ABC promises ‘retention framework’ and talent diversity pipelines

The ABC will try to address its struggle to retain Indigenous staff and employees from diverse backgrounds and get more diverse candidates in front of hiring managers as part of its diversity and inclusion plans for the next three years. 

The commitment was made in a three-year “Diversity, inclusion and belonging plan” released by the ABC on Tuesday, a little over a month after managing director David Anderson and news boss Justin Stevens were criticised for failing to adequately supportΩ Q+A host Stan Grant over racially charged attacks. 

Anderson said the ambitions outlined in the plan build on the “strong foundation for diversity” already in place at the ABC, and lauded the broadcaster’s progress in recent years: “But there is more to do.”

The plan focuses on increasing diversity in the ABC’s ranks, and keeping the diverse staff already employed. For years the ABC has struggled to retain staff from Indigenous and diverse backgrounds. As recently as May, ABC employees told The Age that a lack of diversity among senior ranks had contributed to worsening retention rates of Indigenous staff. 

The ABC said it would “continue to work with external organisations, such as Media Diversity Australia, Bus Stop Films, and Australian Network on Disability” to improve diversity at all levels. As part of that, the ABC will establish an internship program for Indigenous and culturally and linguistically diverse candidates and people living with disabilities. 

It will also engage a “specialist recruitment adviser” to focus on getting more diverse candidates in front of hiring managers. The adviser will “develop strategies and initiatives” and also focus on boosting diversity among ABC leadership. 

A “retention framework” will also be introduced by June next year, with the aim to assess “the experience of employees” over their careers. The ABC said it hoped to “better understand” why staff from Indigenous and diverse backgrounds “may choose to leave”, and take “action” to address the problem. It hoped to see turnover rates among diverse staff at the same level as for employees overall. 

The ABC employs 4419 staff. Of them, 55.4% are women and 44.1% are men. Indigenous representation totals 3.3% overall, and 5.4% of the total workforce lives with a disability. Employees from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds make up 25.7% of the total workforce.

As part of its three-year plan, the ABC will also try to boost diversity across its workforce, with aims to increase Indigenous representation to 3.4% of the total workforce, and increase staff representation of people with disabilities to 8%. 

The ABC also wants to see 50% of its executive roles filled by women, and 30% of content maker and executive roles filled by staff from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. 

On the content side, the ABC has committed to engaging in more community and First Nations strategic partnerships, with a view to lock in at least eight First Nations media and community-based media partnerships by December 2025. 

The promise builds on broader diversity commitments across the ABC’s content, which includes hiring a string of cultural guidance advisers by June next year who will be made available to journalists and other content makers to ensure cultural advice is consistent.

The ABC has also drawn up “content accessibility” targets, including captions on all video content “regardless of platform”. It will also provide transcripts for all podcasts and radio programs and alternative text for all images, and create audio descriptions for “at least 14 hours” of TV and iview programming a week.