DEI case study: IES supports The Care Quality Commission to tackle workforce inequalities at system scale
Context
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is the independent regulator of health and adult social care in England, overseeing a complex and highly diverse workforce across multiple sectors, including acute care, mental health, primary care and adult social care. As part of its statutory responsibilities, CQC wanted to deepen its understanding of workforce inequalities and discrimination across the sectors it regulates, and to consider how regulatory approaches could better support fairness, inclusion and workforce wellbeing.
The challenge
CQC sought to:
- Understand the systemic, organisational and interpersonal drivers of workforce inequalities
- Capture the lived experience of staff working across very different health and social care settings
- Develop an evidence-led picture of how inequalities manifest across protected characteristics and intersecting factors
- Translate insight into practical implications for regulation, inspection and sector improvement
The scale and sensitivity of the task required a robust, inclusive and analytically credible approach.
The IES approach
We led a large scale, mixed methods study designed to capture both breadth and depth of workforce experience. This included:
- Using an intersectionality informed conceptual framework to underpin study design
- A review of national and international evidence on workforce inequalities in health and social care
- Interviews with sector experts, trade bodies, and senior stakeholders
- A bespoke frontline Employee Voice survey, completed by over 800 staff working across all six CQC regulated sectors
- Employer case studies with NHS Trusts to explore effective practice in context
Findings were triangulated across data sources and sense checked with CQC inspectors and senior leaders to ensure relevance and robustness.
Impact
The research provided CQC with:
- A rich, evidence-based understanding of how workforce inequalities and exclusion are experienced at the system level
- Clear insight into the intersectional nature of discrimination, including the compounding effects of ethnicity, gender, health and employment conditions
- Practical recommendations to support regulatory thinking on fairness, rights and workforce inclusion
Client feedback:
“The team at IES were highly professional, responsive and clearly committed to delivering high quality work. Despite some challenges, they remained flexible and solution focused, ultimately producing a final report that was clear, insightful and tailored to our needs.”
Lucy Wilkinson, Deputy Director, Equity and Rights
Care Quality Commission
Like to know more?
Download our DEI services brochure and if you would like to speak to one of our DEI specialists do please drop Dr Meenakshi Krishnan a line: [email protected]
Further reading
Research
Tackling workforce inequalities in health and adult social care
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