Inclusive working environments for all: what can we learn from Norway?
The high levels of social distance towards certain groups, the still toxic working environment and the lack of knowledge about equal opportunities encourage people to look abroad for good examples. This is why the Diversity Charter, in cooperation with the KUN Centre for Equality and Diversity, met with organisations in Norway to share their experiences on how to create an open and inclusive working environment. Key insights from the 11 meetings:
✔️Norvegija collects data on citizens and their experiences of accessing public services. The data shows that the LGBT+ community is more likely to experience discrimination and the quality of services they receive is lower. Oslo City Council and other institutions are updating their action plans and working on how to change this. Although Norway has a GDPR, this does not prevent them from collecting data on citizens’ sexual orientation and gender identity if they agree to share it. Thanks to Statistics Norway for these insights;
✔️projektuojant buildings, offices, logos, websites and anything else about inclusion needs to be thought about from the start. Correcting mistakes and adapting services afterwards becomes very difficult and expensive. We are pleased that the Charter has taken the first steps towards accessibility and has updated its website in line with the recommendations of the Lithuanian Association of the Blind and Partially Sighted.
✔️su children can and should talk about sexuality, and in Norway Pride also includes Pride for Kids, which involves several thousand children and often involves the whole kindergarten;
✔️įmonės states that it provides equal opportunities for all, but employees’ experiences often do not match the companies’ representations. We see this in Lithuania as well, but it is good to see that there is more and more interest in change both in Norway and here in Lithuania.
We are grateful to the Open Lithuania Foundation for this opportunity to visit the institutions and to learn from them. They support our project “An inclusive and open working environment for all: what can we learn from Norway?”, which is part of the Active Citizens Foundation funded by the EEA Financial Mechanism.
