Advocating racial and ethnic diversity in housing boardrooms
In my shoes is a CIH presidential campaign, by Lara Oyedele, that seeks to raise awareness of the importance of racial diversity in the housing sector, drawing on Lara’s lived experience of the housing sector and racial adversity.
The campaign will challenge the lack of ethnic and racial diversity in the boardrooms of housing organisations, providing a catalyst to galvanise positive change.
The campaign will amplify conversations and awareness, by sharing resources, engaging in conversations and sharing a wide variety of lived experiences, #InMyShoes, to create a momentum where racial and ethnic diversity are consistently on the agenda to drive forward positive change.
The campaign will run throughout Lara's presidency from October 2022 to September 2023.
#InMyShoes
Sharing people's lived experiences of racial and ethnic diversity to raise awareness
- CIH Podcast #10: In my shoes with Lara Oyedele
- The Scottish Housing News Podcast 26: Racial diversity in the housing profession with Lara Oyedele, Callum Chomczuk and Fash Fasoro
- A sit down with our new CIH president, Lara Oyedele
- The fear of offending, by Pamela Leonce
- Building a better future for refugees and migrants in the UK
- In my shoes: An interview with Alysha Burrell
- A career in housing, not following in the family footsteps
- Barriers faced by people from minoristised ethnic groups trying to access a social home by Alice Tooms Moore
- Saluting our sisters for Black History Month 2023 a blog by Dewbien Plummer of HouseProud celebrating inspirational Black women in social housing, featuring Lara and the In My Shoes campaign, published by National Housing Federation
- The housing sector is failing to attract a diverse workforce
- Championing equality, diversity and inclusion in the housing profession
- Improving diversity and inclusion with mentoring
- Equality, diversity and inclusion - breaking from the shackles of COVID
- Diversity and inclusion - how mentoring can help your organisation
- What Windrush Day means to me
- Raising the standard for Windrush
- Celebrating Black History Month - What's in a name?
- Diversity is power
Diversity resource library
The resource library has been curated by Lara to highlighting the best research and resources on board room diversity, good practice and guidance to support diverse recruitment.
- Inside Housing diversity survey 2021: revealed how diverse the UK housing's leadership is
- Inside Housing housing diversity survey 2019
- Inside Housing 2018 housing leadership survey results
- Shelter Scotland report on barriers faced by people from minoritised ethnic groups trying to access a social home
- Embedding the principles of equality, diversity and inclusion in the board recruitment process.
- How to diversify your board: a practical guide
- Deeds not words: A pledge to action
- Race equality in housing: a review of the policy approach in England, Scotland and Wales
- SHARP The UK Social Housing Anti Racism Pledge
- Inclusive recruitment toolkit
Our equality, diversity and inclusion census
We are committed to improving equality, diversity and inclusion in our organisation, throughout our membership and across the housing sector.
In order to do this, we’re asking all our members to complete our EDI census so we can capture data and discover what our membership, and in turn, the housing profession looks like across the UK.
This will help us identify where the sector may be underrepresented in different areas across the UK.
We'll continually challenge everything that we do are working to ensure that all aspects of our work are inclusive, including the work with our member steering group to drive professional standards across the sector.
Our EDI framework
The CIH EDI framework can be used by individuals or landlords/housing organisations to make positive changes across the sector.
It features self-assessment tools so you can think about where you are currently with regards to EDI and consider how you can make further improvements to working practice.
- For individuals, the EDI framework compliments the CIH professional standards and directs you towards the steps you can take to champion and improve EDI in your organisation.
- For landlords, the EDI framework sets out a series of commitments underpinned by a range of outcomes.
Shoe Aid
During Lara’s presidential term she will be fundraising for her chosen presidential charity, Shoe Aid, which speaks to Lara’s lived experience of homelessness as a young woman, as well as her love of shoes.
There will be donation points at events and we will be encouraging members to look in their wardrobes and find a pair of shoes to donate. This provides an interactive and equitable way to make charitable donations that will provide vital resources to families and individuals in need, especially during the current cost of living crisis.
Lara Oyedele | CIH president
It’s my motivation to inspire change and champion the importance of racial and ethnic diversity in the housing sector, especially in our boardrooms. We all know more needs to be done in this space and I want to work with CIH, its members, and the wider sector to highlight why it’s important to create a fair and inclusive environment where every individual feels confident not only that they will not be exposed to discrimination, criticism, harassment, or any other emotional harm but also that they and their life experiences will be valued.
