The Security Institute’s Inclusive Security Special Interest Group (ISSIG) has launched an Inclusivity and Diversity questionnaire, aiming to understand the security sector’s workforce in greater detail. After receiving over 500 responses from Security Institute members, the questionnaire is now being opened to the wider sector.
There is a lack of existing data that identifies the diversity figures for the security sector as a whole, which makes it difficult to identify areas for improvement and furthermore hinders any efforts to track changes in the workforce over time.
The questionnaire will help benchmark diversity figures for the security sector, providing quantitative data as well as offering participants the opportunity to anonymously share their experiences and supply their thoughts if they should wish to do so.
This data will be used to inform future initiatives by the Security Institute and its members to improve industry practices and ultimately build a stronger, more inclusive workforce. Going forward the questionnaire’s results will also help evaluate the impact of these future initiatives and help track the sectors inclusivity over time.
To provide a full picture of inclusivity in the sector, the questionnaire addresses a wide variety of demographic categories including but not limited to age, educational background, gender as well as both visible and non-visible disabilities.
Speaking on the importance of the questionnaire, the ISSIG Co-Chairs Anna-Liisa Tampuu ASyI and Lisa Reilly ASyI said: “As a sector, it is our responsibility that our workforce of security professionals reflects the people that we serve to protect. A diversity of viewpoints and backgrounds will mean that, as a sector, we are best prepared to tackle the threats of both today and tomorrow. This is why the Security Institute, through our Inclusive Security SIG, is working so hard to make the sector inclusive for all.
“This sector-wide survey has been created by our Inclusive Security SIG members and will help us benchmark diversity figures for our sector as a whole, informing the projects that we focus on in the coming years.”
Please follow this link to complete the questionnaire: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/security-sector-inclusion-questionnaire
This questionnaire closes on 13/09/2021.
The results of the questionnaire will be shared at the Security Institute’s Annual Conference on 28 October. All participation in the questionnaire is voluntary and all responses will be stored anonymously with no personally identifiable information, in accordance with GDPR requirements.