Essex County Fire and Rescue Service becomes accredited as an inclusive employer

Essex County Fire and Rescue Service has achieved bronze status in the Inclusive Employers Standard. 

It is the first time the Service has applied for accreditation and is delighted that its work to become a more inclusive employer has been recognised. 

Colette Black, Essex County Fire and Rescue Service’s Assistant Chief Executive, People, Values and Culture, said: “To achieve bronze status is a great step forward for our Service and recognises the commitment we are making to valuing all our people. We are on an exciting journey to becoming a more diverse and inclusive place of work that represents the people of Essex who we work to keep safe.” 

The standard, which is only awarded to a handful of organisations in both the public and private sectors, helps Essex County Fire and Rescue Service assess how effective its inclusion work is and provides detailed feedback to enable further development and progress of inclusion and diversity priorities. 

The Service joins companies such as Asda, Sony, Bank of England and Serco in receiving the accreditation. 

Colette added: “This independent verification shows that we have strong foundations in place and provides a clear plan for us as a Service to achieve silver and gold in the future. Importantly it will also help us to encourage people to come and work with us in the range of roles that we offer as an employer.” 

Essex County Fire and Rescue Service has a range of roles that it is recruiting for. To become part of an organisation that values inclusivity and diversity and really make a difference to people’s lives go to Join Essex Fire.

What is the Inclusive Employers Standard?  

The Inclusive Employers Standard supports organisations to assess progress with their inclusion journey and award those meeting the Inclusive Employers Standard with accreditation. It is an evidence-based, objective, accreditation tool for assessing and promoting inclusion in the workplace developed and run by Inclusive Employers. The process is via online submission of narrative and evidence against 35 questions arranged over Inclusive Employers’ six pillars of inclusion, Engage, Equip, Empower, Embed, Evaluate and Evolve. 

Inclusive Employers is the UK's first and leading membership organisation for employers looking to build inclusive workplaces. Inclusive Employers offers consultancy, training and thought leadership, to help organisations make inclusion an everyday reality at their place of work. 

Rupert Moyne, MD - Corporate Services at Inclusive Employers, said: “Huge congratulations to all of the amazing organisations who took part in the latest round of the Inclusive Employers Standard. Participants were at all stages in their workplace inclusion journey from just starting out to those progressing to a higher accreditation level compared to their previous submission. This round saw almost one third of participants coming from organisations that had taken part previously and wanting to measure the progress they have achieved since the last time (and looking to improve their accreditation level). The great thing about the Inclusive Employers Standard is that participation works for organisations at all stages of their journey to workplace inclusion. As well as those at an early stage we saw some first-time submissions from organisations doing some really great work.”