Ethnicity pay gap reports

Our vision is of a future where both people and the planet thrive. In order to achieve this, we need to ensure that everyone who works at the Museum feels they can thrive.

We are striving to create a workplace in which all people feel included and valued. As part of our journey towards greater equality, diversity and inclusion and we are voluntarily reporting our ethnicity pay gap for the fourth year.

Publishing is part of our commitment to making a difference and we think it’s important to demonstrate transparency in sharing the data. We know we have much to do to make change and are not complacent when faced with this data. Tackling this gap is at the heart of our Workforce Diversity Action plan.

The ethnicity pay gap explained

At the Natural History Museum, we pay people the same rate for doing the same job. We have a clear grading system which has recently been reviewed and which provides for roles to be paid equally.

The ethnicity pay gap shows the difference in the average hourly rate of pay between Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) and White employees, expressed as a percentage of average White staff earnings. This is calculated using the same calculation methodology as for gender pay gap reporting. 

Organisationally, we use the term 'marginalised ethnicities' when we talk about our people. We are mindful of the different trajectories and lived experiences of specific ethnic groups and want to avoid complacency in thinking of all individuals from marginalised ethnic groups as a collective but for this report we are unable to disaggregate the data into specific groups due to sample size.

To ensure the data is consistent for benchmarking purposes we are using the term BAME (Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic) but are aware of all the limitations of this term. Ethnic minorities includes White minorities such as Gypsy, Roma and Irish Traveller groups. 

Read more about our pay gap report from 2022 below, or download the report as a PDF.

Reporting our ethnicity pay gap

The below information is based on data from our latest pay gap report in April 2024.

Pay difference

The mean pay difference in hourly pay between Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) and White employees is 13.7% (up from 13% in 2023)

The median pay difference in hourly pay between Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) and White employees is 12.1% (up from 11% in 2023) 

Percentage of staff

We examined the percentage of Museum staff from a BAME background and split the data by hourly rates in four equal groups, or quartiles. Quartile 1 shows the lowest hourly rates and quartile 4 shows the highest.

Quartile 1 breakdown:

25.3% BAME

74.7% White

Quartile 2 breakdown:

14.4% BAME

85.6% White

Quartile 3 breakdown:

17.4% BAME

82.6% White

Quartile 4 breakdown:

10.5% BAME

89.5% White

The ethnicity split across the whole Museum in April 2024, was 16% BAME and 79.9% White, with 4.1% undeclared. 

We are a local, national, and international organisation so for benchmarking purposes we look at London and also England. 2021 Census data shows London has a population of 46% BAME (14% Black, 21% Asian, 6% Mixed and 6% other) and 54% White [1] . The overall population in England is 19% BAME (4.2% Black, 9.6% Asian, 3% Mixed, 2.2% Other) and 81% White.

Understanding our ethnicity pay gap

We can see in the quartile data (where we split employees into four groups based on hourly rate), that there is a larger percentage of staff from BAME backgrounds in the more junior rather than senior roles and our ethnicity pay gap is driven by this lack of representation. However, representation has been increasing across all four quartiles and in particular quartile two increased by 4% and quartile three increased by 3% since last year’s report. 

Taking action to reduce our ethnicity pay gap

Our 2024-2027 Diversity and Inclusion Workforce Action Plan has six key objectives which includes a focus on pathways to employment, broadening the diversity of our applicants, and enhancing our management and leadership capabilities. This work will continue to build on good practice as outlined in our previous reporting including: 

• Internal only recruitment targets. As staff from BAME backgrounds make up 25% of our overall roles in our lowest pay quartile, we have been concentrating on filling vacancies through internal recruitment wherever possible. This is not only to invest in our own staff but to give people more opportunity to develop their careers in more senior roles within the Museum. Last year over 50% of all our vacancies were filled by internal candidates.
• The introduction of an aspiring managers manager programme to upskill our staff in the lowest pay quartile to be able to move up the organisation more quickly when vacancies arise.
• Overall recruitment targets, based on the percentage of hires, which aim to tackle the overall lack of representation of staff from BAME backgrounds within the Museum. Last year 24.1 % of roles were filled by BAME candidates.
• Management training at every level to promote inclusive culture and practice
• The introduction of a new Learning Management System to enable all staff to easily access skills building courses with a focused career hub.
• A mentoring offer available to all staff to support with career development  

We know we have to do more to redress the imbalance we see in our workforce today. As we move forward, we will continue to embed and evolve all these areas of work. Other new initiatives for 24/25 include a Talent Acquisition programme with a focus on continuing to diversify our candidate pool and removing barriers to joining our workforce; and develop and implement data driven, local plans by department to drive an increase in diversity.

We also will continue the focus on our culture and working environment. We need to create inclusive cultures where people thrive. Ongoing education and learning opportunities underpin the activities in our action plan to build the inclusive environment in which the diversity and dignity of every individual is valued and recognised.