Liberté? Egalité? Opportunité!

Equality of opportunity is a priority at CERN. Since the Laboratory established an equal opportunities policy in 1996, some things have measurably changed for the better.
Equal opportunities means just that: no discrimination on any grounds whatsoever, whether gender, religion, ethnicity or sexual orientation, and this was the aim when CERN appointed its first equal opportunities officer, Sudeshna Datta-Cockerill, in 1996. From 1996 to 1998, the main objective of the equal opportunities policy was to improve awareness of the situation and the initiatives to be taken. At the end of 1998, an Equal Opportunities Advisory Panel, chaired by John Ellis, was appointed to support her efforts to avoid discrimination at CERN and to arbitrate apparent cases of discrimination at the Laboratory.

Their mission : accelerating equal opportunities at CERN. The Equal Opportunities Advisory Panel and the Equal Opportunities Officer around an accelerating module. From left to right : Michel Mayoud, Christine Petit-Jean-Genaz, the Equal Opportunities Officer Sudeshna Datta-Cockerill, Elena Wildner, Anne-Sylvie Cerne, Karl-Heinz Kissler, the Chairman John Ellis and Eva-Maria Groniger-Voss.

CERN is not working in a vacuum, but depends on the support of its Member States, which also take measures to ensure equality. This is also a priority of the European Union, which has noted that CERN does not occupy a leading place as far as the employment of women in prominent positions is concerned.
One of the Equal Opportunities Officer’s first aims was to ensure fairness of recruitment. One important step towards improving the gender balance at CERN in all job categories is to encourage women to apply for the jobs in the first place. Vacancy notices are now written in a gender neutral way, so as to avoid discrimination at the start. Then, once all the applications are in, efforts are made to ensure that the number of female candidates interviewed reflects the proportion of female applicants. Finally, all selection boards now contain both male and female members. In 1994, just 6.9% of candidates selected by CERN were women whereas 14% of job applications came from women. In 1999, 20% of applications came from women and 20% of new staff arriving were women. This progress was made without positive discrimination or quotas, simply by increasing awareness of the equality issue, and of course making sure that every post goes to the best person for the job. The result is striking: women civil engineers and accelerator operators are now a common sight around the Laboratory. What was unheard of yesterday is an everyday reality today.
But, although things have improved on the recruitment front, the Equal Opportunities officer’s job is far from done. For example, there’s monitoring of recruitment into the long-term complement, and then there’s the matter of career development. Once women have been recruited, do they enjoy the same career advancement as men?
Another aspect of the Equal Opportunities officer’s remit is the work environment. A healthy balance between work and family life is important to all of us, both men and women. This is one of the reasons why flexible working practices are now being encouraged.
And there is also the question of harassment, either sexual or moral. In a recently published administrative circular, the Laboratory spelled out its attitude to harassment, as developed by the Equal Opportunities Advisory Panel. The Organization considers any form of harassment to be totally unacceptable and treats it accordingly. But the CERN community needs to become more aware what constitutes offence to some, though it may be seen as nothing more than a joke by others, and what procedures the Laboratory has adopted to deal with possible cases as they arise.
The Equal Opportunities officer and her Advisory Panel have already addressed a number of cases of possible discrimination and harassment, including issues of handicap, nationality, and race as well as gender. Wherever possible, they try to resolve problems in an amicable way, avoiding disciplinary proceedings.
The establishment of an active Equal Opportunities policy and the appointment of an Officer to devote some 20% of her time to the question has already brought some rewards. As time goes on, we can hope that the personnel mix at CERN will become a more accurate reflection of a modern, multi-cultural society. What could be fairer than that?