‘resentful yes.’ This experience has helped me see my conditions as an asset to the bank, rather than a negative.”

 

In 2023 and 2024, we supported the 10,000 Able Interns programme founded by the 10,000 Interns Foundation. 10,000 Able Interns was launched in 2022 to address underrepresentation of people with disabilities. And in 2023, we welcomed 10 students for eight weeks paid work experience.

This year though we've gone even further and increased this to 17 interns. Of the 25% of our eligible interns who were referred on to our Graduate Schemes, 30% were from the 10,000 Interns Foundation and the Sutton Trust and 39% of those were fast-tracked to an assessment centre. These programmes help to bring additional diversity to our existing inclusive and diverse talent programmes.

Creating accessible buildings and workplaces 

A hugely important step on the way to an inclusive workplace is ensuring all our buildings are fit for purpose and are spaces where colleagues feel welcomed, valued and able to thrive. 

To that end, we recently opened three more Changing Places facilities in our Bristol, Andover and Leeds offices. Larger than standard toilet facilities, a Changing Places Toilet provides a hygienic place for colleagues with disabilities and their carers. They are big enough for wheelchairs, include a height-adjustable changing bench and wash basin, ceiling track with hoist plus a privacy screen and shower. In fact, in 2022, we were the first bank to open an accessible Changing Places facility in our Old Broad Street office in London – available to colleagues, customers and the public.

And our design standards have been developed to ensure that our new workspaces are better suited to our colleagues with neurodivergent conditions. This includes providing a choice of workspaces to suit differing work styles, minimising ambient and visual noise, optimising natural light, and ensuring layout and sensory consistency across sites.  

Our employee resource group

Access is our network for colleagues with disabilities, long-term health conditions, neurodivergent conditions or allies. Access aims to raise awareness, upskill and support key populations as well as reduce stigma. Within Access we also have several specific communities to bring together colleagues and allies.  

We have an established neurodiversity community, with several colleague-led squads who have set up multiple regional neurodiversity hubs, dedicated resources to support parents of neurodivergent children, and delivered engagement initiatives, including Neurodiversity Celebration Week.  

We also have an established d/Deaf Culture Club to increase understanding and allyship and bring together d/Deaf colleagues across the Group. By sharing lived experiences and insight about d/Deaf culture, our colleagues are better able to understand and support our d/Deaf customers and design products and services for their needs. The d/Deaf Culture Club have also supported the design and delivery of a new training module by providing insights on incorporating BSL.

 

"A hugely important step on the way to an inclusive workplace is ensuring all our buildings are fit for purpose and are spaces where colleagues feel welcomed, valued and able to thrive."

Shaping a more inclusive society

We have an important role in helping shape an economy that is more inclusive, and we are proud of our work in the community.  

Last year, in partnership with Small Business Britain, we produced our Disability and Entrepreneurship Report, which reflected the views of 500 disabled entrepreneurs from across the UK. We are also supporting the Lilac Review, a government-backed independent review spearheaded by Small Business Britain, aiming to tackle the inequality faced by disabled-led businesses and level up entrepreneurial opportunity across the UK.   

Beyond our organisation, we were also proud to sponsor the Disability Power 100 list in 2023 and will be sponsoring this again in 2024. The work that the Disability Power 100 list does to recognise and celebrate the ambition and achievements of the most influential people with disabilities in the UK, aligns to our own ambitions to drive disability inclusion across society. 

Inclusive products and services for our customers

For our customers, we want to be the trusted market leader in accessible and inclusive products, services, and experiences. 

In 2023, we were the first UK business to achieve the Money and Mental Health Policy Institute ‘Advanced rating’. This reflects our work to ensure our products and services are accessible for customers with mental health conditions. And we provide bespoke accessible formats tailored to suit the individual needs of a customer. Our Digital Helpline is accessible and provides BSL translation and speech to text services for customers who are d/Deaf. 

Working with Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB), we’ve been able to provide a broad range of accessible format provisions. We now also work with Citizen’s Advice to directly refer customers to additional advice services.  

On top of this we work with not-for-profit organisation, Digital Accessibility Centre (DAC), to check our websites and apps are accessible for all our customers. As a result of this work, we recently incorporated ‘Recite Me’ to our corporate website – an online accessibility tool that allows users with disabilities and neurodivergent conditions to customise our content in a way that works for them, including providing a screen reader, styling and customisation and reading aids.

As part of our suite of Inclusive Design & Delivery tools, we have created an ‘Inclusive Design Panel’, made up of people with lived experience of a variety of vulnerable circumstances (our ‘lived experts’), alongside experts from charities and support organisations. The panel review, test, critique and provide ideas on different products on a quarterly basis. 

Looking ahead 

Whilst we are proud of our work to date, we continue to challenge ourselves and strive for excellence to ensure that disability and neuro-inclusion is core to our ways of working. 

This needs to show up through our behaviours, decision making, language and the way we support our teams. Getting this right is at the heart of helping Britain prosper – a more inclusive society is a more prosperous society, and a diverse business is a better business. 

Jasjyot Singh OBE
About the author Jasjyot Singh, OBE

CEO, Consumer Lending, Lloyds Banking Group

Jas is CEO, Consumer Lending, Lloyds Banking Group’s centre of excellence for lending propositions, both for customers who bank directly and through intermediaries. 

Consumer Lending serves over 11m customers and includes c £360b of assets (across mortgages, cards, loans and car finance/leasing). In addition, Jas also oversees LBG’s European Retail business and is leading the Group in establishing an embedded finance proposition that brings together consumers and businesses.

Jas has worked at Lloyds Banking Group for 18 years and has held a number of roles across the Group’s Consumer and SME businesses. His previous experience was in consulting roles, based in the US and across Europe, with a range of corporate strategy and digital design consulting projects across multiple industry sectors.

Jas was awarded an OBE for his contribution to financial services during COVID-19. 

Jas is also on the Board of UK Finance (the industry body representing all UK FS) and is a member of the Audit and Finance Committee at UK Finance.

Jas has been the Executive Sponsor of LBG’s Disability and Neurodiversity network since November 2023.

Follow Jas on LinkedIn.

Jas's background Read Less
Rachel Osikoya
About the author Rachel Osikoya

Director of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

Rachel has over 20 years of experience in Culture, Diversity and Inclusion. Most recently, she led a global team to deliver a transformative DE&I strategy to over 25,000 colleagues in 70 countries at the London Stock Exchange.

Prior to this, she was the Global Head of Diversity & Inclusion for Maersk, developing a D&I strategy which empowered colleagues to own its D&I agenda to drive greater accountability. Rachel has also held roles at Standard Bank, Barclays Capital, BT plc and as a lay member of the Equality and Diversity Committee for the Bar Standards Board.

Follow Rachel on LinkedIn.

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