People in Planning

Katy Davis, Partner (Head of Planning London)

Planning Magazine recently produced an insight report on the planning consultancies with the highest proportion of female planners. It reported on a gradual rise: in 2022 40.1% of chartered town planners were female, up from 39.6% in 2020, while the proportion of female chartered town planner directors was 22.2%, up from 20.0%.

The research, now in its fifth consecutive year, is based on responses from the 25 biggest participating firms to Planning’s annual consultancy market report.

Carter Jonas achieved a good position on the league tables for all metrics and recorded a 5.5 percentage point increase in its overall number of female planners. This figure now sits at 24, out of 60 chartered town planners (40%). Our proportion of female planning directors is a greater achievement relative to our competitors, at 19.2%. That said, Carter Jonas would have fared even better in the league tables if Planning had taken into account those of us who are MRICS, as well as those who are MRTPI – I find it very frustrating that I and several of my colleagues were not represented in the figures! 

There is clearly more progress to be made. We all start off in life, boys and girls, interested in property and construction – we stack blocks, we build sandcastles, we play with LEGO, we play Monopoly and nowadays kids play Minecraft or Sim City. And yet at some stage, a misconception that the built environment is for boys and not girls occurs.

While there is a need for further progress, I am reassured that Carter Jonas’ People Strategy is helping us to achieve this. 

People Strategy: Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) is a central component of the People Strategy. A dedicated EDI strategy features specific KPIs used to measure performance, and EDI competencies which are included in our appraisal process, promotion criteria, 360 reviews and management development training. 

Other important components of the EDI strategy include a dedicated EDI Intranet site, an EDI Network which drives our diversity agenda through networking events and initiatives. In a recent satisfaction survey, the HR team asked questions on the EDI metrics and were pleased to see that all had a satisfaction score in excess of 82%. 

The HR team has worked with Clear Assured to gain external recognition for our EDI work and are pleased to have attained Gold accreditation. Furthermore, in our most recent Investors in People audit, we were awarded gold accreditation and commended for our EDI work. 

Recruitment is an issue across the planning sector, and its encouraging that Carter Jonas is making good progress in addressing this, with a specific focus on recruiting female planners. Our processes include gender balanced interview panels and advertising vacancies as open to flexible working. All recruiting managers are provided with guidelines on avoiding unconscious bias prior to interviewing and must have completed EDI training. In 2022 we launched new recruitment e-learning modules to support this further. EDI training is provided for all current and new Carter Jonas employees and partners, with refresher training provided on a bi-annual basis. 

In my opinion, it’s crucial that the planning industry gets into schools and spends time on early careers strategies to inspire people of any gender about a career in property or planning. It affects the whole environment around us – every building, every parcel of land, every sector. And with sustainability and climate change high on the agenda, it should be of more interest to the younger generation than ever. Carter Jonas is very passionate about providing work experience opportunities to school age, hosting Schools Insight Days and going to the schools to talk about a career in planning. I was very pleased to address six formers at a recent Schools Insight day, alongside other female colleagues – and, encouragingly, to a majority female audience. 

Other means by which we encourage school pupils to consider planning as a career include our work with RREF Pathways to Property and our Carter Jonas School Ambassador network which has grown from one volunteer in 2017 to 36 volunteers in 2022. Volunteers work with schools to promote surveying as a career option for young people, focussing specifically on non-traditional surveying backgrounds.

Alongside our work experience and internship programmes, we also offer an apprenticeship programme, which has seen a 40% increase in the number of apprenticeship starts for 2022. 

And we get a great response to all of these initiatives. After all, who doesn’t want to shape the world around them?

People strategy: Maternity benifits

Maternity benefits are important in encouraging women to select an employer and in recognition of this, Carter Jonas enhanced its maternity benefits. So far, 63% of those going on maternity leave have been eligible for the higher levels of enhanced pay and we continue to review these against the industry benchmark on a regular basis. We have also introduced further support and guides for managers to support those returning from parental leave. The employees themselves will be offered a parental leave mentor for professional advice. 

The costs of childcare are an increasing barrier to women returning to work, across all industries: recent research by charity Coram found that a full-time nursery place in the UK costs, on average, £14,000 a year. To enable families to better balance childcare and work, we recently republished and refocused our Agile and Flexible working policy. This made some considerable changes, reflecting the general shift in working practices which has taken place since the pandemic and gives all employees options to work more flexibly. 

For those returning to work after having children and facing the difficult balance of work and home (something that poses challenges, as well as solutions, when work is at home), mentors are of huge importance. Carter Jonas has supported the training of mentors to further develop our mentoring network. Over a third of the network is made up of female professionals and all participants are available to provide support and guidance to colleagues at all levels, with some offering a special focus around women in business. Women returning from maternity leave remains high at 67%, up seven percentage points from three years ago. We hope to continue this trend through further supportive initiatives.

Our Family Network is continuing to be enhanced, and will now be hosted on a dedicated MS Teams channel, to offer help and support for all carers with FAQs, spotlight reports, and employee assistance programme guides. We also continue to develop, offer and promote family friendly policies, to improve our performance in this area. Covid accelerated this and we have supported managers in the delivery through our revised Agile and Flexible Working Policy. 

Our People Strategy has made great progress, but along with much of the property industry, we appreciate that we are still some way short of the gender parity that we aspire to. 

Looking ahead, the figures are encouraging: the RTPI recently reported that women now account for 45 per cent of student members and 47 per cent of licentiates. It is great news that in Planning’s commentary on this, the most encouraging statistic in the report, Carter Jonas’ outreach activity was identified as a positive influence. 

Clearly we are making good progress and I look forward to welcoming many more female planners to Carter Jonas in the future.