TORONTO — In response to recent events which have raised awareness of system racism in Canada and beyond, CBC/Radio-Canada announced today it will accelerate progress on its diversity and inclusion plan launched in 2018.
“We recognize that systemic racism exists in Canada and within many of its institutions, including its national public broadcaster. We are committed to combating racism in all its forms, to removing structural barriers and practices that result in discrimination at CBC/Radio-Canada, and to improving our workplace culture in tangible, concrete ways,” said Catherine Tait, president and CEO, in the public broadcaster’s news release.
“We know these issues aren’t new. People have been raising concerns for a long time and our responses haven’t worked fast enough. So we’re going to tackle things differently and intensify the transformation of our organization so that we are truly inclusive and representative of contemporary Canada.”
CBC/Radio-Canada’s Diversity and Inclusion Working Group is expanding the scope of its work, and recently announced new hiring, retention and promotion goals to build a more representative and inclusive workforce at the corporation.
Across CBC/Radio-Canada, the corporation is pledging to meet the following ambitious goals by 2021-22:
- Half of all new hires for executive and senior management positions will be Indigenous people, visible minorities or people with disabilities; and
- Retention and promotion rates for people from these three groups will be doubled.
In addition, these new representation objectives will be supported by related diversity and inclusion activities, including:
- Making unconscious bias training mandatory for people leading people, including senior management, and available on demand to any employee;
- Committing resources to better identify internal and external candidates from the three target groups (Indigenous people, visible minorities and people with disabilities) for CBC/Radio-Canada’s hiring pool; and
- Continuing to provide training on inclusive newsrooms, the impact of unconscious bias on our content, and reporting in Indigenous communities.
Pressing ahead with its 2018-21 Diversity and Inclusion Plan, CBC/Radio-Canada says targeted professional development initiatives include:
- The Diversity and Inclusion Fund, an initiative to provide internships and development opportunities to employment equity-seeking groups.
- The Developing-Diverse Emerging Leaders program, a 10-month development course for emerging leaders that equips employees with insights, tools and strategies to advance their careers with confidence and purpose. The fourth cohort of this program will graduate in December 2020.
The Diversity and Inclusion Working Group will continue to consult with employees from all equity-seeking groups to identify other initiatives to improve representation and workplace culture at CBC/Radio-Canada, says the news release.
Finally, CBC/Radio-Canada reiterated a major diversity commitment it announced a year ago: by 2025, at least one key decision-making creative role in all English- and French-language scripted and factual commissioned programs will be held by a person from a diverse background.
