Move On Up

Aims: to help to address under-representation of black and minority ethnic professionals in the audiovisual sector by focussing on a key issue – lack of contacts and access to networks, in a contacts-driven industry.

Overview of Project: A series of three events over 18 months scheduling one to one meetings between BME professionals and industry executives in the hope that in the long run the new contacts will lead to contracts and opportunities that they otherwise might have missed.

Funded principally by the Equal Fund through the AudioVisual Entrepreneurship Development Partnership (a partnership led by Skillset and the UK Film Council); BECTU; the London Development Agency’s Creative London and Diversity Works programmes, the BBC, North West Vision, RadioCentre and the TUC.

Each event works by building a successful partnership with industry organisations and companies. For each event a line-up of more than 60 executives is put together by the partnership and BME professionals – everyone from new entrants to BAFTA winners – are invited to apply for a one-to one meeting with any of them. All applications with accompanying CVs are sent to the appropriate executive. Each executive decides who they will see on the day. BECTU draws up a schedule of  20-minute meetings for each executive, and every executive and BME professional receives their personal timetable of meetings.

In addition, the participating companies and organisations are invited to organise workshops on a range of professional matters, eg writers workshop, BBC commissioners’ workshop, pitching, how to get your idea onto the screen, the interactive dimension, CV workshop.

Research carried out in advance of project / during project: A pilot event took place in November 2003 at which 530 meetings were seheduled between 230 BME professionals and nearly 100 executives from film and television primarily in London. This successful evcnt demonstrated that there was a demand from both industry and BME professionals for this type of initiative.

Prior to each event in the new programme:
Statistical research on BME representation in relevant industrial sector.
Research to find new routes to reach the greatest number of BME professionals in relevant sector

Benefits to individuals / Organisations concerned: Each applicant has their CV sent in advance to every executive they apply to see and if selected they get their undivided attention for 20 minutes.

By January 2007 BECTU’s Move on Up programme had facilitated over 1,000 new personal contacts between 300 BME professionals and 150 executives over the two events.

Manchester, February 2007, Move on Up North, for film and television primarily in the north of England: 430 one to one meetings between over 100 BME film and television professionals and nearly 70 executives.

London, October 2006, Move on Up in Radio: 678 meetings between 200 BME professionals and 80 executives.

Some BME professionals have obtained jobs directly as a result of Move on Up contacts. Eg an unemployed TV producer went on to produce a two-part programme for ITV and then became series producer for a BBC network television series. A technician landed a job on Holby City. A camera technician was offered shadowing on Coronation Street. Another producer got a contract at the BBC developing a drama series. BME individual writers and producers and small minority ethnic-led companies have taken contacts forward and are working on or discussing projects with big independent production companies and broadcasters. A writer is being considered for joining the writing team for a drama series. An equipment hire company has put a camera technician on its books for hiring with their equipment.

Many participants have reported that executives have asked for further meetings.

However, another benefit is that these events engage key executives – those with the power to hire or commission –  with the issue of diversity, empowering them to take forward their own initiatives not merely with those they met but new activities inspired by their experience.

These events have helped to demolish widely-held misconceptions; for example they have demonstrated the presence in the industry of  many highly talented and experienced BME professionals, and that people’s ethnicity is not an indicator of the areas they seek to specialise in and such limiting assumptions should not be made.

The RNIB and the BCIDN had expressed interest in Move on Up and RNIB was our guest  at our second event. They are now actively planning a similar event in October for people with disabilities who are working/are interested in working in the audiovisual industry. BECTU is assisting and advising.

Key lessons learnt: Many talented, highly qualified BME professionals have far less access to crucial career-critical information than was hitherto imagined. BECTU has made changes to its model to address this.

The most effective way to address under-representation of BME professionals would be more widespread use of fair employment practices, eg advertising vacancies widely, and ending the unlawful practice of employing people for no pay.

Move on Up has shown that engaging individual executives – those with hiring and/or commissioning responsibilities – with the issue is crucial in successfully addressing under-representation and we have found a great deal of goodwill on the part of many in this regard.

 Under-representation is so severe in some areas (eg virtually 0% in SFX, 2.7% in camera, according to Skillset research) that it cannot be addressed without longterm strategic action in schools and those universities and screen academies that bring new talent into the industry, finding ways to prevent BME new entrants from dropping out, and in some cases perhaps looking at other industries that employ BME workers with transferable skills.

Such is the scale of intervention that is required, government funding is woefully inadequate and there are deficiencies in current equality law that are actually making it more difficult for some diversity initiatives to succeed.

Move on Up also leads us to conclude that when the unions and companies work together on diversity far more is achieved than working separately. Accordingly the policy of the Trades Union Congress is that the government should establish a Union Diversity Fund to which unions can apply in partnership with employers for funding for substantial interventions to address under-representation.

Further info / Links:  Contact Janice Turner on 020 7346 0900; jturner@bectu.org.uk