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Female promotions in energy and utilities increase by 25% in three years
26/2/2025
News
A new report from Energy & Utility Skills highlights both progress and ongoing challenges in improving equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) in the energy and utilities sector workforce.
The Inclusion Measurement Framework 2024 marks the company’s fifth year of tracking diversity characteristics, workforce trends and leadership representation.
Among the report’s key findings on gender representation, promotions of women have increased from 26% to 33% over three years. However, they now only make up just 28% of the workforce – a slight decline from last year. Meanwhile, ethnic minority representation remains low at 7% of leadership roles, despite recruitment rates exceeding their current workforce proportion.
The workforce is also found to be ageing. With 20% of employees nearing retirement, ‘workforce renewal is crucial’, says the study.
The report also notes that the 26–35 age group ‘continues to see the highest turnover since 2021’.
Looking at disability and social mobility, the study found that just 3.4% of employees in the energy and utilities sector have declared a disability, compared to 18% in the wider UK workforce. There are also ‘concerns about limited socio-economic diversity in leadership’.
In addition, the study found that 98% of leaders report understanding their role in promoting EDI, although ‘challenges remain in attracting diverse candidates to senior roles’.
The report outlines a number of recommendations for the sector, including:
- Better retention strategies, including improved exit interviews
- Transparent recruitment monitoring, particularly for ethnic minority applicants
- Greater leadership diversity, with structured pathways for progression
- Collaboration across organisations to share best practices.
‘With over 200,000 new roles needed by 2030 to meet net zero and energy security targets, fostering an inclusive workforce is essential,’ says Energy & Utility Skills.
Click here to read more about how the energy industry needs to move at twice its current speed to reach a target of 40% of women on boards by 2030, a target set by campaigning organisation POWERful Women (PfW). PfW is a professional initiative working to achieve a gender-balanced, diverse and inclusive energy sector in the UK to meet the needs of a net zero future. It is supported by the Energy Institute.
