Editorial: Aviva’s ‘woke’ hiring policies spark boycott – but should they?

A Telegraph report on recent comments made by Aviva CEO Amanda Blanc on diversity hiring has sparked outraged calls for a boycott of the insurer. While some commentators aren’t wrong that it’s reductive to focus on race and gender without considering other career barriers like class (something the insurance industry needs to work on), the Aviva rage is largely unfounded.

‘White male recruits must get final sign-off from me, says Aviva boss,’ the Telegraph’s original Thursday headline, topping a paywalled article, declared.

The splash has hit social media, Twitter in particular, with a vengeance and led to calls to boycott Aviva for its CEO’s “woke” actions.

GB News presenter Martin Daubney teased a segment by saying: “As a female boss of Aviva says she has to approve all senior male recruits all in the name of diversity, I look at whether white people are facing racism.”

“Clue, yes,” Daubney added.

“White male recruits must get final sign off from me, says Aviva boss”

If you’re male and white, it’s time cancel that @AvivaUK policy.https://t.co/zsQLjg0auv

— Ramon Agusta (@ramonagusta) December 14, 2023

Taken at face value, Blanc’s (pictured below) Treasury Committee inquiry comments as framed by the headline, which has since been amended, would pose a big point of concern. Discrimination, be that on the basis of race, gender or any other protected characteristic, is absolutely unacceptable.

Dig a little deeper, however, and Blanc was not saying that all white male recruits at the 22,000 strong insurance company are vetted. Rather, as the Telegraph points out lower down in its article – where many non-subscribers will be unable to see this – Blanc was responding to questioning specifically on senior employees.

What did Aviva CEO Amanda Blanc say to spark boycott calls?

Blanc’s actual words were that there was “no non-diverse hire at Aviva without it being signed off by me and the chief people officer”.

“Not because I don’t trust my team but [because] I want to make sure that the process followed for that recruitment has been diverse, has been properly done and is not just a phone call to a mate saying, ‘would you like a job? Pop up and we’ll fix it up for you’,” the Aviva boss said.

What the Aviva CEO did not say was that white male candidates were being rejected from roles (57% of senior hires at the insurer last year were male, according to an Aviva media statement) – rather, that the recruitment process was being vetted. Nor did she qualify what exactly a “non-diverse” hire might be, or specifically say that she was checking hiring processes around a specific group of people.

Insurance – building diversity in a people business

If you’ve never worked in or around insurance, you might not know that it badges itself as a proud people industry. This is fantastic if you’ve got an in, but not everybody has a pass to what has traditionally been seen as an Old Boys’ Club.

Historically, it hasn’t been easy to climb the ladder in insurance and financial services as a perceived outsider, whether that’s because of your gender, your race, or another protected characteristic like a disability or even class.

Senior leadership stats reflect this.

Meanwhile, just 78 of Aviva’s senior leaders are ethnically diverse, versus 670 who are white.

The figures hardly scream that Aviva is anti-white or anti-male.

What Blanc appears to be saying (if clumsily) here is that the organisation is looking to clamp down on ‘jobs for mates’ and make sure that historically discriminated against people get the same opportunities as others. This is not about refusing white men, a diverse group of people within itself, a place at the table unless they do not deserve it.

There is far more to diversity and discrimination than gender or race, and this is something that insurance companies do need to get to grips with.

Nevertheless, Blanc and her top team are not wrong to scrutinise hiring processes.

What’s your view on Aviva CEO Amanda Blanc’s comments on non-diverse candidates and the hiring process? Share a comment below.