Why visible celebrations of inclusivity matter to real estate

COMMENT Freehold recently celebrated its 10th anniversary with a gala event at Jerwood Hall, LSO St Lukes, London. In addition to celebrating the milestone anniversary, the event acted as a fundraiser for LandAid, a youth homelessness charity that funds projects across the UK supporting young people at risk of homelessness, including LQBTQ+ projects like the Albert Kennedy Trust. After a long Covid-19-induced gap, it felt incredible to be at an in-person industry event again. Having not seen familiar faces for so long, it felt like a reunion in many ways. Celebrating the contribution that Freehold has made to the property industry’s LGBTQ+ community while benefiting an incredibly worthy charity in LandAid, made the evening particularly special for me personally as I’m a director of both organisations. As the UK’s leading networking forum for LGBTQ+ real estate professionals, Freehold has done incredible work over the past 10 years. Since March, when I joined the board, I’ve been able to see and participate in that world first-hand. Over the past decade, Freehold has grown from an idea sparked by a chance meeting between two industry professionals to a membership of more than a thousand. In that time, it has taken more than 50 professionals through its official mentorship programme and facilitated hundreds of informal mentorship chats. It has also had several board members named on industry lists, including the OUTstanding list of the 100 most influential LGBT+ executives and the EG Power List. For an industry that hasn’t historically been known for its diversity (traditionally being viewed as a bit of an old boys’ club for straight men from a middle-class background), Freehold has meant that LGBTQ+ property professionals know that they’re not alone, and that knowledge hopefully brings about the confidence to truly be themselves in the workplace. I think this is critical if the property industry is to properly serve its customer base. I know this from my professional life. More than 80m people of all shapes, sizes, colours, religions, and sexualities visit the two Westfields every year, and to ensure our centres are attractive to our diverse customer base, I need a team that reflects that diversity. Organisations like Freehold that promote inclusion within our industry, and events like Freehold 10 that visibly celebrate diversity will help attract a wider pool of talent to the property sector, and that in turn will make our industry stronger. The property sector contributes too much to the British economy and employs too many people for it not to be fully inclusive. There can be no doubt that the property space has come a long way in the past 10 years when it comes to inclusion and many of those gains are down to the hard work of organisations like Freehold. I look forward to seeing what gains we can help it make over the next 10. Scott Parsons is chief operating officer, UK, at Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield