At Good Finance our mission is to be the trusted source of information for charities and social enterprises on social investment. There is no shortage of reports that highlight the structural and systemic inequalities that disproportionately affect marginalised people and communities. Racialised and disabled leaders access social investment at lower rates than White and/or able-bodied leaders.
As a team we want to ensure that we are actively engaging with people and communities to tackle the barriers to information around social investment. In 2021 we launched the Addressing Imbalance programme as a means of directly engaging and supporting organisations working with leaders who have traditionally been underrepresented within social investment. You can find out more about the Addressing Imbalance programme here.
We continue to actively engage with organisations whose work is instrumental in supporting leaders, but we recognise that this is not enough. To truly move the dial and commit to being inclusive and anti-racist, we must put equity, diversity and inclusion at the heart of everything we do. This statement sets out our principles, our commitment and importantly, the actions we’re taking to make this happen.
Our principles
Our principles underpin our commitment and actions:
People-centred design
Good Finance was founded on person-centred principles. Anyone that comes to Good Finance should be able to find relevant, representative and accessible information on social investment. We strive to listen to you, to be open to feedback and respond to challenges and questions.
We do this through:
- Direct feedback on a quarterly basis from the Good Finance Steering Group
- Facilitating ‘User testing’ sessions to gain feedback on specific pieces of work
- Tracking and monitoring our Google, newsletter and social media analytics to see how people are engaging with our content and information
- Feedback incorporated via surveys, email or direct interactions e.g. following an event or training session
- Implementing suggestions for new tools and resources from our users
Accessibility
Our brand guidelines are central to our identity and ensure we honour our commitment to accessibility and inclusivity. The guiding principles of these are: -
- Branding: We use fonts, colours and layouts in a way that is accessible, taking into consideration people who are visually impaired or neurodivergent. Our imagery is reflective of people and communities across the UK. We seek permission for use of images from events, case studies or other sources and use a combination of real life and stock photography as well as graphics
- Language and tone: Our use of language is guided by our intention of creating a space that is inclusive and accessible to a diverse audience. We avoid language that perpetuates systemic injustice or negatively defines or positions a person or group who have experienced marginalisation. Our tone is friendly and informative, we avoid jargon, acronyms and convoluted language.
Our commitment
Stemming from our principles, our commitment lays out our key focus areas and how we hold ourselves accountable.
Supporting the sector
As an educational platform, we do not directly make or influence social investment decisions. However, we recognise our role in the sector and the ability we have to support, champion and share knowledge. Our commitment is to:
- Amplify the challenges, experiences and opportunities of social investment with charities and social enterprises
- Influence investors and decision-makers to act and address imbalances
- Support access to tools, resources, information and connections to help access to social investment be more equitable and inclusive
Sharing knowledge and collaborating
We work with our stakeholders to share knowledge and insight to support a more equitable social investment space. We do this by:
- Providing bursaries to support the participation in e-learning programmes for leaders from under-represented demographics who may otherwise struggle with the time and capacity needed to fully participate
- Working with partners who are actively engaged with diverse communities across the UK, taking a collaborative approach to creating content to meet the needs of their audiences
- Spotlight examples of social investment into organisations led by leaders from UK minority backgrounds and/or supporting under-served communities, being transparent about the opportunities and challenges that social investment presents
- Developing a network of peer support for social enterprise and charity leaders with lived experience who want to build an understanding of investment committees and be part of the decision making process
Growth and openness
We share relevant information on engagement with stakeholders. Our KPIs measure:
- The success of our engagement through both quantitative and qualitative metrics
- Who our audience are – we share anonymised data to show the breakdown of our audience demographics
- How are we engaging with organisations in a meaningful way – via events, collaboration, partnerships or other means
Where we collect protected characteristic data, we follow the principles:
- Sharing of data by users is optional and users are given the opportunity to opt out of providing this information; -
- Information is securely stored and only accessed by a dedicated member of the team
- Protected characteristic data is anonymised prior to sharing with team and/or stakeholders
For further details please refer to the Good Finance privacy policy.
Our actions
Our actions reflect how we put principles and commitment into practice through our everyday work.
Inclusive communication
We follow best practice guidelines around:
- Fonts, colours, layouts that are accessible to screen readers
- Use of alt text
- Accessibility tools
- Language
We use imagery that visibly showcases diversity in terms of gender, ethnicity and disability. We follow inclusive language principles and are intentional in using terminology that redresses inherent power dynamics;
Events (general principles)
- We collect accessibility requirements during the registration process and ensure that any reasonable adjustments are put in place
- We proactively seek to attend/facilitate events that help us build our reach and engagement with a diverse range of people
- We are committed to platforming a diverse range of speakers, inclusive of more than gender and visible diversity
- We do not attend or facilitate all-male panels
- We offer speaker renumeration for people from 'frontline organisations' who participate in our panels or sessions
- We have a safeguarding policy in place to support everyone involved with our events
- Where possible, events are recorded and a subtitled version is shared with attendees following the event
- Slides, resources and links are shared with attendees
- We collect feedback via polls and surveys
In person events
- We select venues that are accessible for ambulant disabled and hearing-impaired learners and where we believe that reasonable adjustments of our audience can be accommodated
- We provide badges for attendees and encourage people to share their pronouns and pronunciation of their names
- We offer a hybrid experience wherever possible
Online events
- Facilitators include their name, organisation and pronouns in screen name. We invite attendees to do the same.
- We encourage people to turn their camera on if they feel comfortable to, but highlight this is not a requirement
- We ensure there are multiple ways for people to engage during the session. This may include polls, surveys or different methods of sharing their questions
E-learning programmes
We have taken a user-led approach to the design of our e-learning programmes. Steps that we have taken to create an intentional learning environment include:
- Check accessibility requirements of learners during registration process
- Implement any required adjustments
- Provide learning in multiple formats including subtitled videos, slides and video transcripts
- Share community guidelines
- Bursaries are available to provide financial assistance to learners who require additional support to participate Further details and criteria can be found here.
Communications
In communications such as blogs, case studies and newsletters, we follow Good Finance brand guidelines and refer to best practice guidance in terms of language, use of imagery, styling and user experience. We are constantly reviewing the terminology we use, recognising that language is ever-evolving, however underpinning this is an intention to redress power imbalances, acknowledge user preferences and be open to feedback.
Partnerships
We work with a range of partners including Steering Group members, Marketing Partners, Addressing Imbalance Partners and contributors. Our partnerships are designed and delivered in collaboration and we actively seek feedback to ensure our work brings value to our partner audience. We have a payment framework for partners to ensure equity and transparency across our work. We have established a code of conduct to ensure partners we work with our aligned with us on working towards a fair and equitable future for all. Contributors are remunerated in line with our speaker remuneration policy. We have a provision of bursaries for Steering Group Members whose participation is not covered by their employer.
Team
- We strive to embed inclusive practices throughout our hiring process. This includes a blind application process, providing interview questions/tasks ahead of time where appropriate and implementing any reasonable adjustments for candidates
- Our team have undertaken training in equity, diversity and inclusion and are committed to ongoing learning and development
- We offer flexible working arrangements, wellbeing support and make reasonable adjustments to ensure our team feel supported
Suppliers
We have a commitment to buying social and work with social enterprise suppliers wherever possible. If you’re a social enterprise who’d like to work with us – get in touch!
Our commitment to redressing imbalance is evergreen, and we recognise that as we continue to develop our practices, challenge our biases and learn from others we will evolve and adapt to better meet the needs of our diverse audience. In the cases where our intentions and our actions do not align, or we lack the insight to do better, we commit to being open to feedback, taking ownership of mistakes, apologising and continually educating ourselves to do better.