Recruitment and HR partner focused on diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I), The Responsible Resourcing Agency (RRA), has launched under Co-Founders Adele Bridgeman and Alison Filkin.

With pressure mounting on the industry over DE&I, the Responsible Resourcing Agency takes aims to focus on better representation and equality in the industry.

As a result, the agency aims to help large and small media, marketing and advertising companies tap into a richer talent pool and build welcoming and inclusive work environments that better reflect a diverse society.

The launch comes amid the broader media industry’s increasingly urgent struggle to meet its DE&I responsibilities and a rising clamour for employers to do far more to promote broader representation, retain talent and improve potential and existing employees’ sense of belonging, the company said.

This follows a new survey, which identified DE&I as the issue that would make the single greatest impact on young media professionals if leaders were to make it their top priority in 2024.

Meanwhile, almost one in seven global marketing and advertising staff claimed they would potentially leave the industry due to a lack of diversity, equity and inclusion – a figure that rises to one in six among women and LGBTQIA respondents, and one in five for ethnic minorities.

As well as recruitment services, RRA sets out with a mission to drive positive people practices across the whole employment experience – advising on employee relations, policy and procedure, wellbeing, employee engagement, training and development, and compliance.

Bridgeman said: “It’s proven that companies who are diverse and support inclusivity with the right programmes and equitable solutions will outperform their peers. RRA is a team of experts who help clients hire specialist and diverse talent across the media, marketing, digital, production, creative and sustainability sectors.”

Bridgeman has over ten years of industry experience. Before co-founding RRA, she spent three years at multimedia publisher, LADbible as a Talent Business Partner, heading up the recruitment and DE&I strategy globally, and previously held senior recruitment positions at The Marketing Store and GroupM where she helped launch their first and largest diversity and inclusion initiative and a UK-wide apprenticeship programme.

Filkin is a multi-sector HR Director with more than 20 years’ experience in HR, both as a consultant to small and large clients and as a corporate leader in global organisations such as Adecco and the worldwide team of planning and buying powerhouse Mindshare.

She said: “We understand that the expectations of our clients as employers, partners and suppliers are significant,

“They are expected to have a legally compliant, happy and diverse workforce, an inclusive environment, a sustainable business model and a purposeful business strategy, all whilst being commercially successful. That is a lot to deal with. We are here to uncomplicate the complicated, strengthening diversity, making business fit for progress and allowing them to focus on what they do best.”

Bridgeman concluded: “Responsible resourcing is what sets us apart. It’s a broad set of criteria, from finding the right talent and onboarding them to your business, to essential endeavours to ensure their HR and duty of care needs are met by your business. We love people and we are excited about creating and enabling teams that are fit for progress.”