The East and Southeast Asian Advancement Gap
How to recognise it, and where to begin.
East and Southeast Asian professionals are among the most likely to be hired and the least likely to be promoted. The research consistently rules out ambition and ability as the explanation.
This briefing sets out why the pattern stays hidden in UK reporting, what the gap is actually made of, and the one analysis that makes it visible inside your own organisation.
No sign up and no email required. 11 pages including references.
What is inside
Four things the briefing establishes.
Why your reporting will not show you this
UK ethnicity categories aggregate ESEA populations until the pattern averages away. Mandatory pay gap reporting will aggregate further, not less. The briefing shows what national data can and cannot tell you, including an analysis of manager to professional conversion derived from Census 2021.
What the gap is actually made of
Three components: perceived visibility, withheld feedback and absent sponsorship. They sit in different places and move on different timescales. Only one of the three sits inside a coaching room, and the briefing says so plainly.
Why it is hard to see, and harder to get recognised
It hides in aggregate data. It hides in feedback that reads as positive and gives the recipient nothing to act on. And it hides behind competence, because strong performers make a pipeline look healthy while promotions go elsewhere.
Where to begin
The evidence you need is your own promotion conversion by cohort, using data you already hold. The method is set out in the briefing and you can run it internally without giving me access to anything.
The reporting clock
There is a reason to start before the requirement lands.
On 25 March 2026 the government confirmed it will legislate for mandatory ethnicity and disability pay gap reporting for employers with 250 or more staff. Commentary from major firms puts realistic commencement no earlier than 2027.
Large employers will be required to publish action plans alongside the data. The published figure will not capture this gap, because ESEA populations in most UK firms are too small to report separately. The number will look unremarkable while the underlying pattern continues.
The action plan is where it becomes visible. Organisations that understand their own pipeline before the requirement commences will write those plans from evidence. The rest will write them from a single aggregated figure that does not show them where the problem is.
Who wrote it
Dr Jung Wing Wan spent 25 years in the pharmaceutical industry, rising to Global Regulatory Strategy Lead at companies including Bristol Myers Squibb, as a British Chinese professional in a Western corporate structure. He is an executive coach, speaker and author of the Amazon best seller Personal Mastery: A Leader's Guide to Finding Meaning and Fulfilment in the Modern World.
His original training is scientific, which is why this briefing is careful about what the evidence does and does not show, and plain about which parts of the gap coaching can and cannot move.
A first conversation
Start with your numbers, or start with a call.
The natural next step is a short exploratory call. How far the gap is already recognised internally, what you have tried, and what change you would most want to see. From there, a sensible first step becomes easy to define.
If you would rather start with your own numbers, the method is in the briefing and it needs nothing from me.