Glossary of language relating to socio-economic background and inclusion in an organisation

Social mobility

Definition: Social mobility measures the strength of the link between a person’s childhood circumstances and their adult outcomes – and the extent to which people are free to move between socio-economic groups, within their lifetime, and between generations.. The term social mobility is used frequently, especially in politics. It means supporting and creating opportunities for individuals from lower socio-economic backgrounds to enable them to become more economically successful.

Use and context: Typically, in an organisational context, the focus is on improving socio-economic diversity and inclusion – this can contribute to social mobility, but it is not the same thing. Social mobility focuses on individual people, rather than on the wider workplace and its policies, processes and working culture.

Social equality

Definition: Social equality is a state where socio-economic background does not determine an individual's access to opportunities in higher education and the labour market, i.e. where all individuals within a society have equal rights, liberties, and status, regardless of their background or identity.

Use and context: Social equality aims to eliminate social hierarchies and ensure that all individuals have a fair chance to participate fully and reach their full potential in terms of educational and employment outcomes.

Socio-economic background

Definition: Socio-economic background is the prevalent term to refer to the particular set of social and economic circumstances in which an individual grew up. This can be measured objectively by capturing information on, for example, the type of school individuals attended, whether they received free school meals and their parents' occupation and level of education.

Use and context: This term facilitates fair and objective discussion of the influence of social and economic circumstances on individuals’ educational and career trajectories. We note that, individually, any one indicator does not necessarily determine whether someone is from a more or less advantaged socio-economic background (particularly in relation to school type), but that collectively they create a picture.

Social class

Definition: While the terms ‘lower socio-economic background’ and ‘working class’ are sometimes used interchangeably, they are not the same. Class is harder to define and may be influenced by individuals’ perceptions of their social status. Class can refer to a range of behaviours and tacit assumptions, from how to dress and talk to food choices and hobbies.

Use and context: Employees and clients may be less comfortable talking about social class than socio-economic background.

Social justice

Definition: Social justice means people achieving through their own choices and efforts, unimpeded by their socio-economic background. For employers, this means creating the conditions to enable everyone to reach their full potential. More broadly, social justice means just and fulfilling relations between the individual and society. Social mobility is related to social justice but focuses more on an individual’s upward socio-economic trajectory within society.

Use and context: Achieving social justice requires societal and corporate responsibility for change.

Diversity

Definition: Diversity is about representation and ensuring that workforces reflect the populations they serve and are drawn from. Diversity also generally refers to actions to increase the representation of groups that are under-represented in particular organisations

Use and context: Recognising that employees are collectively diverse helps to move away from seeing one group or culture as the ‘norm’, with others expected to adapt to that norm.

Inclusion

Definition: Inclusion means creating the conditions in an organisation to allow individuals from diverse backgrounds to contribute and achieve to their full potential. It means creating a working culture in which individuals from diverse backgrounds feel comfortable and valued.

Use and context: Inclusion focuses attention on policies and processes as well as individual behaviours.

Intersectionality

Definition: Intersectionality refers to the overlap of more than one diversity characteristic or aspects of a person’s background or circumstances. It also refers to the possible effect of this in compounding a person’s experience of inequality.

Use and context: By means as an example, we might say: “our research found that people from an ethnic minority background and females from lower socio-economic backgrounds face a ‘double disadvantage’.”

Meritocracy and merit

Definition: In a meritocratic system, people are rewarded and progress on the basis of demonstrated achievement. This principle is often associated with fairness. However, for meritocracy to give rise to social justice, an organisation needs to create conditions and a working culture that are inclusive.

Use and context: Organisations also need to discuss openly what they understand by merit and what qualities they value.

Talent

Definition: Talent is difficult to define, but broadly speaking is a specific aptitude or skill that helps an individual to succeed. It can be problematic to assume that a talent is innate, as research tells us that it may be correlated with longer-term exposure to something and opportunities to learn and practice.

Use and context: It may be more helpful to focus on merit, which focuses on what a person achieves.