Our commitment to inclusion and diversity

At Leeds Building Society we know it’s better to belong, which is why inclusive practices and supporting all our colleagues to be at their best is at the heart of our business. From our leadership to our talented colleagues, we’re better equipped to understand the needs of our current and future members if we have a diverse team that represents the communities we serve. We want the Society to be a place where our colleagues can make a difference and further support us in pushing forward our purpose.

Our inclusion and diversity strategy is focused on embedding inclusive practices into everything we do, creating a collaborative environment where diverse perspectives are sought to power our thinking. We know that having diversity of skills, experience, background and opinions means we can achieve more and provide a better service to our members.

We're backing our words with action. We've taken part in the Inclusive Employers Standard to independently assess our progress and are proud to have been awarded Gold Standard, the highest level of accreditation available. We were able to do this through:

• Demonstrating our efforts to recruit, develop and retain the best diverse talent.
• Showcasing our learning offer that supports our colleagues on their own allyship journeys.
• Promoting the work of our five colleague-led forums covering DiverseAbility, ethnicity and cultural heritage, gender equality, LGBTQ+ and wellbeing.

We’re proud of the progress we’ve made but we know there’s still work to do. Our agenda is sponsored by Andrew Greenwood, Deputy Chief Executive Officer, who is our accountable executive for inclusion and diversity. The Nominations Committee reports annually in the corporate governance section of the Leeds Building Society Annual Report and Accounts on the agreed objectives and progress made.

You can read more about how we support our colleagues in our Impact Report.

Women in Finance Charter

Updated December 2024

When we signed up to the Charter in 2018, women made up 23% of our Board and 33% of our Senior Management.

We regularly review progress to our targets to ensure they are stretching and in 2023 updated our target to reflect our senior leadership population. For this group we have a target of 45% representation by 2026. As of end of year we have 31% female representation in this population and currently believe we are not on track to meet our Charter target of 45% by our deadline of 2026.

We are committed to making progress to our targets and supporting our inclusion and diversity agenda. You can read more about the activity we are undertaking in our end of year reporting.