Across 26 years in safeguarding and public service, including 15 years as a children’s social worker and the past decade coaching social workers of all levels, I have noticed something that should give our profession pause.

The stories vary but the themes rarely do.

A Global Majority student social worker wondering whether they are being ‘too sensitive’ after being repeatedly overlooked in placement discussions. A practitioner sitting on a concern because they have already been labelled ‘passionate’ (which, depending on tone, can mean a great many things). A team manager quietly questioning whether their voice carries the same weight in leadership spaces, despite holding significant responsibility.

Perhaps the most concerning pattern is seeing capable professionals begin to internalise difficult workplace experiences as personal inadequacy. This way of thinking rarely presents dramatically. More often, it sounds like: Maybe I'm overthinking it? Perhaps I should just get on with it? I don’t want to make this bigger than it is.

Workforce diversity and organisational pressures

Social workers are remarkably skilled at helping others name difficult experiences. We can be less generous when those experiences are our own.

This is not simply anecdotal.

As of 2025, Social Work England reported more than 104,000 registered social workers in England. Children’s workforce data shows that 27% of children and family social workers (where ethnicity is known) are from racialised backgrounds. Yet, workforce diversity does not automatically translate into equitable experience, progression or belonging. Particularly when many Global Majority professionals continue to describe barriers to visibility and leadership progression.

The wider workplace context is equally sobering. In 2026, research from the Trades Union Congress highlighted a sharp increase in explicit racism experienced by Black and racialised workers. Social work does not exist in a magical anti-racist bubble simply because our values suggest it should.

Children’s social work workforce data also reported around 7,000 vacancies in 2024, with a vacancy rate of 17.2%. When retention pressures are already significant, organisations cannot afford to overlook the emotional and cultural realities shaping staff experience.

This matters because social work does not run on policies, dashboards and case recording systems alone. It runs on judgement, reflection, emotional presence, confidence and relationships. When those begin to erode, systems and the communities we serve, feel it.

The importance of systemic change

Over the years, much of my response to these themes came through one-to-one coaching. Those spaces have been powerful. I have seen social workers rebuild confidence, navigate difficult workplace dynamics, prepare for leadership progression and reconnect with their professional identity.

However, I eventually reached an uncomfortable conclusion: coaching one social worker at a time would never be enough.

When the same themes emerge from students, practitioners, managers and senior leaders, the issue is no longer simply about individual resilience. It is about systems.

This is not merely about workload or generic wellbeing initiatives. Before anyone reaches for the wellbeing poster and fruit bowl budget, some Global Majority professionals are navigating something more complex: exclusion, microaggressions, hypervisibility, invisibility, stalled progression and the exhausting internal calculation of whether raising concerns is worth the personal cost.

That emotional labour rarely appears in workforce dashboards, yet it absolutely affects retention, wellbeing and leadership confidence.

What can be done to help?

The evidence is not particularly mysterious. Psychologically safe leadership matters. Restorative reflective supervision matters. Fair progression pathways matter. Organisations willing to have honest conversations about race, power, culture and belonging matter.

Not performatively. Consistently.

This thinking led me to create the Black & Diverse Safeguarding Professionals Conference & Awards (BDSC). Not because the sector needed ‘another’ event but because what I was hearing suggested something wider was needed: a psychologically safer professional space where workforce wellbeing, equity, leadership and belonging could be explored honestly.

The response has been telling. Our inaugural event welcomed over 100 safeguarding professionals. The following year, that grew to around 180, alongside expanded workshops, partnerships and cross-sector engagement.

That growth suggests a clear appetite for these conversations.

Encouragingly, this dialogue is not happening in isolation. This year’s BDSC event, taking place on 19 September, continues to bring together practitioners, leaders and organisations committed to exploring wellbeing and equity in the workforce and in practice. I’m pleased that Research in Practice will also be contributing to this year’s event as part of that wider professional conversation.

The bigger question for organisations is straightforward: are we creating workplaces where racialised social workers can thrive, or merely survive professionally?

If we are serious about retention, progression, leadership development and equitable practice this cannot remain a side conversation. It has to become core business. It has to become core business.