Martyn Dicker

Martyn Dicker’s outstanding leadership and strategic impact have marked 2024 as a transformative year for UNICEF UK (UUK) and the wider charity sector. As Chair of the Charities HR Network, Martyn led its growth to a record 160 charity members, strengthened key commercial partnerships, and launched innovative initiatives—including a group for large charities—positioning the network to influence the future of charity people professionals.

Martyn’s achievements at UUK gained national recognition, including a feature interview in People Management. He spearheaded a flexible culture and advanced ambitious equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) efforts, publishing comprehensive pay gap reports six months ahead of schedule and improving key metrics like ethnicity pay gaps and minority representation.

Under his guidance, UUK’s people strategy played a pivotal role in achieving a record income of £161m and near-record employee engagement scores of 7.7/10. Martyn led a pay overhaul ensuring all roles reached market median, improving pay equity, transparency, and satisfaction by 15%, while reducing voluntary turnover to 10%.

As Programme Director for EDI, Martyn introduced a bold strategy focused on redistributing power, fostering inclusion, and external influence—resulting in a rise in colleagues from the Global Majority from 19% to 30%. He also championed wellbeing improvements, boosting wellbeing scores by 13% through capacity planning and prioritisation initiatives.

Martyn’s strategic approach to learning and development further raised skill satisfaction by 9%, making him an exemplary leader advancing both people and organisational excellence within UNICEF and beyond.