Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
We value the diversity of businesses that we support and are committed to doing everything in our power to help them flourish and grow.
Aligned with our ESG strategy, we support major EDI initiatives in the Venture Capital industry and set market standards for our delivery partners.
To reflect our external ambition internally, we have a progressive EDI strategy focused on creating a workplace where everybody feels included and supported, where diversity is celebrated, and all colleagues can be their true selves at work.
Read our Board Diversity Statement here.
The Race at Work Charter
To reflect our external ambition, BBB signed the Race at Work Charter in March 2021.
Building on the work of the 2017 McGregor-Smith Review, the Race at Work Charter is a public commitment to improving the experiences of Black, Asian, and ethnic-minority employees in the workplace.
It sets out five actions for signatories to take:
- Appointing an executive sponsor for race
- Capturing data and publicising progress
- Ensuring zero tolerance of harassment and bullying
- Making equality in the workplace the responsibility of all leaders and managers
- Taking action that supports ethnic-minority career progression
Investing in Women Code
The British Business Bank was a founding signatory of the Investing in Women Code and our commercial subsidiary British Patient Capital was one of the first institutional investors to sign up to the Code.
The Investing in Women Code is a commitment to enhance female entrepreneurship in the UK by improving their access to tools, resources, and finance.
Learn more about how as an organisation, the British Business Bank is committed to upholding this code:
Learn more about the Investing In Women Code.
Our Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion efforts in recruitment
We strive to be an equal opportunities employer and are committed to onboarding, developing, and retaining individuals who can help us meet our strategic goals.
In order to ensure a diverse workplace where talent is celebrated and colleagues have the resources to pursue their own development, we have rolled out a range of policies and programmes.
We are always looking for ways to strengthen these policies and programmes further wherever we can.
Learn more Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion.
Research
Core to the Bank’s mission is making finance markets work better for all smaller businesses in the UK.
Here are just some of the pieces of research we have done into diversity and representation within finance:
Invest in Women Taskforce
The Invest in Women Taskforce is an industry-led, government-backed initiative with the ultimate goal of making the UK the best place in the world to be a female entrepreneur.
Its mission is to create the largest funding pot world-wide for female investors, with capital deployed by female investors into female-powered businesses across the UK.
In support of the aims of the Taskforce, the British Business Bank has committed to supporting the aims of the investing £50m into female-led funds through its existing programmes.
Female-led funds should approach our teams at the Enterprise Capital Funds and British Patient Capital to explore funding, where the criteria for funding from those programmes will remain the same, but we will be actively seeking to support more female led funds with the additional capital available.
Find out more about the Invest in Women Taskforce.
HM Treasury's Women in Finance Charter
The British Business Bank became a signatory to the HM Treasury Women in Finance Charter in 2018. At the time of joining the Charter, women represented 33% of our senior management population
Following the successful achievement of our previous Women in Finance Charter target, the Bank adopted a broader definition of senior management in 2025, aligning with industry practice by defining senior management as Executive Committee-1 (ExCo-1), comprising colleagues at Grade A-C equivalent levels. This approach better reflects the Bank's leadership pipeline and supports more meaningful measurement of progress.
Our current headline Women in Finance Charter target is to achieve 45% female representation within our ExCo-1 population by 30 September 2028.
As at 31 August 2026, women represented 37.5% of our senior management population, based on our ExCo-1 definition of senior management.
The Bank continues to monitor progress through regular reporting, workforce planning and succession planning activities. Based on our assessment of interim progress, we believe we remain on track to achieve our target of 45% female representation in senior management by September 2028.
Alongside our headline Women in Finance Charter target, the Bank also maintains a broader set of gender representation ambitions across leadership levels. These include maintaining gender balance within the Executive Committee and increasing representation across the wider leadership pipeline. This tiered approach reflects our commitment to developing diverse talent at all levels and supporting sustainable long-term progress in gender representation.
Over the last year, we have continued to strengthen our approach through:
- Succession planning and talent review processes that actively consider gender representation and support the development of future female leaders.
- A mentoring programme designed to increase development opportunities, visibility and progression.
- The use of diversity and representation data within workforce planning and leadership decision-making
- Continued investment in inclusive leadership, colleague networks and inclusive recruitment practices to support the attraction, retention and progression of women across the Bank.
We remain committed to creating an inclusive culture where everyone can thrive and to improving female representation across our leadership population through sustainable, long-term action.
Accreditations
