Barclays has ditched gender and ethnicity targets for US staff, making it the latest UK company to bow to Donald Trump’s anti-diversity drive.
Managers at the US arm of the British lender will no long have to consider how new hires and promotions advance the careers of women and people from minority ethnic backgrounds, who have traditionally been overlooked in the banking sector.
The bank’s chief executive, CS Venkatakrishnan, made the decision after a review, which started late last year, into its approach to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI).
A Barclays spokesperson said that the review was “still under way” and that “in the meantime, we have taken the decision to no longer have specific US representation ambitions. Our representation ambitions for the rest of the group will continue, and are being considered as part of the review.”
They added: “We remain committed to a culture which values inclusiveness and equality of opportunity across Barclays.”
The spokesperson clarified that the review, run by its head of DEI, Natalie Hattrell, began before Trump won the presidential election in November.
While Barclays had not set US-specific targets, its 11,600 US staff, including those in offices in New York, Nevada, New Jersey and Delaware, were expected to adhere to global targets. Those included the goal of 33% of director and managing director roles being held by women by the end of 2025. Staff from under-represented ethnicities were also due to make up 50% of those senior positions.
Barclays is maintaining targets for the rest of its roughly 91,260 global staff, including the 43,180 it employs in the UK.
Venkatakrishnan said in the memo, first reported by Bloomberg: “The group executive committee has been carefully considering the changed environment in the US. As a global organisation, we have always complied with the local requirements in the jurisdictions in which we have operated. In doing so, we have remained faithful to our workplace culture.”
The US rollback comes two months after Venkatakrishnan, who was born in India, told journalists that Barclays had an “enduring commitment to a culture of inclusivity in the bank. It’s enduring and unwavering”.
“If you want to get the very best people, by necessity, you get a very diverse workforce,” he said during a full-year earnings call in February. “We want to provide equality of opportunity, and we want to create that inclusive environment in which people really can shine, excel and contribute to this bank. So that’s our approach, and we will continue to run the business and run the company in that way.”
Trump used executive orders after returning to the White House in January to reverse DEI policies in the federal government. While the orders did not directly apply to the private sector, he called on companies to follow suit, and asked the US attorney general’s office to consider how the rules could be more widely enforced.
It started a wide-ranging reversal, with several large US corporations, including Walmart, McDonald’s, Ford and Amazon, announcing plans to scrap or scale back their DEI schemes.
Barclays is the latest UK company to drop some of its DEI targets, with others, such as the pharmaceutical company GSK, going as far as pausing diversity activities for UK workers.
Last month City regulators at the Bank of England and Financial Conduct Authority controversially announced they were not planning to introduce new diversity and inclusion rules for financial companies and would instead support “voluntary industry initiatives”.
