City staff diversity report highlights ‘always room for improvement’

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This article was published 15/07/2022 (1189 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The City of Winnipeg’s workforce is slowly becoming more diverse, a new civic report finds.

However, the study says staff diversity still lagged behind that of the community itself in 2021, especially for women and people with disabilities, while the median pay for those within “equity groups” was also lower that of all city employees.

A human resources expert said the data provides valuable insight.

“These diversity reports help remind the privileged among us that there are still barriers, there are still problems, there is still work to do,” said Katherine Breward, who teaches human resource management at the University of Winnipeg.

Last year, people who self-identified as Indigenous represented 11.1 per cent of the city’s workforce, and 12.2 per cent of the overall population. Racialized peoples represented 16.4 per cent of the workforce, and 25.7 per cent of the total population. Women represented 28.2 per cent of the workforce, and about 51 per cent of the total population.

Those with self-identified disabilities represented 4.5 per cent of the workforce, and 34.3 per cent of the city’s population.

Coun. Markus Chambers, a member of city council’s human rights committee, said more work is needed to ensure consistent employment equity in all categories over the coming years.

“There’s always room for improvement. We are trending in the right direction but it is a matter of continuing to provide opportunities… not only for employment but for transferring of skills.”

Breward said a key challenge for employers is to determine the barriers that act as obstacles to meeting diversity goals.

“The reason that (progress is so) slow is a lot of the barriers that are faced are really subtle. They are not things that people are doing on purpose. There are things that people don’t even recognize are barriers,” she said.

For example, Breward said many potential employees with autism excel at work that involves pattern recognition and attention to detail but may struggle with reading social cues during job interviews.

“That interview is a meaningful and substantial barrier to people getting employment,” said Breward.

Among three of the city’s traditional equity groups, representation was slightly higher in 2021 than during the previous year, with the exception of women, who made up about one percentage point less of the overall workforce than in 2020.

Breward said COVID-19 pandemic demands to care for elderly relatives who fall ill or isolate with sick children disproportionately affected women.

“Women are (often) expected to take on (caregiving) responsibilities and employers don’t provide adequate supports for that,” she said.

While the median annual salary for city employees was $62,116 in 2021, medians for each equity group fell thousands of dollars lower.

That amount dropped to $57,608 for Indigenous staff, $56,975 for racialized employees, $57,059 for female staff, and $51,708 for workers with disabilities.

Breward said the pay gap reflects the fact “equity-seeking” people often take on entry-level jobs and then face barriers to promotion, while women’s career prospects are more likely to be affected by family duties. Certain employees are also far more willing to negotiate their wages than others, she added.

“There is a lot of data that shows men are much more willing to negotiate their starting salary than women… (and) people with privilege generally feel more confident negotiating their starting salaries.”

Breward said another key challenge for employment equity is access to education, which can be a key requirement to obtaining management-level positions and higher salaries.

The 2021 data marks the first time the city reported on the representation of LGBTTQ+ and newcomer community members within its overall workforce, which account for 1.5 per cent and 0.31 per cent, respectively.

Data on how that compares to the general population was not available, while Statistics Canada figures were used for other groups.

Since the diversity report is based on self-declared data, it may not fully reflect the workforce, the city warned.

Overall, Chambers said he’s glad to see an apparent increase in diversity: “It’s (important to) ensure that services that we are providing and the person that is administering them are reflective of the community that we’re serving.”

In an emailed statement, spokesperson Tamara Forlanski said the city is taking several steps to increase diversity, including a job fair that invited 100 low-income, Indigenous and newcomer youth earlier this year.

joyanne.pursaga@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @joyanne_pursaga