Gender Pay Gap Report 2022

This report sets out gender pay gap data from Diamond Light Source, for 2022 using a snapshot date of 5th April.

Diamond endeavours to provide a collaborative, inclusive environment in which employees can succeed. We recruit employees from around the world who possess a diverse range of skills and talents. In April 2022 we had over 40 different nationalities working for us with a workforce comprised of 607 men and 178 women.

We are committed as an employer to take action to close the gender pay gap at Diamond, in line with our vision and core values.

Diamond's 2022 Gender Pay Gap

As of 5th April 2022, we had 607 men and 178 women employed at Diamond resulting in women making up just under 23% of our workforce. Our mean gender pay gap for 2022 for all employees is 9.1% (10.3% in 2021) which is a reduction of over 1%. Our median gender pay gap is 7.2% (5.7% in 2021). Our mean gender pay gap remains below the National Average for 2022 of 14.9%. [Source, ONS Data]

Why do we have a gender pay gap?

As in previous years, the main reason for our mean and median gender pay gaps continues to be the under-representation of women in senior science, technical and engineering roles. The latest government data shows that women make up less than a third of the UK’s STEM workforce [Source, WISE Campaign], a stark figure that is dependent of many factors rooted in our education system and society.

From independent Equal Pay Audits undertaken in 2021 and 2022 we are confident that there is no significant difference in pay between men and women in comparable roles. We also continue to ensure all jobs are evaluated using the Korn-Ferry Hay job evaluation system which is internationally recognised as a robust methodology for determining the weight of different roles.

Factors affecting our 2022 gender pay gaps

The reduction of the mean gender pay gap is due to a variety of reasons. These include a director vacancy at the time the snapshot data was taken and several resignations from men in some senior roles. Other contributory factors include the number of promotions during the reporting period, in which 32% of employees promoted were women - an encouraging figure when compared to our current male/female ratio (77.3%/22.7%).

The mean bonus pay gap is 14.2% and the median bonus pay gap for 2022 is 16.7%. During the year 41.5% of men and 44.4% of women working at Diamond received a bonus. While a slightly higher proportion of women received a bonus the overall average value was slightly less in monetary terms.

It is positive to report that there have been some small increases in the percentages of women in the Upper Quartile (up to 14.3%) when comparing data to 2017 (at 11.3%) when reporting commenced.

Current activity

During 2022 we continued to work on initiatives focused on promoting equality, diversity and inclusion with out existing workforce and through our recruitment processes. Actions included:

• Raising awareness on EDI through virtual events and quarterly inclusion newsletters, featuring topics such as menopause, gender biases and neurodiversity, along with Diamond case studies and role models.
• Running a “spotlight on employee benefits” campaign featuring our family friendly and flexible working policies.
• Publishing revisions to our family friendly policies and procedures and making these accessible on enhanced pages on our intranet.
• Continued engagement with the public through our outreach programme with a focus on inspiring and encouraging women to access further education and careers in STEM.
• Sharing good practice in a jointly organised gender equality event with the University of Bath.
• Holding a seminar and discussion delivered by Professor Uduak Archibong on positive action and issues affecting minority groups and women.
• Giving talks on Athena SWAN progress and on Shared Parental Leave.
• Launching an internal Gender Inclusion Network to support women and men at Diamond.
• Leaders taking an active approach to encourage male colleagues to attend EDI focused events, particularly those aimed at supporting and celebrating female colleagues, eg International Women’s day.
• Offering mitigating unconscious bias training in annual appraisals.
• Planning to advertise STEM role/s over the next few months supporting the opportunity to return to STEM work following a career break.
• Securing commitment from our Executive team to making policies gender neutral.

Next Steps

In 2023 and beyond we will be pursuing the following actions to ensure our ongoing commitment to closing the gender pay gap at Diamond.

• Reviewing a hybrid working policy with support from Working Families.
• Launching the second EDI strategy for 2023 – 2028, which guides us on three core standards - Athena Swan, Disability Confident and the Talent, Inclusion and Diversity (TIDE Mark) plus the Working Families Benchmark which will be undertaken bi-annually.
• Using the Leonard Cheshire Trust for expert disability awareness in recruitment training for student supervisors responsible for recruiting students.
• Launching a series of networking meetings for early career female scientists that facilitate engagement with more senior scientists and help identify mentor and sponsorship opportunities for them.
• Continuing to update existing policies and procedures and introduce new, ensuring that equality is a key consideration and Athena Swan recommendations are incorporated in their production. This includes removing obstacles to opportunities and offering enhanced benefits over and above statutory requirements where possible. For example, offering policies in accessible and adaptable/formattable formats and asking the EDI groups to feedback from a minority and gender perspective based on accessible communication guidance.
• Adding clearer messaging on our career pages that demonstrate our commitment to work life balance and openness to exploring different types of flexible working for roles.

Download our report here.