Inclusivity

Diversity and Inclusion at BHF

Heart and circulatory diseases do not discriminate. We are committed to beat heartbreak for everyone and we are committed to be an inclusive employer.

At the BHF, equality in the workplace is a part of normal life. Whatever your age, gender, religion, disability status, sexual orientation, ethnicity or family circumstances, you’ll be treated with fairness and respect. We want all our colleagues, volunteers and supporters to feel comfortable and able to bring their true selves to work.

Our diversity and inclusion activities span across many areas that are prevalent in all our communities. We strive to encompass accessibility to work for people with caring responsibilities, working parents, disabilities and age. Ultimately, we want our workforce to represent the people we support.

Some of our recent successes include; an enhanced maternity policy, a decrease in our gender pay gap, attending Pride events across the country, being a trans inclusive employer, with support programmes in place to support those transitioning, and our My BHF campaigns where we proudly showcase diversity in our communities. We’re also dedicated to offering flexible working that supports all our colleagues.

We are working with colleagues across the organisation to increase the number of employee affinity groups, which are spaces for colleagues from underrepresented groups to feel connected, included and heard. We have already set up these groups for our black colleagues, different religions and faiths, people interested in anti-racism and working parents. We are looking forward to developing more affinity groups as these become imbedded within our organisation.

When working at BHF, we want you to bring your true self to work. You will find a culture where colleagues are keen to get involved in activities that make individuality part of what we do every single day.

As a charity, we aim to beat heartbreak forever, but we also want to beat heartbreak for every heart. We will only achieve this by welcoming colleagues and having an inclusive environment so people from all backgrounds feel able to join our BHF family.

Find out more about what we are doing by reading our commitment to diversity and inclusion.

Wellbeing

We want to inspire and support all colleagues to live a healthy and happy life, at home and at work. We strive to enable those working with us to achieve and maintain a positive state of physical and mental health which also includes social and financial wellbeing.

We support our colleagues by providing regular tips and resources to eat well, get physically active and keep socially connected.

During this time where we are all working remotely, colleagues take part in “random coffee chats” and are paired with another member of the wider BHF team for a virtual chat and catch up. We’ve also created a Meetings Charter to establish working practices we can all commit to as we adapt to more virtual meetings.

We have set out ten commitments for healthy, safe and inclusive meetings, built around our BHF values; Brave, Compassionate, Driven and Informed. These commitments include Tech-free lunch breaks and ensure we allow ourselves adequate screen breaks.

Mental Health Ambassadors

We have resources available to help maintain and look after your mental wellbeing through our Mental Health Ambassadors. These trained colleagues of the BHF are a point of contact for anyone within the organisation who may be experiencing mental health concerns or emotional distress. Our ambassadors offer non-judgemental support and signpost individuals to the appropriate professional support.