Coalition of Media and Creative People Form Charter to Improve Diversity at Advertising Events

A coalition of figures from the media and creative industries have joined forces to create a charter and certification designed to improve diversity and inclusion at advertising conferences and events.

Diversity and Inclusion at Conferences and Events (Dice) has launched with a 10 point charter laying out how event organisers can promote inclusivity, avoid tokenism and finally banish all-white male panels (or "manels") by 2021. Based on the 2010 UK Equality Act, the charter looks to help those producing industry events to "prioritise an inclusive approach from the outset". Event managers can submit their agenda to receive an official Dice certification.

The charter covers three elements: line-up, content and marketing. Within this there are guidelines around race, age, gender, class, disability and neurodiversity, in addition to the accessibility of venues. The action plan will be supported by limited free consultations with organisers when necessary.

The Dice team is made up of: Amy Kean, head of strategic innovation and creativity at Starcom; Seb Joseph, brands editor at Digiday UK; James Whatley, strategy partner at Digitas UK; Nicola Kemp, managing editor of Bite at Creativebrief; Alex Tait, chief exec of marketing consultancy Entropy; and Faisal Ahmed, director of innovation and business transformation at Sudler London.

Diversity has become a major issue for event organisers after the CES was called out in 2018 for announcing an all male keynote speaker lineup, compounded by a later protest that adding more female voices would be a "challenge". Elsewhere, Dmexco faced criticism in 2019 for hosting 19 all-male panels. Despite such high-profile missteps, the issue of diversity remains a live one with major gatherings such as the World Economic Forum in Davos accused of elitism.