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User guide - Section 2
Drawn from the Code of Good Practice: Preparation, Implementation and Monitoring of Employment Equity Plans
| Phase 1 PREPARATION |
Phase 2 IMPLEMENTATION |
Phase 3 MONITORING |
| Step 1 Assign responsibility Step 2 Step 3 Step 4 |
Step 5 Corrective measures and objectives Step 6 Step 7 Step 8 |
Step 9 Monitor, evaluate, and review Step 10 |
The preparation phase contains the relevant steps that an employer need to take in order to produce an employment equity plan.
Step 1 : Assigning responsibility to one or more senior manager
The first step in the process is to assign responsibility for the development, implementation, and monitoring of the plan to one or more senior managers.
These managers should
and need
The assignment of responsibility does not relieve the employer of any responsibility imposed by the Act.
The assigned managers could be employed to manage employment equity only or could be managers who have been assigned this role as part of their other responsibilities.
Step 2 : Communication, awareness and training
This step should focus on positive outcomes such as
What should employees know?
All employees should
through a variety of methods which could include one or more of the following
What about managers?
Managers should
Step 3 : Consultation
Consultation should start as early as possible in the process
How should this happen?
A consultative forum should be established or an existing forum used if this is appropriate, for example, an existing diversity committee, affirmative action or employment equity forum.
Who should be included?
All stakeholders such as:
- Representative trade unions
- Employee representatives from
- Senior management, including the managers assigned with responsibility
What is proper consultation?
Proper consultation includes
Ongoing interaction with and accessibility to senior management with regard to employment equity issues is critical to the success of this process.
What would be considered relevant information?
Relevant information could include that relating to
Relevant information is not limited to information supplied by the employer. Employees may be in a position to provide employers with valuable information that could be considered in developing an employment equity plan.
How often should the consultative forum meet?
This will vary from employer to employer depending on size, sophistication, existing levels of diversity, and what has already been accomplished in the workplace with regard to employment equity. Meetings should, however, take place regularly and employers should allow time off for these meetings.
Step 4 : Conducting an analysis
Why an analysis?
For two reasons
Firstly, to assess all employment policies, practices, procedures, and the working environment in order to identify barriers that may
Secondly, to determine the extent of under-representation of employees from the designated groups in the different occupational categories and levels of the employer’s workforce.
a) Review of policies, practices and working conditions
What should be reviewed?
What to look for?
All practices should be checked to see if they are fair and do not result in unfair discrimination.
Discrimination can take the form of any distinction, exclusion or preference made on the basis of race, colour, sex, religion, political opinion, national extraction or social origin, which has the effect of reducing equality of opportunity or treatment in employment and occupations.
For example
Consideration should be given to whether pre-employment tests are based on competency sets generated through job analyses or whether they are tests which could be considered biased in favour of one or more groups?
Another example would be to monitor disciplinary action, to check whether there is consistency in the application among different groups of employees in the workplace.
b) Workforce Profile
How do you establish a workforce profile?
Firstly, by establishing which employees are members of designated groups.
Employers can do this by getting the information from employees themselves using form EEA1 of the Regulations, an example of which is included in Section 5 of the Guide.
If employers have alternative and reliable sources of this information, such as the information captured on employment application forms, they may use this as long as employees are able to verify or change such information.
Many larger employers will have this information stored on some form of computer system. While they will be able to use this information they will need some mechanism to enable employees to verify and change their personal details.
Secondly, by comparing the number of employees from designated groups with relevant demographics.
There are many sources of information that employers are able to use in order to do this.
At a more general level employers can look at the distribution of the economically active population in the regions in which they operate and compare this to the distribution of their workforce overall as well as by occupational category and level.
Demographic information is available from Statistics South Africa. Form EEA8 of the Regulations provides information relating to the distribution of the economically active population per province. Forms EEA8 and EEA9 of the regulations provide information regarding occupational levels and categories. Copies of all forms are included in Section 5 of this user’s guide.
The source and use of more specific information for comparative purposes will depend on the nature of the organisation and its activities. For instance, employers providing professional services will often be affiliated with related professional bodies who have access to information regarding the availability and source of specialised resources.
How do you establish meaningful comparisons?
There are a number of bases on which employers can benchmark their diversity profiles.
An employer can compare his workforce profile
Most employers are willing to share information on a reciprocal basis and there are a number of existing research services in which employers can participate in order to establish comparative information.
Meaningful comparisons are not once-off. After an employer has established a comparative position at a point in time, this should be reviewed on an ongoing basis and the changes tracked. Sections B and C of the report form EEA2, a copy of which is included in Section 5 of this booklet, are useful in establishing what information employers should collect and track over time.
The Commission for Employment Equity (CEE) is mandated by the Act to do research in order to develop norms and benchmarks for the setting of numerical goals.
The second phase contains all the steps that an employer needs to take to implement the employment equity plan
Step 5 : Setting objectives and formulating measures
How to go about setting goals and objectives?
The preparation done in phase one should provide employers with:
This information, together with their business plan, should enable employers to set realistic and achievable goals.
What are affirmative action measures?
Affirmative action measures are those measures that need to be taken to address those employment policies, practices, and working conditions that were identified in Step 4 as having an adverse effect on the employment and advancement of members of designated groups.
For each specific practice identified, an affirmative action measure or measures need to be formulated and developed.
Some examples are
Employers might also choose to develop pro-active measures as part of their social responsibility programmes such as
Corrective measures will differ from one organisation to another depending on the barriers identified.
Step 6 : Establishing a time frame
Duration of a plan?
As specified in the Act, the duration of a plan should be between one and five years. Employers should decide on the duration of their plans given their particular circumstances and the timeframe in which they can make meaningful progress.
The time frame should set out more than the duration of the plan. It should specify milestones and the target dates set for reaching these.
Before the end of the term for a current plan, an employer must prepare a subsequent plan.
Step 7 : Allocate Resources
What resources?
Step 8 : Communicate the plan
The plan should be communicated to all stakeholders.
What should this include?
Communication should inform stakeholders
Phase 3 contains the steps that an employer takes to monitor and review the implementation of the employment equity plan
Step 9 : Monitoring and evaluating the plan
What should employers do?
Employers should
Step 10 : Reporting to the Department of Labour
Section 3 of the guide deals with when and how to report to the Department and also deals with some frequently asked questions.