Diversity & Inclusion

As an Executive Search consultancy, we have a leading role to play in increasing diversity of leadership across the transport, infrastructure and built environment sectors, in regard to diversity of gender, ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation, religion and other protected characteristics.

We have a responsibility to ensure that we do everything within our power to provide diverse and balanced longlists and shortlists, as well as to ensure our own organisation offers a diverse and inclusive culture.

Embracing a Diverse and Inclusive Industry

Newsom Consulting is an equal opportunities employer and is dedicated to encouraging a supportive and inclusive culture amongst both our own and our client’s organisations.

On average 33% of our recent executive searches have been successfully fulfilled with a female candidate. This compares very favourably with the industry; in the top 150 UK Transport and Infrastructure companies only 21% of all Directors are female, with only 7% in core business function leadership roles.

We strive to provide you with a balanced pool of candidates. We frequently offer advice to our clients on how to adapt the role to make it more inclusive and appeal to a wider, more diverse audience.

We commit to providing you with a shortlist of at least 30% gender, BAME or other diverse characteristic representation. If this isn’t possible due to the specific talent pool we are searching within, we will provide you with our findings as to why this is the case. We will also work with you to find a solution that will open up the market to a more diverse pool of candidates.

This may involve flexing the brief, looking outside of your industry, or adapting the role to cater for flexible working patterns, amongst other solutions.

Diversity within Newsom Consulting

As an organisation, Newsom Consulting is progressive when it comes to diversity and inclusion. 50% of the Newsom Consulting team are women, with 17% being ethnically diverse. In having a diverse team ourselves, we reduce unconscious bias by providing an inclusive culture within the workforce.

However, having a diverse workforce is not enough in itself. Managing diversity and developing a culture of inclusion is a continuous process of improvement, not a one-off initiative.

The Standard Voluntary Code of Conduct for Executive Search Firms

We subscribe to The Standard Voluntary Code of Conduct for Executive Search Firms. This policy outlines a voluntary code of conduct which all of our consultants follow:

1. Board Succession Planning
Support Chairs and their nomination committees in developing medium-term succession plans that identify the balance of experience and skills that they will need to recruit for over the next two to three years to maximise board effectiveness. This time frame will allow a broader view to be established by looking at the whole board, not individual hires; this should facilitate increased flexibility in candidate specifications.2. Executive Succession Planning
Support nominations committees, CEOs and CHR Directors in developing clear, appropriate targets for enhancing diversity in senior executive roles and in developing plans to strengthen the pipeline of diverse candidates.

3. Diversity Goals
When taking a specific brief look at overall board or senior executive composition and, in the context of the business’s agreed aspirational goals on gender balance and diversity more broadly, explore with the client if recruiting women and/or ethnically diverse individuals is a priority both generally and on this occasion.

4. Defining Briefs
In defining briefs, work to ensure that significant weight is given to relevant skills, underlying competencies and personal capabilities and not just proven career experience, in order to extend the pool of candidates beyond those with existing board roles or conventional corporate careers.

5. Longlists/Shortlists
When presenting longlists, try to ensure that at least 30% of the candidates are women – and, if not, we will explicitly justify to the client why there are no other qualified female options, through demonstrating the scope and rigour of the research.

We will then ensure that the shortlist is appropriately reflective of the longlist, discussing with their clients each woman on the longlist and aiming to have at least one woman whom they would ‘strongly recommend’ that the client should meet. We will also discuss and agree with the client and meet specific targets for ethnic diversity on the longlist and seek to ensure that the shortlist is appropriately reflective of the longlist.

6. Candidate Support
Provide appropriate support to candidates to prepare them for interviews and guide them through the process.

7. Supporting Candidate Selection
As clients evaluate candidates, we will ensure that we continue to provide appropriate weight to intrinsic competencies and capabilities, supported by thorough referencing, rather than over-valuing certain kinds of experience. Then, as necessary, we will offer advice on interview process best practice to demonstrate how to reduce the impact of unconscious biases.8. Induction
Provide advice to clients on best practice in induction and ‘on boarding’ processes.

9. Embedding Best Practice
Ensure that best practices in supporting clients on enhancing board and senior executive diversity are well-documented and shared internally and that adherence to the Code is effectively monitored, including regular training on unconscious biases and how to reduce their impact.

10. Signalling Commitment
Signal our commitment to supporting diversity on boards and in senior executive ranks, and our adherence to the Code, through our website, marketing literature and client discussions. Sharing data on our track record on their website as appropriate and include case studies of their success.

We include diversity KPI’s in all our client proposals, as well as publishing our results so they can see how far we have come, and steps we are taking to ensure that our diversity statistics are always on the rise.

Alongside this we produce an annual Diversity Report, looking at the Top 150 companies within Transport & Infrastructure to analyse how the industry as a whole is doing and how we compare as an organisation.

11. Broadening the Candidate Pool
Seek to broaden our own networks of potential candidates, leveraging as appropriate external lists produced by relevant organisations. Investing time into developing relationships with the pipeline of future female and ethnically diverse candidates.

We are continuously on the lookout for relevant industry groups to join and support in order to broaden our network including Women in Rail, Women in Transport and Women in Construction. Our consultants attend networking events and summits to broaden their networks and to gain insights into how best to attract diverse candidates. We are also currently working with senior leaders to explore how best to establish a BAME diversity network that will be beneficial to companies and candidates across the sector. We regularly reach out to our contacts within the industry to get feedback on best practices for attracting a diverse workforce, and to network them for recommendations on our assignments.

Newsom Consulting are proud sponsors of the Senior Women in or Formerly in Transport (SWiFT) group, a networking group founded by Women in Rail to champion diversity within leadership roles across the transport sector.

Since taking over as the CEO of Crossrail I have put a lot of effort into establishing the right leadership team to complete the project. Newsom Consulting have been a great partner in this work. Together we have worked to assemble a great new team with the right energy and capability for one of the worlds most complex projects.

Jim and team are a real pleasure to work with; responsive and sensitive to our unique circumstances.

CEO, Crossrail

Newsom Consulting are incredibly well connected to the industry and very quickly understand our needs. They take time to understand the role profile, the culture and challenges of the organisation, and then hand-picks the shortlist. This process works really well and saves time and money in the search.

MD, Transport Infrastructure, Amey

We have used Newsom Consulting extensively for a number of years, we have always found them responsive and great to work with. Their understanding of the brief and our business has always resulted in a shortlist and successful candidate that meets our requirements.

Chief Executive, Murphy Group

We recently retained Newsom Consulting to recruit a key strategic Director for BAM Nuttall. It was a very professional service, they fully understood the brief and delivered against it extremely well. They kept us informed throughout the search, providing a really good shortlist of candidates. The shortlist included a consultant’s report on each candidate that was informative, honest, with insightful analysis. Newsom Consulting had their finger on the pulse of what was going on in the market and we got the right candidate out of the process

Managing Director- Transport & Regions, BAM Nuttall

Heathrow have partnered with Newsom Consulting to recruit several key leadership roles for our Expansion team. On each search they have been successful in providing an excellent shortlist from which we have appointed a high-calibre candidate. Jim has worked with Heathrow for a number of years and has developed a good understanding of our business, and we have recently appointed Newsom Consulting as an executive search partner for the Expansion programme.

Expansion Programme Director, Heathrow Airport

UK Parliament retained Newsom Consulting to help us recruit the Managing Director for Strategic Estates. This was a good experience and we were well supported throughout the recruitment process. Newsom provided a great deal of industry specific knowledge. The advice and support at the early stages of the process, and specifically helping us define our candidate spec to get what the business really needed from the hire, was invaluable

Director General (Operations), House of Commons

Exceptional knowledge of the industry and thoroughly professional service.

Managing Director UK Engineering, SYSTRA

We have worked with Newsom Consulting on a number of successful senior searches. They listen carefully to assemble the right brief and have identified strong, well targeted shortlists. Their written documentation on the search and shortlisted candidates is informative and insightful.

Managing Director Rail, WSP

Jim has worked with us to source and secure leading talent for 15 years and his commitment to understand our business needs and proactive nature underpins this successful relationship with Newsom Consulting.

CEO, Steer Davies Gleave

We retained Newsom Consulting to help us find and attract several new Directors for our Public Sector Transport practice. Jim and his team really listened to what we needed, understood our values and the expectations we have for anyone joining our team. They cut to the chase on any thorny issues, which speeded up all our interactions and decision-making. We were able to hire several high-calibre candidates from the search.

Partner & Public Sector Transport Leader, PwC

ACE partnered with Newsom Consulting to assist us in recruiting the newly created position of Director of Communications & Marketing. We were seeking a unique blend of skills and experience, and were very pleased with the selection of candidates on the shortlist and ultimately the chosen candidate we were able to appoint. Jim and the team were enjoyable to work with, they took the stress out of recruitment and provided a personal service and genuinely cared about us finding a good quality candidate with the right culture fit for our organisation

Chief Executive, Association for Consultancy and Engineering (ACE)

ACE retained the services of Newsom Consulting to help us recruit our next CEO. They really listened and took our requests on board, were proactive and pushed the process through efficiently. Their candidate reports and shortlisting process were clear and helpful, with a high calibre of candidates presented, enabling us to hire a great candidate. They made the recruitment process easy for us and were a real pleasure to work with.

Chairperson of the Association for Consultancy and Engineering 

Our Team

Lauren Goldring

Paul Neave

Richard Dobbs

Jim Newsom

Simon Arthur

Emilia Kilburn

Pei Gong

Ellen Dennis

Eloise Samuelson

Rebecca Peacock

John McFarland

Kelly Barlow