Inclusive Diversity

In our differences lies our treasure

Our ambition

Our ambition as BDO Belgium is to ensure that everyone feels welcome, respected, valued, and heard. We want to create an environment where everyone has the opportunity to grow and be themselves, in all our diversity. This is why we use the term 'Inclusive Diversity' or short ‘ID’. Inclusive diversity for us means to be inclusive in all of our diversity. 

Our ID approach

At BDO Belgium, we're determined to be an ID leader as part of a continuous improvement approach.  

We want to be there for everybody. But on top of that, we also recognise that having the same processes, conversations, and focus for everybody (equality) will not necessarily lead to equal opportunities for all, due to our differences, unconscious biases and different starting points.  

Therefore, we have set up a program with a general ID focus in combination with a focused approach on those who encounter barriers and ensure to remove them.  

Ultimately, our goal is to eliminate the need for these additional programs and actions as there are no barriers in the process and no biases in our thinking. We aim for systemic change. We aim for inclusion. 

To achieve this ambition we focus on: 


our ambitions





  1. Creating awareness around the topic of ID and our biases 

  1. Rolling out programs with effective actions for our focus areas 

  1. Eliminate barriers and biases from our processes. 



Awareness

We have laid the ID foundation over the past few years by: 

Establishing a Keys to Growth program, where all equity partners took on a role in ID as learners, amplifiers of a certain focus area, or as reversed mentors in our women's events. 

Having strategic debates with the leadership team and organising team conversations during team meetings across different business practices. 

Setting up an ID communication plan that integrates events such as Iftar, the first day of school, International Women's Day, and more.

Organising training sessions for our Marcom team on inclusive communication principles. 

Developing ID checklists for different departments. 

Making ID part of our onboarding program. 

Focus areas

As there is so much diversity within our organisation, we defined three initial areas where we want to make a significant difference:  

focus areas

These areas were identified through an ID scan that we performed based on exit conversations, employee surveys, demographics, and other sources. 

In our approach to align behaviour and foster empowerment and empathy, we carefully follow through on these steps:  

  1. Identify the root causes of possible barriers 

  1. Align on BDO’s vision and develop actionable programs to achieve this 

  1. Implementing these programs and integrate key principles, tools and learnings into our organisation’s processes (HR, Academy, Adcom/Remcom, MarCom…) 

  1. Track the impact of our actions through KPIs


parents at bdo



Based on internal and scientific research, combining family and work is a common struggle for many career-loving parents in consulting. We are proud to share our vision and initiatives on the Parent Journey @ BDO. 

Supporting colleagues in their parent journey is part of our BDO DNA, as a human consultant. 

In this respect, our vision focuses on proactive communication, empathy, giving and taking, empowering our parents to take control, and being in the driver’s seat.  

 


We’ve found it’s key for our (future) parents @ BDO to have:   

  1. A clear view of the BDO’s vision on parents, easy access to practical information, flexibility options, insights and tips from other BDO Parents. 

  1. Proactive and open conversations throughout the different phases with the leadership and other supporting functions.  

And that’s why we developed the Parent Booklet and Conversation Starters for Parents & Leadership:

parents journey



The Parent Booklet is designed to offer practical advice, tips, and tricks for parents (to be). It aims to inform about options at BDO and helps to navigate through the parent journey within the organisation. At the end of the parent booklet there are Frequently Asked Questions as well as an overview of the support system that is available.  

Furthermore, we rolled out our Conversation Starters both for parents and for leadership and people managers. These tools can be used to facilitate the conversation within teams during the parent journey and are best used hand in hand with the parent booklet. 

 


women at bdo

While BDO has a good overall gender diversity balance of 50%, we do see a gap when it comes to leadership.  

During our Reverse mentoring events, Equity partners and women discussed possible barriers and opportunities in consulting and which ones are most relevant in our BDO organisation.  

The affinity or similarity bias is the unconscious, very human tendency to prefer people with the same background, interests, lifestyle, etc. Take, for example, promotions or recruitment. Because of this bias, specific profiles may be better understood and therefore valued and promoted more than other profiles. Simply because we feel more comfortable with people who are similar to us.  

We discovered many of our female colleagues struggle with balancing work and personal life. Research shows that this is more the case for women than for men due to a gender bias where women are still too often seen as the primary caretakers in the household. This feeling of having to compromise or choose between career or family (or another priority) causes stress. 

 

Women, often more than men -  struggle with feelings of doubt about their skills and level of expertise. According to research, women set the bar very high for themselves and often underestimate their own achievements. Which can hinder their professional growth. 

Within many companies, there is some sort of “ideal leadership model”. Research shows that this often is a dominant male model who is visible, extroverted, likes to take the stage, works long hours, etc.  

Such a dominant leadership model can be a barrier to those who look at and do things differently, but who can perfectly take up the role of a leader. This barrier is felt by women at BDO and is also relevant for for instance introverted leaders.  


A sponsor is a person who can support you in your career towards a leadership role or another position. A sponsor has an open mind, supports you, works above the radar and believes in you. They allow you to prove your abilities and talents by, for example, pushing you forward in projects. The sponsor offers you opportunities to make your talents visible and puts you in the spotlight where you don't do it yourself.  

There is no one-way ticket to leadership, as honest feedback on aligning personal development plans is part of their tasks as well. Therefore the sponsor role - picked up by -leadership and/or people managers - is a huge opportunity in the promotion process. 



Based on the five conclusions mentioned above, we want to further empower women and create awareness within the organisation. These barriers and opportunities also come back in our ID events. During these events, our colleagues get the tools, insights and learnings to keep growing and become a leader in ID as an organisation. 

These events are open to all our colleagues and the topics include: the Parent Journey, giving insights and working on the identified barriers and opportunities that were discovered during our reverse mentoring. 



During the kick-off of our ID events, we had the pleasure of having our CEO, Peter Van Laer give a keynote on biases and why it’s normal to have them, because that is how our brain works. However, it is very important to be conscious and think about them rationally.


subcultures within bdo


subculturen





As the third focus area, we discovered the importance of subcultures within our organisation: 

  • Having subcultures is a strength as different groups in an organisation lead to more agility and adaptation, especially when dealing with changes. 

  • Leadership plays a crucial role in subcultures as people copy their surroundings or as we also sometimes say “monkey does, what monkey sees.”  

  • It’s all about balance. Our colleagues want to feel like they are part of a subculture (Business Practice, Office, etc.) while also feeling like a BDOer.  

Processes

As our approach to reaching our ID ambitions involves removing barriers from our system, UPOP - our external ID partner - conducted an ID scan on our recruitment, promotion, and exit processes. This scan consisted of desk research and in-depth interviews. 

The results of the ID scan identified the red flags in these processes. This is not unusual due to the presence of bias. However, it’s important to recognise the impact and consciously work on eliminating these barriers.  

As a result, we have discussed the outcome of the ID scan with all our departments and have aligned on actions that will be taken based on each department's role and business plan. 

As a way of example, we are currently taking the following next steps: 

  • Our recruitment team followed an unconscious bias training 

  • Our Marketing team follows a biannual ID audit and training on inclusive communication 

  • Our HR Business Partners improved the job descriptions to benefit from the transparency in our promotion process. They also enhanced our thank-you conversations.  

Our ecosystem

By doing this BDO is contributing to the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals:

SDG

Inclusion Diversity BDO Belgium_2

Inclusion Diversity BDO Belgium_2

Inclusion Diversity BDO Belgium_2

Inclusion Diversity BDO Belgium_2

“As CEO, ID is one of the cornerstones of BDO’s future. In our differences lies our treasure.”
Peter Van LaerCEO BDO Belgium

Peter Van Laer - CEO BDO Belgium

Karen Keuleers

“I truly believe in the value of ID and am proud as BDO sponsor to actively challenge the organisation”.
Karen KeuleersChair of BDO Belgium
“ID is one of the pillars of our human resources strategy, it is where we as an employer make the difference.”
Wim GalbuseraHR Director

Wim Galbusera

evy

“By embracing and celebrating our differences, we can break down barriers, challenge stereotypes, and create a workplace that fosters creativity, innovation, and growth.”
Evy GordtsInclusive Diversity Lead