Joanne Lockwood: Hello, everyone. My name is Joanne Lockwood, and I am your host for
Joanne Lockwood: the Inclusion Bites podcast. In this series, have been
Joanne Lockwood: interviewing a number of amazing people as simply having a
Joanne Lockwood: conversation around the subject of inclusion, belonging, I'm generally
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Joanne Lockwood: grab a decaf, and let's get going.
Joanne Lockwood: Today is episode 30 with the title.
Joanne Lockwood: Personal is political and how silence speaks.
Joanne Lockwood: I have the absolute honor and privilege to be joined by professor, Laura
Joanne Lockwood: So an OBE. Laura describes herself as
Joanne Lockwood: a black woman, nurse, academic and queen.
Joanne Lockwood: When I asked Laura to describe her superpower, she said, it
Joanne Lockwood: is my story of self embracing silences and silos
Joanne Lockwood: about inclusion. Hello, Laura. Welcome to the
Joanne Lockwood: show. Hello, Gerard. That was a wonderful introduction.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And, yeah, it's been a while. We've been waiting to speak, so I'm really looking
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: forward to it. I've got my decaf, so, I'm ready to go.
Joanne Lockwood: Brilliant. Wow. Yes. We have we've planned this
Joanne Lockwood: months ago, didn't we?
Joanne Lockwood: Tell me about personalist political and how silent
Joanne Lockwood: speaks. What does that mean to you? Wellbeing I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: don't know if you've heard the phrase person as political before. It comes
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: from, a really well known book, the women's room.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Now I read that book when I was 7, believe it or not, for the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: first time, and I kind of remember stopping at that phrase and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: thinking, what does that mean? And I didn't really understand it.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And I reread the book when I was seventeen. So 10 years later,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and those words just kind of pow, kind of hit me.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And what I realized was that what it
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: really meant was that the things that happened to me,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: which up to that point, I just thought, oh, well, that's happened to you, Laurel.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: That might happen to one you know, but it's just a thing that's happened.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I've realized that those experiences, particularly
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: around inclusion or around feeling left out or
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: around not being given an equal chance
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: were actually what politics was about.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And I know people think about politics in terms of, you know, which party do
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you vote for, etcetera, etcetera. But for me,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: politics in a in a kind of social sense is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: about distribution of resources, who gets what, who
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: counts, whose experience is promoted, and whose
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: experience is kind of maybe even vilified. So the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: politics of living and the politics Wellbeing
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: with diff ourselves is really what counts.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: So the my personal experiences, our personal experiences,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: are the political point. So the personal is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: political. That's what counts. So in my experience, yours,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and what happens to me is not just me. It is really a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: reflection of our world, I suppose, and and where we live.
Joanne Lockwood: Well, yeah, I just, as you're speaking, I'm just reflecting on this.
Joanne Lockwood: Storytelling is so powerful, isn't it? They are listening to people's
Joanne Lockwood: lived experience. It creates that empathy bridge. It
Joanne Lockwood: allows us to what's I can never understand what it's like to be you. What
Joanne Lockwood: I can do is take your your story and try and relate it into
Joanne Lockwood: language that I can understand. Yeah. Absolutely. I mean,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I I say to me that is my superpower, as you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: mentioned, at the beginning, and it's all our superpowers, is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that we are the we are 100%
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the experts on our own life. We don't need to, you know, we don't
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: need other people. Other people can comment. They may influence.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: They may affect. But we are the expert because even
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: when we all experience the same thing, we're all in the same
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: situation. We all see and feel something
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: different. And so that story, my
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: story, the story within me is not only my
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: superpower, but it's knowledge that only I have,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and it's really, really important, I think, to hear
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: stories of each other to share stories. It's it's how it's what makes us
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: human, isn't it? It's how we learn. It's how we become the people
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we are through stories. I love
Joanne Lockwood: that. We are our own expert. I love that. It's a great, great, great sound
Joanne Lockwood: bite. And they're so true because when I some of the
Joanne Lockwood: training I do. I talk about the equation, e plus r
Joanne Lockwood: equals o. So e as an event, something occurs.
Joanne Lockwood: Yes. The r is our reaction to that event, and that
Joanne Lockwood: leads to an outcome. But what we often get is the plus is
Joanne Lockwood: our perspective, our lived experience,
Joanne Lockwood: ourselves bringing into our our narrative or
Joanne Lockwood: our view of that event which -- Yeah. -- so different people see the
Joanne Lockwood: same event. These are different reaction and therefore a different
Joanne Lockwood: outcome. And we often forget to understand
Joanne Lockwood: someone's lived experience as to why they think react or perceive
Joanne Lockwood: differently because we're so focused on the outcome, not how we get there.
Joanne Lockwood: Yes. That's why the stories are so important, isn't it? Absolutely. I mean, we
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: see it every day. I mean, when we watch the news, you know, when they
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: have eyewitness reports, The eyewitness reports are always slightly
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: different, which kinda makes you think, oh, how can that be? Because if
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: everybody saw the same thing at the same time, How
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: can the stories be slightly different? But, of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: course, what just as you've said, what we forget is that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: what you see depends on who's looking.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Where you're standing? And where you're standing relative to that. Well, you have
Joanne Lockwood: stood in the past. Yeah. Your history. Exactly. Your socialization. You're
Joanne Lockwood: upbringing. Your what's what makes you happy, what makes
Joanne Lockwood: you sad is a is a good influence on on your reaction as well as
Joanne Lockwood: not. Yeah. I mean, it's almost you know, the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the wonder of the mind is is fabulous,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and it's almost instantaneous that whatever we, as
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we speak, it's filtered, even without us knowing it's filtered
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: through our experience. It's filtered through our expectation.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And it's filtered through how it feels to be in that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: moment. So it's already
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: our interpretation of events is already
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: immediately interpreted by ourselves.
Joanne Lockwood: And this is where we phase into unconscious bias it
Joanne Lockwood: plays into that whole set
Joanne Lockwood: perspective is also a type of bias, isn't it? Because we it's our
Joanne Lockwood: fast brain, we discuss straight into memory, fill in
Joanne Lockwood: gaps, make assumptions, etcetera,
Joanne Lockwood: etcetera. And this all comes from our perspective, our lived experience. Isn't
Joanne Lockwood: it? It does. It comes from our lived experience, but
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: also I think as as we are social beings,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: our lived experiences also affected by the people around us.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And their reaction as well. So almost immediately, we're using our
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: own experience, but we're we're also checking it out
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: around. I mean, I don't know if if you've ever been in in a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: situation where an accident has happened, and I don't mean there's something
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: catastrophic. It can be something even as a small child, it it could be
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: something that's easier as, you know, something getting knocked over, you know, or
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: broken. Almost immediately where we've got the shock
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: of looking at it. And then we look at each other. We're looking to see
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: how other people are reacting. So we we look for that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: kind of community of reaction as well, which
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: which is really important. Kind of that group think
Joanne Lockwood: sometimes that if you're not careful, isn't it? Yes. It's
Joanne Lockwood: I mean, I I offer the only other thing I I'm very conscious of is
Joanne Lockwood: when we live in our in our tribe, our group, our
Joanne Lockwood: socialized circle, our echo chamber. Yes.
Joanne Lockwood: We have this in intent need to belong to this group. We
Joanne Lockwood: wanna feel part of something. And often our views
Joanne Lockwood: are merged into the groups. Yes. So we find it very
Joanne Lockwood: difficult to have our own individualistic opinion for fear
Joanne Lockwood: of shunning or ostracization from the group. You know, I'm I
Joanne Lockwood: often talk about if you're a man in IT supporter and a
Joanne Lockwood: lovable supporter, you have you almost implied that you have to have a
Joanne Lockwood: rivalry And then you can't almost you can't, you know, allow to
Joanne Lockwood: acknowledge something great about the opposition.
Joanne Lockwood: Despite the fact that you may want to, but because your group, your tribe,
Joanne Lockwood: unleashes you back into this conformity box, or you'll be
Joanne Lockwood: kicked out and and into the world on this. And I think we could be
Joanne Lockwood: very careful sometimes that are what we use for safety in our groups and
Joanne Lockwood: our our our our family units or wherever that may be could often
Joanne Lockwood: reinforce biases or perspectives that maybe we're
Joanne Lockwood: not, we're a bit worried about breaking out of.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Yeah. Because I think part of it is that there's an issue of personal
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: safety that people feel, and that comes along with feeling
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: accepted. So I think often when we're in a group situation, and we certainly
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: see this, don't we work? We see it with with groups of people of all
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: different ages that we we're we're kind of trying to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: check out, am I accepted
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: immediately? And if not, what do I need to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: do? To make myself accepted or what
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: needs to happen in order for me to be accepted. And that's part of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the kind of, I suppose, unconscious way in which
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we we we measure our position within a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: group. We we're kind of trying to we're trying to position ourselves. We're
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: trying to locate ourselves in a particular situation.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And that happens, you know, at home as well as at work.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: We look for clues that that will help us to see
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: whether we are accepted or will be accepted within
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: this group. And that's
Joanne Lockwood: where the belongingness, the inclusion,
Joanne Lockwood: bringing your whole self to the group, if you like, so that you know what
Joanne Lockwood: you can bring, what you can't bring, what opinions are good opinions, what's outer
Joanne Lockwood: kilter of the group. Yes. So all that social dynamic occurs, isn't
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Yes. It does. And and, you know, I think that I don't know about
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you, but certainly in my experience as as a as a black woman sometimes in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: those groups is that something may not necessarily
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: strike me, around race and ethnicity, let's say,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: particularly about our conversation. But because I'm aware
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: of my position, I do feel a sense of responsibility
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: to raise that issue. It may not be my issue personally, but I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: feel that if I'm not in the group who if I'm the only one in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the group, who else is going to raise that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that point or give that different opinion.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And I don't know, as I say, sometimes it's quite difficult because people can
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: often assume that because I raise something, it's my issue personally, and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: it isn't necessarily my issue personally, but it is an
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: issue that may affect my tribe or my group?
Joanne Lockwood: Oh, I I had this kind of debate yesterday on Facebook as it happened.
Joanne Lockwood: And I was trying to get across the difference between something that
Joanne Lockwood: is offensive and that I wasn't
Joanne Lockwood: offended. So I wasn't personally offended, but it was
Joanne Lockwood: an offensive remark. Yes. And
Joanne Lockwood: it wasn't about me, but it was about the perception of this topic.
Joanne Lockwood: The other people I know would find that conversation offensive,
Joanne Lockwood: although I'm hardened to it, and I don't find I'm not offended by myself,
Joanne Lockwood: but I know it's not a good conversation to have.
Joanne Lockwood: And Someone's almost calling me, you know,
Joanne Lockwood: calling me out as a snowflake or a politically correct person than trying
Joanne Lockwood: to whatever. And and and telling me I was offended. I
Joanne Lockwood: said, oh, I'm not offended. I'm just pointing out that what you're talking about is
Joanne Lockwood: potentially offensive to somebody. And that all I'm asking you to do is
Joanne Lockwood: consider who may be listening or watching and
Joanne Lockwood: that that's the impression you may give. And it was really
Joanne Lockwood: hard to get across the difference between how I feel
Joanne Lockwood: and and what is being perceived as.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Yeah. I I I think that that's something that we that's been around for a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: long time, and it's quite difficult, because I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: think when you occupy a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: when you visibly occupy a minority position, okay,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: so it's not something you can avoid you know, because people will know, you know,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: even if you say nothing, even if the conversation's not about that, you know, even
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: if you're in Tesco doing your shopping or whatever, you know, it's, you know,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you it's with you all the time. It's not something you can
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: choose to take off or put back on. When you're in that position,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And people there often assume, and I I I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know I've had this, that people assume that every
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: conversation that relates to the thing that you are visibly
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: part of is actually your your battle.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: So, you know, an experience tells me that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I also filter that. So I filter that as to whether or not to say
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: something, and that's where the the the the challenge comes
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: about being offended by something
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and and knowing something is offensive or has
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the potential to cause offense And it also happens, I think,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: with, you know, friends and and members of my family who are
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: not member of the same visible minorities as as
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: myself, that people have said to them, when they've raised
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: an issue, say, about race and ethnicity, if they're not, black or
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: minority ethnic themselves, they'll say, well, why do you care? You know, it's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: almost like there there is a we we we reach a situation where who
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: has the right or who the right all the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: responsibility to raise an issue has been to be offended. And, actually,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that is that's always a really tricky one, isn't it?
Joanne Lockwood: I I mean, it's often said that to be offended as a privilege, most
Joanne Lockwood: people don't have the privilege Wellbeing offended that they just are, if you
Joanne Lockwood: like, or choose whether to be offended or not. And you're
Joanne Lockwood: right, so right about just being you sometimes,
Joanne Lockwood: you feel this obligation to represent and be
Joanne Lockwood: a role model for whatever your characteristic may be.
Joanne Lockwood: And that could be quite exhausting. It is. Because you you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: can't you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: can't choose not to be. But there's always a sense of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: responsibility as well. And I and I say I do I do it's a it's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: a it's a tight rope. That I think
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that I learned to walk because I, you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, buy, by a whole range of of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: situations, some due to my own direct efforts, some due to being in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the right place at the right time, some due to circumstance, some due
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: to to some good allieship by people who did not look
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: like me. I have I am in a position where I am in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: spaces where there are not many people like me or with my particular
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: social background or experience, etcetera. So there is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: some responsibility when you're in those spaces to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: say the things that have to be said to have those disruptive
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: conversations and those challenging conversations,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: but it but it is a responsibility that you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: carry and you and learning to live with that is kind of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: part of the personal political balance.
Joanne Lockwood: As you're thinking, thinking that, I'm just thinking, I often say that I I've kind
Joanne Lockwood: of cheated because I'm professionally trans
Joanne Lockwood: whatever better way of putting it. Whilst I don't always talk
Joanne Lockwood: about that as my primary conversation, it's
Joanne Lockwood: part of who I am. It's my It's my Wellbeing to the
Joanne Lockwood: conversation is my that lived experience. And I can't take
Joanne Lockwood: it off. I don't hide it a bit. So I I
Joanne Lockwood: own it. But it means that I can, I have a privilege that
Joanne Lockwood: because I'm professionally my personality, I don't have
Joanne Lockwood: to hide any part of me because that's what people are expecting? And I have
Joanne Lockwood: a lot of empathy for people who are
Joanne Lockwood: a Java programmer, a, as an accountant, whoever,
Joanne Lockwood: who have the same characteristic as myself, a lot of people, and they just
Joanne Lockwood: want to be a great accountant. They don't want to be professionally
Joanne Lockwood: trans or black or whatever. They wanna be an accountant.
Joanne Lockwood: So I feel like I kinda cheat sometimes because I'm allowed to be
Joanne Lockwood: me because that's what I do. And I don't have I don't
Joanne Lockwood: have the same battle as somebody who wants to be the accountant first.
Joanne Lockwood: But at weekends, I wanna be able to take my professional
Joanne Lockwood: hat off and just go back to being the Sainsbury
Joanne Lockwood: shopper, you know, go back to my day job of being a human
Joanne Lockwood: being. And that's where I find sometimes my shield
Joanne Lockwood: of armor is let down. I want vulnerable
Joanne Lockwood: I'm now back to the world of of the accountant trying to be an accountant.
Joanne Lockwood: I'm the Sainsbury shopper trying to be a Sainsbury shopper, and that's where I feel
Joanne Lockwood: -- Yeah. -- defenseless sometimes because I don't have my
Joanne Lockwood: my my my my professional armor around me. Professional
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: armor. Yeah. Yeah. But I but I I would actually I mean, I think
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I would I challenge that in a in a way
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: because I just think it's a it's a different challenge.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: It's a different challenge. It's not it's not less what is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: different. And, you know, very much, you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, inclusion and diversity is around
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: equal, but different. So recognizing the difference, but seniors are just a different way of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: being. And
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I know what you mean. So, for example, when I go to when I go
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: to the shops, whatever, I mean, you know, I tell I'm a black woman doing
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: a shopping, you know, a middle aged black woman doing a shopping, you know, and,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I noticed different things. So, for example, when I was a lot
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: younger, if I was walking down the road and there'd be a group
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: of young, young working class
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: men of whatever group, you know, black, white, whatever, they're all crowded on
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: floor as a young woman walking past you know, they'd have a look at you.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: They, you know, they probably would they probably wouldn't step out of the way so
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that you'd have to work your way through so they can slow your path
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and I would walk towards them thinking, oh, what's gonna happen
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: now. Okay? As a fifty seven year old woman walk
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: in the same street, I walk down the road, and they all step off the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: pavement. Now I don't know. Now I know that's politeness. You know, they but,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: obviously, they're looking at me and thinking this could be my mother or even possibly
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: my grandmother. So I'm I'm no longer in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: this fear of having to create a reaction. I'm just, you know, oh, you're
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: right. Oh, and they nod And, you know, even though they might be, you know,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: being a bit boistery, sure that they tend to walk and let me go past.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And if if somebody in their group doesn't move, they'll say, move. And
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: move them along. So there's something about we are differently
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: presented and challenged, but on the other hand, professionally,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: as you say, when I turn up and I'm doing a presentation or I'm doing
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: a talk, they know what they're getting. So they're expecting a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: politically astute politically aware, black
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: woman to talk about inclusion and diversity, and they
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: they they filter me differently. And I think that's what
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: it is, but you're you're vulnerable. So my vulnerability, I feel more in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the professional space if people are not expecting me,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: to look like I am. And that's the thing, isn't it? It's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: if the if if if I'm going to a meeting and it's not about inclusion
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and diversity, it's about something else. People may have spoken to me
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: on the phone. They hear my voice. I'm not necessarily what they're expecting to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: walk through doing. I've actually had people say, oh, You weren't what we were expecting.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I don't know if you've had that, but they let you think, oh, you're actually
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: saying that out loud, you know, or do you can you hear yourself?
Joanne Lockwood: Yes. I've had some face similar because because the two sides of the work I
Joanne Lockwood: do, some of it is around trans awareness, LGBTQ plus.
Joanne Lockwood: But a lot of the work I do is around more generic inclusion
Joanne Lockwood: belonging. I don't want it. I do focus
Joanne Lockwood: groups, interviews, facilitated workshops, those sort of things.
Joanne Lockwood: And I don't sign post anything about me other
Joanne Lockwood: than Joanne Lockwood, inclusion, plumbing specialists. So I
Joanne Lockwood: I have, I mean, I stood up on stage in front of six hundred
Joanne Lockwood: people, And I know people are gonna go, well,
Joanne Lockwood: as soon as I start speaking, because my voice -- Yes. -- is not congruent
Joanne Lockwood: with my with my visual image. And I know that's part of my
Joanne Lockwood: reaction power, if you like, to throw that and land
Joanne Lockwood: at the beginning and own the room and get people to look back and go,
Joanne Lockwood: oh, that wasn't expected. But I've I've run training sessions,
Joanne Lockwood: recently for a European network, and they they do evaluation
Joanne Lockwood: forms at the end. And and I've I've run run this this this event twice.
Joanne Lockwood: And twice, I've had a common comment on the evaluation form saying, I really
Joanne Lockwood: confuse why Joanne's voice it doesn't fit with
Joanne Lockwood: how she looks, and that people are actually remarked about it. Do you
Joanne Lockwood: think there weren't so worried about my content. There were just there were just
Joanne Lockwood: confused by my voice. It's like, oh, well. It's the way it
Joanne Lockwood: is. Yes. Well, exactly. And that and that's the thing. So I think that the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: point you're making about being Chad, I think we're we're differently
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: challenged different spaces. I was speaking, I remember,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: having a conversation with my partner, And, you know, he
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: he's white, he's English, you know, Yorkshire born and bred, you know, all the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: rest of it. And for him, he he
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: notices, I'm his first black partner.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: So he he notices now things that I don't notice. So
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: he'll go not so much now with years down the line, but he at the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: beginning, he would say, well, people are looking at us. I've gone, yeah, they'll
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: lockwood for him, he couldn't understand why they're looking at us? You
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, it's because he's not had that within his experience.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Now he has that. Now he says, I just look at him straight back, but,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you know, before he was slightly confused, and it just shows that,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: sometimes we're with our friends, and our colleagues. And this happens at
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: work. It happens in different places where, you know, they're sometimes
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: more likely to hear some of the negative comments than we
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: are because people have some kind. Most people have a filter week saying, well,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: actually, I'm not going to directly address this with Joanna. I'm
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: not directly gonna talk about this with Laura because I really like them because
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I'm I might be on steady ground, but
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: they might speak to our colleagues, our peers, our families, our
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: partners, because unless they
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: out themselves as being related to us or working with
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: us, people don't know. And they're kind of thinking, often
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: thinking, At what point do I say I'm offended, or what point do I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: say my partner's black, or what point do I say my partner's trans, or what
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: point do I say? You know, you know, my mother or
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: my father or what? At what point do I do I say? Cause they
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: haven't got that obvious if you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: like safety that that will allow people to think
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: twice before they say things to them, and how do they cope with that? And
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that's often something I get asked. That's really
Joanne Lockwood: interesting because I've got a good friend who shared with me about probably
Joanne Lockwood: about a year ago that people kept coming up to him. And saying
Joanne Lockwood: asking questions about me, you know, how should I talk to Joe, this, Joe, that,
Joanne Lockwood: Joe, and he just just don't wanna say, Why didn't you ask
Joanne Lockwood: Joe? Yes. You don't ask me. I'm not Joe's
Joanne Lockwood: agent, you know, kind of a champ and Joe. And, but sometimes, I
Joanne Lockwood: guess our friends often get put in the
Joanne Lockwood: position where people go to them because they don't people don't wanna maybe offend
Joanne Lockwood: us or they wanna yeah, they don't wanna
Joanne Lockwood: show their anxiety to us. So, yeah, it's quite interesting. Well, I was gonna say
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: sometimes sometimes people are, with good intention
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: if it's not within this sphere of experience either directly
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: or indirectly, they really just don't wanna get it wrong.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: It's, you know, that's I think that is probably the the major driver. They
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: don't know how, you know, how to do it. So they
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: go to somebody who they assume or they see
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: seems to do it okay. And so I think that's one of the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: good one of the key things I would say around kind of inclusion and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: belonging work. Is that is recognizing that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: it, you know, it's not about focusing on
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the members of the minority group. And fixing them or
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: helping them. It's not just that. It's also more about the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: general population. And kind of moving
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: beyond just telling them the rules and regulations to giving people
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: actual ways of living and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: working with the with inclusion issues every day.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: The everyday issues, what do I do? What what words do I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: use? Is it okay for me to just ask you know, how do
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I actually approach that? And and and as I say, for them,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we often don't know what people's per and all lives are like when we're at
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: work and and we see them for that split second in business or just between
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: 9 to 5 Monday to Friday. So, you know, how do we
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: help them so that they can be their wholesales? They don't have to hide the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: fact that their partner, family, sister, brother, best friend,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: whatever. Belongs to the the very group that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you are using offensive language about or where they feel
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: uncomfortable. Yeah. I don't know about
Joanne Lockwood: you, but, I mean, I I know when someone is has good intent.
Joanne Lockwood: They're being curious. They're being respectful. And whilst
Joanne Lockwood: in the back of my mind, I I'm from the saying, well, here we go
Joanne Lockwood: again, another another person asking this question, I
Joanne Lockwood: also want to leave them with a great feeling about
Joanne Lockwood: me, about people of my characteristic.
Joanne Lockwood: So inevitably, I will always respond in a very positive way.
Joanne Lockwood: Because I respect someone's honesty and curiosity, and I don't
Joanne Lockwood: want to just push them away and get angry with them. Absolutely. And
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I think that is the key thing. It it's it's not what
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you say. It's the way in which you communicate something.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Helps people to understand your intent. When I was,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: training as a nurse, this is, you know, way back in the early
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: 1980s. When I was training as a nurse, One of the things
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that, often struck me was,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: patients and other, colleagues I worked would ask me
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: questions that I would think, well, surely everybody knows that. And I realized
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that they didn't know that because they'd never experienced it. They had lived in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: places where they never had a black next door neighbor or knew anybody in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: their family where that had happened. So,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: but what I felt was I was their first experience of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that, or at least I was made them feel that they could ask the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: question. And I always said to patients, to all the students, as
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I grew up and started, obviously, supporting students and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: learners to say There's no shaming, not knowing
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the answer. The only shame is not asking the question
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: appropriately. You know, so you just ask the question. And if
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: peep people are more than happy, I mean, the whole thing about stories where we
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: started, people love talking about themselves. You know, that's just, you know, they lack to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know that people are interested in them. And so that's why it's the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and so the intent of why you're asking about them.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And more importantly, waiting and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: listening to the answer is really, really
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: important. Yeah. The active listening, the mirroring, the nodding, the
Joanne Lockwood: repeating the words Yeah. Very important. Yes. I mean, going back
Joanne Lockwood: to what the, yeah, the phrase you said earlier, the sound bite, we are our
Joanne Lockwood: own expert Yes. So you don't need to ask
Joanne Lockwood: somebody else about me. Ask me. I'm my expert. I don't
Joanne Lockwood: know what makes me happy. I don't know what makes me sad. I
Joanne Lockwood: know what you can do to help me. Yes. I mean, we
Joanne Lockwood: talk about this in when we talk about disability, people often say, well,
Joanne Lockwood: How can we make sure we're accessible for this person? Well, ask
Joanne Lockwood: them. Ask them. Don't don't guess. Ask them. What do they
Joanne Lockwood: need? And they will they will answer you. Yes.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Absolutely. And I also think it's it's about using some of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the tools that we're giving as reference points not as an
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: instruction manual. So often, you know, we, you know, we all
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: have, or within businesses, certainly, within learning and and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: training. There may be lists or information given around
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: different communities, you know, just for knowledge of understanding, certainly
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: around erasing religion or or belief systems or
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: or things like that, but they're not they're not a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: instruction manual. They're more like a reference menu. So you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, if you know, for example, oh, I don't know. I know that in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: general, this community, this is something that may be an issue or this is something
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that goes with this particular religion, That's the start of a conversation with
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the individual person to say, I've heard this. Is that true? How
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: what's your thoughts about that? Because we all
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: live our identities. We all live
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: our cultures. We live our positions differently. You know,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and that's where we, you know, opening those conversations,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: recognizing that you're as as you've just said, that we're already talking to the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: expert in the room even even our parents don't
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know us as well as we know ourselves. And so, you know, if
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you're gonna ask know, you could ask, you could ask my parents about what happened
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: when I was born because, obviously, my memory of that is not quite as strong
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: as me. But if you wanna know what I think about something, what
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: land, why what you want I want you to call me, how I'd like
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you to approach me, what I'm happy to be engaged in, then you need
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: to ask me. And take the time to listen to my
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: answer. Don't pretend to ask me. Don't do a survey and then
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: have no no, you know, allowing to see nothing changes
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: based on my my responses. And that's not the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: same as doing what I say. That's actually being evidence in that you're listening.
Joanne Lockwood: That's so true. I mean,
Joanne Lockwood: it's, yeah, that is so true. I mean, people claim about survey
Joanne Lockwood: fatigue. It's not survey fatigue. It's lack of action fatigue. Yeah. People
Joanne Lockwood: get frustrated by being asked what they think and nothing ever coming of it. That's
Joanne Lockwood: -- Yeah. -- that's the struggle people have. Absolutely. I mean, we -- I'm just
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: gonna say
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: absolutely. We're seeing, research, a lot of the research that was done
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: in the kind of sixties seventies around,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: different community a lot of the anthropological.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: That's a long word for Wednesday morning. Anthropological,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: studies. What they actually show is that people get tired. Peep there's there's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: a a somewhat much more famous me who said, people get
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: tired of engaging in work, which does them
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: no good.
Joanne Lockwood: Well, they don't understand the outcome. There's no -- They don't see any change, any
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: difference. No action. Follows the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: inquiry. An analogy I often use
Joanne Lockwood: is the difference between blowing into a straw and blowing into a
Joanne Lockwood: balloon. With a balloon, you blow the balloon. You could see and
Joanne Lockwood: feel the balloon expand. You've got a reaction. Yes. With a
Joanne Lockwood: straw, you're just giving, and there's no feedback. Yes. It
Joanne Lockwood: becomes tiring. It becomes exhausting and frustrating.
Joanne Lockwood: Whereas the balloon, you've got a reward, haven't you? Yes. That's the
Joanne Lockwood: difference. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. I think that that is that is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: absolutely key to that. You know, you know,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I remember from when I was a lot younger, people used to say to me,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Laura, what do you think about this? Now you say to them, you know, if
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you if you don't want my truthful opinion, don't ask me.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Because I'm not gonna give you the answer you just wanna hear. And
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: then also if I've given you my story, giving you my
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: opinion, giving you my thoughts, I've invested in this.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: So where's the return to of my investment?
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: How is that going to do me good? And I don't mean necessarily financially
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: individually. How am I gonna feel that my contribution
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: makes a difference? Can you answer why I call the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: so what question? So you're asking me what I think so
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: what difference is that gonna make? Yeah, or
Joanne Lockwood: what's your why? Why does it matter that I have an opinion? What are you
Joanne Lockwood: gonna do with that? Exactly. Exactly. And that's often the mistake
Joanne Lockwood: businesses make when they're implementing DNI policies
Joanne Lockwood: or processes. So what is the why? Why are we doing
Joanne Lockwood: this? What difference are we gonna make? What's the outcome? Exactly.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And what difference does it make here in this
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: business? Not what difference does it just makes the world? I mean, you know,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we're all have the altruistic, you know, we all do our lockwood any changes in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the world. Absolutely. But in in a business sense,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: why is this important and how is this important and how will
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I know that this particular business
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: has made those efforts How will I know that what
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I've contributed within the organization I work in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: is valued? And I see the only way I know that is by
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: seeing they used to say the Wellbeing the responses.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: But if everything's just the same, you know, where we we
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: just this week is you know, 1 year since George Floyd, if
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: everything is the same, so what?
Joanne Lockwood: Too often people are focused on these performative actions.
Joanne Lockwood: This or we could do the right thing. It's the hygiene. It's the compliance.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Yes. We all know that to make something
Joanne Lockwood: sustainable, it's gotta have a business outcome and and
Joanne Lockwood: beyond the, it's the right thing to do.
Joanne Lockwood: Businesses, our businesses, and we have to respect the fact that they they
Joanne Lockwood: want to see an outcome. They want to know why it's going to benefit their
Joanne Lockwood: customers themselves why it's gonna make them more creative. Because
Joanne Lockwood: we see the McKinsey reports. We see the stats. We all know that about diverse,
Joanne Lockwood: inclusive companies are more this and more that and more the other Yes.
Joanne Lockwood: Yeah. The facts don't change people, and we're not
Joanne Lockwood: doing it because people don't understand the why and
Joanne Lockwood: the outcomes that they're gonna get from that return. And they don't
Joanne Lockwood: join up their processes. They don't have their hiring teams
Joanne Lockwood: aligned with the marketing team aligned with the business and the
Joanne Lockwood: operations objectives, hire as golf and hire as quick as
Joanne Lockwood: possible, whoever's available without thinking about the
Joanne Lockwood: the overall goal of the organization from a DNI perspective. Yes. The
Joanne Lockwood: product designed and always consider all of the people. So, we often
Joanne Lockwood: think of DNI's people function is isn't more than a people
Joanne Lockwood: function. It's a it's a business function. It's not -- It is. It's very much
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: a whole system's approach is what they need. Because
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: otherwise, people get stuck and also people are let down.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And, you know, bad news travels fastest So, you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, it's not enough just to appoint somebody from Madago's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: background into a role if the system that you're putting them into
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: hasn't been considered. Because then they just fail, and then that's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: another failure. And then that's also somebody else who who
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: has invested their time and themselves for you. But also business
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: wise, it also reflects badly. You know, it
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: always reflects badly.
Joanne Lockwood: The theme we started with the storytelling and you
Joanne Lockwood: shared a great way of, again, a note on it is
Joanne Lockwood: ask. So I'm really, really curious. You know, I've we we
Joanne Lockwood: spoke before we went live on the recording about
Joanne Lockwood: some part of your identity that you're really proud of as part of your background
Joanne Lockwood: that's brought you where you are now. But I've before I talk about that, I'm
Joanne Lockwood: really fascinated about you're an occasional poet.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: So what kind of poetry are you writing, and what's it about?
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Well, it's interesting. I've been writing poet tree for
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: years, actually, for for a long time, but not just for
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: myself. Poetry is my way of what I would call
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: downloading my brain. I've got, you know, I'm one of these people whose brain always
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: seems to be on the go. And and, sometimes I get
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: stuck know, like, you've got to kind of reboot your computer. Some so poetry is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the way in which I download some things that happen, and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and it literally has just been the way of doing that. But
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: then, in 2018, you'll remember it was
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the 17th 70th anniversary of the NHS. It was
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: also the 17th anniversary of the Empire Windrush, landed at Tilbury
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Docks, and I was chairing a conference I was due to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: chair a conference, for NHS workers around,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you know, kind of celebrating the NHS, diversity of the NHS,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: etcetera. And we were looking for we were all
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: helping the organization, and we were looking for some poetry to be
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: done. As in black as an interlude between the formal because it was a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: bit of a celebration as well as kind of like information, give it.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And the the group that we're putting together didn't really have funds. They were
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: it was very charitably done, and they inquired 2
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: professional poets about writing a poem for the event.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And the cost was a bit too high. They couldn't really afford it. So I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I don't know what happened to me. I almost had a rush of blood, to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the head. So I said, well, I can write you something. I don't mind writing
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: something for you. So I actually wrote it's the first time
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I wrote a poem, specifically on demand rather than
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: just doing the downloading. And I wrote a poem,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: called you called and we came. And it was
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: actually about the the Empire Windrush coming post
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: war, to and the the nurses and doctors and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that people who came to help the British empire after the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: war to rebuild, and the experiences
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: of racism and you know, non inclusion and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: belonging, as I call it, that occurred after that. And that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: was the first poem. And this poem just went Stella, people have used it over
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and over again for Black History Month for various things. I've performed it. It's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: become part of a play. It was a part of a ballet performance.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: That was done by hitting the northern ballet.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And since then, people have asked me about writing poetry, dwrap
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: poems, I've realized I've got lots, hundreds of poems.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: So I'm now considering because people keep asking me
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I'm considering whether to, I'm
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: considering writing. When I say considering, I started doing it really.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: A book based around not all my poetry, but
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the book is, I think, is going to be entitled stories
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: from my mother's house. And I'm going
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: to frame it around different parts of the home and the house. It's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: not because the poems are about a house, as somebody asked me. It's more
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that if we think about the rooms in our house, it's about like
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the rooms in yourself, And different rooms have different kind of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: spirits, different meanings. You know, the kitchen,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: for me, as a as a black woman, the kitchen is the heart of the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: house. It's family, it's belonging. It's social. So and it's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: about Wellbeing. You know, the your bedroom is kind of your own sanctum.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: It's your space. I mean, a reflection. It's your place of peace, of taxation.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: So I've got different poems about different moods and different experiences, and I'm thinking
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: of that the chapters of the book will have a intro if you like
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: about the rooms in my mother's house, and then the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: poetry will follow. So that's what I'm creating at the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: moment. So poetry is -- I love it. I love it.
Joanne Lockwood: -- is a sense of me. Yeah. It's it is my inner story,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the poem. I think that's, I think that's really great. I
Joanne Lockwood: mean, my wife dipped a toe into the water of
Joanne Lockwood: writing a book, and she
Joanne Lockwood: designed each of the chapters around a song that meant
Joanne Lockwood: something to her at that particular phase of her life.
Joanne Lockwood: Hasn't got published yet, but she's still working on it, but it's all she started
Joanne Lockwood: with the songs, which evoked a feeling
Joanne Lockwood: and put it back in that place of being that age in that
Joanne Lockwood: situation. Yeah. And the song was kind of the trigger point for that
Joanne Lockwood: moment in her life, and I thought that was a really good way of doing
Joanne Lockwood: this up, but I love the idea of the each room in the house has
Joanne Lockwood: a kind of a meaning and a and sets the scene for the.
Joanne Lockwood: Yeah. I for me, it's,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: poetry has always been my
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: inner, my my self story, the the things stories I tell
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: myself if you know what I mean. And I think that for
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: me, there's something about the timing of stories
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: needing to be told. So so The silence is it for
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: me. There are there are I have a thing about silences, and this is where
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we get the kind of silence speaks, is that our our experience
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: is all things we've talked about. The stories itself are our
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: silent stories. Our experiences are silent.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Until we choose to share them. And and we are
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the safeguarding of ourselves.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And, you know, we are our own main protector. And so we
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: do feel so we choose which stories to tell. So
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: but there are times when when something
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: happens or you witness something or you experience
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: something or your business is going through something where the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: silence becomes so pressured to speak that it starts to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: scream. You know, it reminds me of that painting of the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: screen. It's a silent screen.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And the power that there is in those untold
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: stories of ourselves.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Is huge. And the and and what what I learned when I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: wrote the Winderish poem is that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: what came out was the untold stories
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: of making that sacrifice. The untold stories of the generations, we heard
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we had the winter candle, and what we heard was the untold
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: stories of ordinary people
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: giving off their best for a course and the consequences
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: of when their stories were not heard.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And so that's the importance of, like, the importance of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: hearing silences, and silence always
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: speaks. It's never truly silent.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: But we don't always hear it. Woah. Woah.
Joanne Lockwood: Yeah. Powerful. Very powerful. I I completely relate to
Joanne Lockwood: that. Yeah. It's often what is not
Joanne Lockwood: said rather than what is said sometimes, isn't it? Absolutely.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Space. We're all looking around at each other. When something happens, we go back to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the there's an accident that means that everyone looks. The silence is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: deafening. But I also think science
Joanne Lockwood: is powerful to allow science to just be
Joanne Lockwood: and allowing everybody that time to think to reflect to
Joanne Lockwood: pull their thoughts together because we live in a world where we wanna keep
Joanne Lockwood: filling this vacuum of science with noise Absolutely. To
Joanne Lockwood: allow people that that introspective time that that thought
Joanne Lockwood: generating time rather than just pushing people to
Joanne Lockwood: have an opinion now So take your time.
Joanne Lockwood: Pause. Interesting. Yeah. And I think
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we we sometimes have to give people permission to take time
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: because there is we're in this fast world where everything has to be day before
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: yesterday. And, you know, we're all we're still, you know, living through COVID, and we
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we've all been through as period of time where the world's been a lot more
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: silent. And, you know, COVID hasn't
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: created the issues that we've seen. But it's allowed
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: a space where we can hear what's already there. And I think that is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: often what many businesses are seeing now, certainly around inclusion and diversity.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: You know, the things that happened over the last year have
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: actually made a stop and see
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the world we're already inhabiting, whether that's the business world, our social
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: world, you know, the the world of the TV, what have happened,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we we are seeing what already exists or we're hearing
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: those stories, this is a really, really great
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: time to listen to the stories
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that are already there in your space?
Joanne Lockwood: I'm also, as you're talking, I'm thinking about the power of looking at
Joanne Lockwood: photographs without a noise, without without any
Joanne Lockwood: sound, just your yourself Wellbeing absorbed
Joanne Lockwood: using your sight sense, and being
Joanne Lockwood: really in tune with what the photograph is saying to you. Yes. Because
Joanne Lockwood: often, we we watch tele and they they put background music or there's
Joanne Lockwood: someone talking over it, but to truly study their image
Joanne Lockwood: and the power and impact that makes about the story
Joanne Lockwood: it's telling and might make writing your own story about the image,
Joanne Lockwood: putting your own spin on what you see. Absolutely. One of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: things that I often ask people when I when I coach them is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: about giving them time in the coaching just to be silent.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And I asked them the question, what's your silence telling
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you? And that's what we get from pictures too. What's the pic
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: not what is the picture of? But what's that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: picture saying to you? And that's using your inner
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: voice. That's your own story. The speaking to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you, yourself speak.
Joanne Lockwood: Must be really powerful to to have a group of people all
Joanne Lockwood: narrating a picture with their own lived experience and
Joanne Lockwood: perspective and seeing different
Joanne Lockwood: emotions coming out of that that same, you know, again, event,
Joanne Lockwood: reaction outcome. That perspective of what they're
Joanne Lockwood: Wellbeing. And that tells a lot about their lived experience that their own
Joanne Lockwood: story does not, maybe they're paying. And if and if you -- Maybe they're fabulous.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Absolutely. And if you go back to historically, that's what we did, didn't
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: we? We sat down and we we we told stories, you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, whether we're watching the fire, whether we sat, you know, before the the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: world of fast forward and and, you know, online and, you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, we we sat
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and we told stories. And in those
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: stories, just like we've bought as we do now, when someone
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: tells you a story of yourself, you actually hear your own
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: story, how it relates or not, how
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: it's different to that one, how, you know, something that
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you'd never perhaps considered before, and that comes out of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: their story. And you get much more of that from personal stories than you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: do from a manual giving you instruction
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: because it doesn't evoke that human emotional
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: connection and potential that we have in our
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: stories. It's always much more interesting to hear a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: story about what happened than to read about it. Well,
Joanne Lockwood: I'm gonna ask you another story about yourself. So I know you're
Joanne Lockwood: immensely proud to be a professor, to be awarded an
Joanne Lockwood: OBE, and also appearing on the
Joanne Lockwood: as the 8th most influential black person on a powerless in 2018.
Joanne Lockwood: So I know you're missing a part of that. So tell
Joanne Lockwood: me tell me that story. Well, I can't tell you how I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: ended up on powerless because it was nominated, you know, I was nominated kind
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: of, what's the word anonymously. So I never knew, you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, you just got this thing. And and the same, I suppose, would there be,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I think the pro the professor was different because that the culmination of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: years of work, of research work, of policy work, of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: advocacy work, and development work around
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: health disparities, particularly. And
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the OBE was a nomination which I got was for services
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: to nursing and health policy. I've worked on many health
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: policies both in the UK and, overseas,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: which all have an element to focus on equal
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: chance, as I called it. The first policy I worked on was,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: one was published way back in 2001, which was the 1st sexual
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: health and HIV strategy. For England.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And that was and the reason that these things are proud because
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the the OBE and the policy work has always been
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: focused on diversity and inclusion in many senses and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: disparities. And I think about the people
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that I met on that work along the way. And the OB to
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: me is a reflection of them. Who were many, many were, I mean,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: certainly working in the early and mid eighties around HIV at AIDS,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: when it was AIDS and it was before HIV. Working with communities who
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: were verified by nature of their sexuality of just being
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: themselves, you know, the the hundreds who died, the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: people who lost their job, the people at the house is firebombed, all those
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: things. And and he, you know, here I am, you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, 20 years plus later,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and that OB is reflection of their voices.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And, my
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: responsibility to ensure that their voices and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: their experiences were included in every line of that policy
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that pushed it where it needed to be pushed. And the professorship comes
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: is if you like the professional bit that comes along with that, the writing,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you know, this the book we talked about Wellbeing my first nonfiction book, but I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I've written textbooks, journals, articles, etcetera,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: policy documents, all that kind of thing. And for me, this is
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: for all those people who should have got an OB,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: who should have been given recognition for the work that they did,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: private, voluntary, all that, you know, the the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: windrush generation, my parents, you know, the ancestors.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: That's why I'm proud of it. That that it's not
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: only my efforts. I'm not here. I didn't
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: arrive here on virtue of my own efforts.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: But definitely for me, you know, the allies that I had along the way,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: those people who pushed me when I didn't want pushing who prodded me when I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: needed prodding, but I didn't wanna do it, and who actually just stood me up,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: brushed me down, and kept me going. And that's why I'm proud of it.
Joanne Lockwood: That's so true. I mean, I hear many people who have been awarded,
Joanne Lockwood: at OB or similar that they all would tend to say, it's
Joanne Lockwood: it's not about me. It's about I was just the, what, the
Joanne Lockwood: visible person, this is everybody else. It's the
Joanne Lockwood: impact we've all had in change of people's lives. Yes. I
Joanne Lockwood: just happen to be the one that got picked to be
Joanne Lockwood: recognized for you. And I was a little bit in ears,
Joanne Lockwood: honest, and think about the impact that people have had on lives. And
Joanne Lockwood: that's what the OB and similar wars are about. It's it's not about you
Joanne Lockwood: as a person. It's about what you've the impact you've had on others,
Joanne Lockwood: and the impact on society for in a positive way. So I think I think
Joanne Lockwood: a amazing. -- what it's for. Absolutely. What it's for, you know, I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you know, it was the first person what although
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I didn't know it at the time, first person that I nursed, when I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: say nursed to death, I don't mean they're nursed, but, you know, who I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know. That's always true. I nursed them. The first person that I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: nursed who, died as a result of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: complications associated with age was in 1982.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And the dignity of that man, and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: what he taught me about the best and the worst of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: humanity will will stick with me. That was 1982.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: So, you know, when I went to the palace and I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: got that award and received it, you know, his was the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: face that I saw. And, you know, that's
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: with me, and no one knows name, you know, obviously, but
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that's the person I saw.
Joanne Lockwood: That's, again, very powerful, very powerful. Did you get to
Joanne Lockwood: go to a garden party and, get your No. Well, there is a garden
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: lot. You I tell you what you do. You get to go to Buckingham
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Palace, and it's really strange because you've only seen it if
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: you're being up there by the gates. You walked through the arch, but I've never
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: seen so much gold in my life. You know, obviously, we talk you know, I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: had to keep reminding myself that this wasn't kind of, you know, Focal. This
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: was the real thing. But the, it was,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Prince William who gave the OBE, on the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: ceremony that I was at. And we I remember
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: walking through the halls and with a partner much children, you know,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: because you get you get to bring 4 guests with you. And I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: remember walking through the halls with them and thinking,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: good grief. You know, I was I was born in a, you know, back
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: to back to Octum down terrace in the front room on the setting, you know,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: in the, you know, in the not the most oblivious parts of of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Nottingham. And I'm thinking, how on earth am I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: walking through in Paris here and with with all these people. And I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I think I was just thinking of the the distance traveled. I mean, both my
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: parents had died a while ago. In fact, today is is my would be my
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: dad's birthday. But, I think about
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: them and the struggles they had and coming to England at the time of, you
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, no no dogs, no black the Irish kind of thing. And
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and I'm just thinking, how on earth am I now walking
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: through these hallowed halls? But it was it's a fabulous day, and I met some
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: great people, and the people getting the awards were from all walks of
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: life. People have done really good work for charities and and
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: people who'd you know, shown great bravery around
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: supporting somebody else and and so on and so forth. And,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And the most surprising thing for me was actually real I didn't realize
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that the gers were who were two of who were
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: still on either side of Petroleum, We're actually like the personal bodyguards.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: We're all family. I never knew that. Maybe I'm the last person to know that,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: but I never knew it, but I learned so much, and I remember sitting in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: that room thinking, wow.
Joanne Lockwood: Yeah. Good, mate. I've I've been packing a palace once, so I
Joanne Lockwood: got invited to a garden part back in 2009,
Joanne Lockwood: 2010, it was the year where the heavens opened and
Joanne Lockwood: it hailstoned. Oh, wow. We we the
Joanne Lockwood: Bucking Palace Garden party is a is it a huge lawn,
Joanne Lockwood: and there was probably I know, 2 or 3000 people out
Joanne Lockwood: there. Yeah. And the heavens opened and literally everybody rushed into the
Joanne Lockwood: back of the palace. There's a couple thousand people all huddled dripping
Joanne Lockwood: wet in their their their hats, their dresses,
Joanne Lockwood: their shoes, so everyone was soaked to the skin.
Joanne Lockwood: Literally, it was like an instant heaven's open no escape.
Joanne Lockwood: And it, yeah, it was probably the worst rain
Joanne Lockwood: in London in in this in a decade or something. We were out in god.
Joanne Lockwood: That's right. Oh, Darren, the hats and all the nice dresses. Oh,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: dear. And all the hats were very in, all the shoes were very in. It
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: was kind of yeah, the outfit you'd you'd you'd
Joanne Lockwood: you'd planned and and were proud of and there's something that's just the
Joanne Lockwood: soggy soggy mess because it's it's the middle of
Joanne Lockwood: suburb. It was a it was a June. I think it was a June day,
Joanne Lockwood: but it hailstoned, really hailstoned and emptied
Joanne Lockwood: It's incredible. It actually was featured in the in the,
Joanne Lockwood: London evening standard on the front page. Really? Creamed garden party
Joanne Lockwood: reigned off sort of thing. And pictures of us all running in, but it
Joanne Lockwood: was yeah. So that was that's my
Joanne Lockwood: Buckingham Palace experience getting wet.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: For how sandwich is the dog keeping the sandwich? I remember going. Well, you oh,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: well, that's good. But the key thing is, Jira, a bit Did you use the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: toilets? I thought, I've got to use the toilets just to say that I've used
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: the toilets of booking advice, which I
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: did. I did actually. So -- Oh, no. Definitely. If anyone
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: ever goes to book it by make sure you use the toilets, they're fabulous, but
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: at least you can say I feed it there. Yes. We
Joanne Lockwood: we park on the mound because if you get invited to the garden party, you
Joanne Lockwood: get parking pass so you can park nearby. And, of course, that seems like
Joanne Lockwood: a good idea until you try and leave. Yes. You can't get out because
Joanne Lockwood: every, all these hundreds of cars are there, that part of London
Joanne Lockwood: is busy in the evening. And it looks like 2 hours to get out
Joanne Lockwood: of there and across London, and we thought, you'd be better off getting a
Joanne Lockwood: cab or or walk into the tube station. Well, that's where we got
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: a cab, and then we got a cab, because I was we weren't
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: too far away. We were, veneers co court. So we
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: got a cab from there. So yeah.
Joanne Lockwood: Yeah. Well, I mean, that's amazing. I mean,
Joanne Lockwood: hearing your story, you know, hearing some of your background and what
Joanne Lockwood: makes you proud, I guess, is really fantastic. I've got one last question. You
Joanne Lockwood: describe yourself as an a queen, academic
Joanne Lockwood: and queens, where where does that identity come from?
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Well, an academic is is more about my my inquiring
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and inquisitive mind, and I am an academic. I'm, someone who wants to ask me
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: if I'm a real professor. Yes. I'm a real professor. Yes. I'm a PhD in
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: all the academic bits of paper that go with that.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: But I think that's because I seek
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: evidence and it's it's not one kind of evidence. Sometimes the evidence,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: as I say, is from people's stories or their experience, but I seek
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: evidence to help me make decisions and I try and bring a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: critical mind and also be
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: always open to changing my mind based on new evidence on new
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: information. That's the academic bit of me. The
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: queen is a reflection of my culture, my cultural
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: position. I have being blessed to reach my 57
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: years so far, lockwood. And
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: I've reached a point where that is part of my identity.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: You know, we, you know, as as a black woman, as a queen, as a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: as a head of a family, and the holder
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: of the culture and the heart of a family and part of the
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: community. And that's how I see myself
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and that's how I hold myself, and that's how I present myself. You
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: know, young women are young queens and old women are
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: queens, and we you know, just as men are kings
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: within that, but we we have that sense of responsibility
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: and leadership through our families. And that's that's why I'm
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Wellbeing.
Joanne Lockwood: Thank you so much. Thank you. I'm sure for
Joanne Lockwood: everyone is listening, there's so much there to
Joanne Lockwood: to ponder and take inspiration from How can I
Joanne Lockwood: let's just get in touch with you? Well, people can,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: contact me via my website. It's lauracerrant.com.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: And also by email, laura@laura.com.
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: So that's easy. I'm also on Twitter. I go in for where is my name,
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: Laura Sarrant. I've Googled it a few times. I'm the only Laura 70
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: for Google, but you'll get it anyway. And I've also got, a
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: podcast, which is called speaking for ourselves, which is really about
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: those untold stories. So there's lots of ways people come, and I'm on
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: LinkedIn, obviously, but everywhere I am, I'm just there as me as my
Professor Laura Serrant OBE: name. So you should find me relatively easily. And S
Joanne Lockwood: E, double r, a n t. Yes.
Joanne Lockwood: Brilliant. Okay. Well, that's been amazing.
Joanne Lockwood: So a big thank you for everyone who's listened for tuning
Joanne Lockwood: in. Please do subscribe, to keep updates on future
Joanne Lockwood: episodes of the Inclusion BiTE podcast. That's b I t
Joanne Lockwood: e s. Teddy Friends, Teddy colleagues. I've got a
Joanne Lockwood: number of more, but could they be more excited? Don't think so, but I have
Joanne Lockwood: a number of exciting guests lined up that I'm sure you'll also be inspired by
Joanne Lockwood: over the next few weeks months. And, of course, remember if you'd like to be
Joanne Lockwood: a guest, let me know. I welcome any feedback and
Joanne Lockwood: suggestions and on how I can improve the show. So email
Joanne Lockwood: me at joe.lockwood@seachangehappen.co.uk.
Joanne Lockwood: And finally, my name is Joanne Lockwood. It's been an absolute
Joanne Lockwood: pleasure to host this podcast for you today. Thank you to my guest.
Joanne Lockwood: Catch you next time. Bye.