WEBVTT 00:00:00.410 --> 00:00:04.090 Hello everyone, my name is Joanne Lockwood and I am your host 00:00:04.250 --> 00:00:08.046 for the Inclusion Bites podcast. In this series, I 00:00:08.068 --> 00:00:11.598 have interviewed a number of amazing people that simply had a 00:00:11.604 --> 00:00:15.034 conversation around the subject of inclusion, belonging 00:00:15.162 --> 00:00:18.750 and generally making the world a better place for everyone to thrive. 00:00:19.650 --> 00:00:23.278 If you'd like to join me in the future, then please do drop me a 00:00:23.284 --> 00:00:24.174 line to 00:00:24.212 --> 00:00:28.578 jo.lockwood@seechangehapen.co.uk. 00:00:28.754 --> 00:00:32.310 That's S-E-E Change Happan dot Co dot Uk. You can 00:00:33.290 --> 00:00:36.966 catch up with all of the previous shows on iTunes, Spotify and the usual places. 00:00:36.988 --> 00:00:40.726 So plug in your headphones, grab a decaf 00:00:40.758 --> 00:00:42.534 and let's get going. 00:00:44.750 --> 00:00:47.866 Today is episode 93 with the 00:00:47.888 --> 00:00:51.230 title engineering inclusive excellence 00:00:51.570 --> 00:00:55.066 and I have the absolute honour and privilege to welcome Claire 00:00:55.098 --> 00:00:58.782 Angliss. Claire is a leader of learning for 00:00:58.836 --> 00:01:02.426 large engineering organisation and is also the 00:01:02.468 --> 00:01:06.178 owner of her own inclusive coaching business. When I 00:01:06.184 --> 00:01:09.634 asked Claire to describe her superpower, she said she is 00:01:09.672 --> 00:01:13.506 honest and delivers clear talk backed up 00:01:13.528 --> 00:01:17.366 with action. Wow. Hey, Claire, welcome to the 00:01:17.388 --> 00:01:21.174 show. Hi Jo. So nice of you to invite me 00:01:21.212 --> 00:01:25.058 to talk today. Absolute pleasure. We've 00:01:25.074 --> 00:01:28.774 worked together in the past and it was an honour to invite you along 00:01:28.812 --> 00:01:32.474 and even more of an honour for you to accept. Thank you. So, 00:01:32.512 --> 00:01:35.926 Claire, engineering inclusive 00:01:35.958 --> 00:01:39.690 excellence, tell me why we chose that as a title. 00:01:40.910 --> 00:01:44.686 Well, Jo, as you know, I'm the head of learning for Thales in the 00:01:44.708 --> 00:01:48.442 UK and we've been looking at engineering excellence 00:01:48.506 --> 00:01:52.222 within our business and leadership for a long period of time 00:01:52.276 --> 00:01:55.954 now. And when I talk about engineering excellence, I'm really talking 00:01:55.992 --> 00:01:59.522 about a place where everyone feels valued and that they can 00:01:59.576 --> 00:02:03.170 contribute their best. So all of that 00:02:03.240 --> 00:02:07.046 head in for any engineering organisation, in delivery for the 00:02:07.068 --> 00:02:10.754 customer, of course. But a place where people can achieve 00:02:10.802 --> 00:02:14.434 and thrive and feel that they belong, feel that they're 00:02:14.482 --> 00:02:18.246 trusted, feel that they can contribute and be their 00:02:18.268 --> 00:02:22.026 most authentic selves, that they feel they want to be at work. 00:02:22.208 --> 00:02:26.026 That's easier said than done, isn't it? I mean, we hear this buzword, bring 00:02:26.048 --> 00:02:29.578 your whole self to work. And I always say, well, that's easy to you, 00:02:29.664 --> 00:02:33.030 easy for you, because the further you are from the bell curve of 00:02:33.040 --> 00:02:36.346 normality, the harder it is to bring that whole self, isn't 00:02:36.378 --> 00:02:40.094 it? That's why I chose my words really carefully there, Jo, because 00:02:40.132 --> 00:02:43.680 I said that you choose to do. Because I think 00:02:44.530 --> 00:02:48.306 I had a conversation and I'm trying to remember where it was. It 00:02:48.328 --> 00:02:52.146 was a couple of years ago now, at a learning conference I was 00:02:52.168 --> 00:02:55.826 at and I was listening to a speaker there who was talking about bringing your 00:02:55.848 --> 00:02:59.654 whole self to work. And I was thinking, the same as you. That's really easy 00:02:59.772 --> 00:03:03.362 if your whole self is something that's well accepted 00:03:03.426 --> 00:03:07.174 or very, I guess, the norm of where 00:03:07.212 --> 00:03:10.762 you work. And they were talking about 00:03:10.896 --> 00:03:14.742 a really senior leader in a large, organised, complex 00:03:14.806 --> 00:03:18.506 organisation and saying that they'd been talking about how 00:03:18.528 --> 00:03:22.094 you were your most authentic self at work. And he had 00:03:22.132 --> 00:03:25.598 been sharing that he couldn't possibly be that. 00:03:25.764 --> 00:03:29.498 And the reason was that his extracurricular activity 00:03:29.594 --> 00:03:32.560 was one that maybe others wouldn't understand 00:03:33.110 --> 00:03:36.494 and wouldn't accept. And being a very senior 00:03:36.542 --> 00:03:40.274 leader, he decided that he wouldn't share 00:03:40.392 --> 00:03:43.442 that. His choice of 00:03:43.496 --> 00:03:46.990 extracurricular was to be naked in the woods with other people 00:03:47.080 --> 00:03:50.918 that like natureism and love to be outdoors naked in 00:03:50.924 --> 00:03:54.726 the woods. So he made a decision not to share what his extracurricular kind 00:03:54.748 --> 00:03:58.406 of hobies were outside of work. And I guess that's where 00:03:58.428 --> 00:04:02.266 I share my words really carefully. It's of what you 00:04:02.288 --> 00:04:06.106 choose, of what is comfortable. And I would have loved to get to a 00:04:06.128 --> 00:04:09.722 place, Jo, as you know, where we could really be our most 00:04:09.776 --> 00:04:13.582 authentic selves. But it's always about what you choose to share about 00:04:13.636 --> 00:04:17.150 you, because there will always things about everybody we choose not 00:04:17.220 --> 00:04:20.494 to. So I think that's important, that as 00:04:20.612 --> 00:04:24.174 HR and learning leaders, we're really understanding that you can't 00:04:24.222 --> 00:04:26.820 possibly be asking that of everybody. 00:04:27.830 --> 00:04:30.900 No. And picking up on that particular example, 00:04:31.670 --> 00:04:35.298 the natureism, this person's sort of 00:04:35.464 --> 00:04:38.786 weekend community and hobby, or their lifestyle, 00:04:38.818 --> 00:04:42.646 whichever makes them happy. It's coming in to 00:04:42.668 --> 00:04:46.422 work on a Monday morning or having taken some time off. 00:04:46.556 --> 00:04:50.362 So what did you get up to? And then immediately this person's having to cover, 00:04:50.496 --> 00:04:53.786 mask, hide what they've done, 00:04:53.968 --> 00:04:57.798 sanitise their response. And that's 00:04:57.814 --> 00:05:01.482 a huge cognitive load for people to have to process it. 00:05:01.536 --> 00:05:05.322 You say they choose to share that or not. By choosing 00:05:05.386 --> 00:05:09.230 not to share it, they choose to create 00:05:09.300 --> 00:05:12.510 a story and a myth, which is even harder sometimes to maintain. 00:05:13.570 --> 00:05:17.314 I think that's absolutely right. I guess what I 00:05:17.352 --> 00:05:21.106 see as our kind of role to play is to help people to be 00:05:21.128 --> 00:05:24.866 able to share the things that they feel they'd like to and that 00:05:24.888 --> 00:05:28.706 they can balance with. This is something that's 00:05:28.738 --> 00:05:32.438 really important to me, and I don't want to mask this. 00:05:32.524 --> 00:05:35.830 It causes me more distress if I do to. 00:05:35.980 --> 00:05:39.606 Actually, I'm a senior financial controller in a large organisation 00:05:39.718 --> 00:05:43.020 and this is what I choose to do at my weekends and actually 00:05:43.950 --> 00:05:47.626 the outlying kind of balance in what would happen if I 00:05:47.648 --> 00:05:51.366 did choose that. And actually it's private to me, I don't really 00:05:51.408 --> 00:05:55.146 want to. I guess that's where I'm coming from. It's 00:05:55.178 --> 00:05:58.320 more. If you choose not to share that because 00:05:58.930 --> 00:06:02.746 for you, it's just not something you feel comfortable sharing, then I'm 00:06:02.778 --> 00:06:06.226 okay with that. But what I don't want is for people clearly to be 00:06:06.328 --> 00:06:09.700 not sharing things that then causes them pain not to share. 00:06:10.470 --> 00:06:14.274 Yeah, I completely agree. And the pressure to out yourself on 00:06:14.312 --> 00:06:17.746 everything, if you like, can't be there either. And just 00:06:17.768 --> 00:06:21.474 because someone maybe is gay, bi, 00:06:21.592 --> 00:06:25.218 lesbian, it doesn't need to bring that to work. If you're 00:06:25.234 --> 00:06:28.486 comfortable saying, actually, it's none of your business who I sleep with, who I have 00:06:28.508 --> 00:06:32.214 relationships with. I don't feel the need. I'm not hiding myself, I'm just 00:06:32.252 --> 00:06:35.674 choosing not to share that. It doesn't matter to me. Yeah. And some 00:06:35.712 --> 00:06:38.826 folk, it's a big part of who they are and it's what they want to 00:06:38.848 --> 00:06:42.586 share. I guess it's like any of us. There are things that I 00:06:42.608 --> 00:06:46.446 might choose to share. When I was going through a divorce, did I choose 00:06:46.468 --> 00:06:50.190 to share that at work? Not with everybody. With the people that I 00:06:50.260 --> 00:06:53.982 felt needed to know to support me, but not with everybody. 00:06:54.116 --> 00:06:57.858 And that was testament. When I changed my name from Mortimer to 00:06:57.864 --> 00:07:01.666 Anglis back to my maiden name, the amount of people that congratulated me on 00:07:01.688 --> 00:07:05.170 getting married, there was far more awkward conversations 00:07:05.590 --> 00:07:09.190 about congratulations on being married than there was probably 00:07:09.260 --> 00:07:12.754 that if I'd have had the conversation that I was divorced, 00:07:12.802 --> 00:07:16.214 but I just felt it was no one else's business and I didn't really need 00:07:16.252 --> 00:07:19.954 to. So when people push for people to share everything, 00:07:20.012 --> 00:07:23.722 but it's a really inclusive space and you can share whatever you want to 00:07:23.776 --> 00:07:27.002 share your truth, I think that is always with 00:07:27.056 --> 00:07:30.790 choice, and that should be made really clear that it's not 00:07:30.800 --> 00:07:34.638 an expectation that you do that, but if it's right for you, 00:07:34.804 --> 00:07:38.398 then you can. Yeah. And 00:07:38.564 --> 00:07:42.410 I think the key thing really is you should have an ultimate expectation 00:07:42.490 --> 00:07:45.760 if you do decide to share something, people go, 00:07:46.130 --> 00:07:49.842 wow, excellent. Thank you. Brilliant. Thank you for trusting me. 00:07:49.896 --> 00:07:53.746 And that's the kind of the reaction. It's not sort of like, oh, oMg. Or 00:07:53.768 --> 00:07:57.060 sort of run for the hills. It's kind of a, yeah, okay, 00:07:57.670 --> 00:08:00.902 actually, so and so down the corridor, it has a similar 00:08:00.956 --> 00:08:04.006 lifestyle, have a chat with them and suddenly there's a network built up and you 00:08:04.028 --> 00:08:07.574 suddenly feel fine that other people can share that as well. 00:08:07.692 --> 00:08:11.466 And obviously went through the same thing obviously went through 00:08:11.488 --> 00:08:14.986 the same thing seven or eight years ago. Where you end up building up this 00:08:15.008 --> 00:08:18.060 huge backstory about everything. And 00:08:19.550 --> 00:08:23.006 wherever the old adage is, it's always easier to tell the truth because you never 00:08:23.028 --> 00:08:26.846 have to remember what the lie was or what the fabrication was. And 00:08:26.868 --> 00:08:30.718 I found myself going away for weekends and my social 00:08:30.884 --> 00:08:34.718 engagements, and people would say, what'd you do last night? I said, well, I 00:08:34.724 --> 00:08:38.490 went for a stag weekend, which at the time wasn't technically a 00:08:38.500 --> 00:08:41.874 lie. It wasn't technically a truth. It was kind of an easy way of saying 00:08:41.912 --> 00:08:44.498 I went away with a load of people to Blackpool for a bit of a 00:08:44.504 --> 00:08:48.326 stag weekend. The fact it was a load of trans women having 00:08:48.348 --> 00:08:51.960 a weekend away, trying to explore themselves and have some time out, 00:08:52.890 --> 00:08:56.710 you end up making the story up and then you finally 00:08:56.780 --> 00:09:00.566 do share something and it becomes people then feel 00:09:00.588 --> 00:09:03.958 a bit lied to if you're not careful. You've been deceiving me, you've been telling 00:09:03.974 --> 00:09:07.130 me this all this time. So, yeah, it's that really fine line 00:09:07.200 --> 00:09:11.046 between lying to people about what you're doing and choosing not to share, hasn't 00:09:11.078 --> 00:09:14.766 it? And I found that was a real awkwardness where people said, oh, you've been 00:09:14.788 --> 00:09:18.474 lying. I guess we do that though, Jo, don't we? To protect people somewhat 00:09:18.522 --> 00:09:22.286 as well, because people tend to want to help. So if 00:09:22.308 --> 00:09:26.106 you tell someone something, they then tend to feel like there's 00:09:26.138 --> 00:09:29.794 something they should do about it. And I think that goes back to your point, 00:09:29.912 --> 00:09:33.618 how to react when someone shares something like that with you. Because if you'd have 00:09:33.624 --> 00:09:37.414 shared your truth, I wonder how many people would have wanted to help or 00:09:37.452 --> 00:09:41.046 support or talk about what you were going through that 00:09:41.068 --> 00:09:44.726 were totally unequipped to do so. That would 00:09:44.748 --> 00:09:48.282 have been actually of hindrance at that moment in your life, 00:09:48.336 --> 00:09:51.738 rather than help, potentially, but actually, 00:09:51.904 --> 00:09:55.594 how we respond to someone when they share their truth with 00:09:55.632 --> 00:09:59.258 us, or are open about who and what they 00:09:59.344 --> 00:10:03.066 choose to do. I guess it's a case of us not feeling 00:10:03.098 --> 00:10:06.574 like we need to help support, fix or do 00:10:06.612 --> 00:10:10.254 something with that person and just say, thank you for sharing that. Is there any 00:10:10.292 --> 00:10:13.940 support, like, from me, maybe is a good question, rather. 00:10:15.350 --> 00:10:18.100 Oh, that sounds really interesting. Tell me more. 00:10:20.070 --> 00:10:23.762 I really didn't know. I'm so sorry, Jo. You're going through all this because 00:10:23.816 --> 00:10:26.450 actually that wasn't how you were feeling. 00:10:27.430 --> 00:10:31.062 It's interesting, you mentioned a couple of things there. So you mentioned 00:10:31.116 --> 00:10:34.838 that our human need to fix and 00:10:35.004 --> 00:10:38.150 the sympathy and the, oh, you're brave, 00:10:38.230 --> 00:10:40.970 or you're so courageous. 00:10:46.270 --> 00:10:49.402 Everyone's obviously well meaning, but they're not actually 00:10:49.456 --> 00:10:52.974 responding to you. They're responding about themselves, aren't they? It's all about 00:10:53.012 --> 00:10:56.206 them. Oh, you're so. It means I couldn't do 00:10:56.388 --> 00:10:59.626 so. You're courageous means, oh, wow, that scares 00:10:59.658 --> 00:11:03.486 me. And then this listening to fix, isn't it sort 00:11:03.508 --> 00:11:06.446 of like, let me help you. Let me solve your problem, because you're obviously not 00:11:06.468 --> 00:11:10.258 intelligent enough to fix your own problem. You need my suggestion to fix it for 00:11:10.264 --> 00:11:13.346 you. And I can say something and they're going to go, wow, Jo, I could 00:11:13.368 --> 00:11:17.090 have done that without you. How amazing. Yeah, I agree, 00:11:17.160 --> 00:11:20.786 Jo. Yeah. I was chatting to someone on a podcast 00:11:20.978 --> 00:11:24.774 this episode last week, Greg, and it's coming out a couple 00:11:24.812 --> 00:11:27.586 weeks time. And he was saying that when he was going through a really dark 00:11:27.618 --> 00:11:31.014 time and contemplated suicide at some 00:11:31.052 --> 00:11:34.266 point, and when he was telling people about it, he said it was really hard 00:11:34.288 --> 00:11:37.814 to find people who would just say, thank you for sharing 00:11:37.862 --> 00:11:40.954 that. Do you want to talk about it more? Do you want to explore it? 00:11:40.992 --> 00:11:44.606 Rather than the natural reaction is what can I do to help? Or what can 00:11:44.628 --> 00:11:48.318 I do to fix it? Actually, just listening to me, let me understand 00:11:48.404 --> 00:11:52.174 why I'm in this dark place. Give me space to 00:11:52.212 --> 00:11:55.998 speak, is what it is. And it's really hard to 00:11:56.164 --> 00:11:59.806 not chip in with an answer than that. And I think that's the challenge. 00:11:59.998 --> 00:12:03.826 Yeah, that kind of takes us as well. Sorry, Jay. That 00:12:03.848 --> 00:12:07.586 takes us to this kind of leadership piece as well, because that's 00:12:07.618 --> 00:12:11.462 about that connection being based upon, I guess, 00:12:11.596 --> 00:12:15.382 love, rather than a need to lead or fix or 00:12:15.436 --> 00:12:19.174 nurture. And that's around that genuine kind of empathy, 00:12:19.222 --> 00:12:23.066 compassion, genuine care. And I'm not suggesting that someone that 00:12:23.088 --> 00:12:26.810 offers support isn't offering that care, but 00:12:26.880 --> 00:12:30.714 actually, when you really think about what someone else needs rather than what you 00:12:30.752 --> 00:12:34.298 need in that moment, quite often it is someone 00:12:34.384 --> 00:12:37.870 just wants to talk and share what's going on for them, 00:12:38.020 --> 00:12:41.358 or they're just telling you because you asked a question, right? If someone says, what 00:12:41.364 --> 00:12:44.606 did you do at the weekend? And you said, well, as you said, Jo, I 00:12:44.628 --> 00:12:48.290 was with a group of friends, and it was a group of trans women 00:12:48.360 --> 00:12:51.460 exploring and taking some time out together, 00:12:52.230 --> 00:12:55.534 I guess you wanted to share that if you felt 00:12:55.582 --> 00:12:58.260 that with me, you could share that. And 00:12:59.130 --> 00:13:02.120 that sounds like an interesting weekend. Did you have a good time? 00:13:02.730 --> 00:13:06.338 Yeah, exactly. And it was. But I think you're 00:13:06.354 --> 00:13:09.846 right. I wasn't comfortable enough in my own skin 00:13:10.038 --> 00:13:13.820 or where I was heading in my life. 00:13:14.590 --> 00:13:17.418 So that 00:13:17.584 --> 00:13:21.114 private weekend wasn't necessarily something that was worth 00:13:21.152 --> 00:13:24.846 sharing at that point, because I didn't know what it meant. I had no 00:13:24.868 --> 00:13:28.654 context. If someone asked me a question about it, I couldn't answer any 00:13:28.692 --> 00:13:32.206 question about it. Just was. So you're right, I 00:13:32.228 --> 00:13:35.554 wasn't hiding myself specifically, it was just nothing I wanted to 00:13:35.592 --> 00:13:38.802 share. So you mentioned 00:13:38.856 --> 00:13:42.498 earlier the concept of allowing people to thrive and 00:13:42.584 --> 00:13:46.280 belong, and I'm a great believer in those two words. 00:13:46.810 --> 00:13:50.598 Firstly, thrive. I should succeed or fail based on my 00:13:50.604 --> 00:13:54.294 own merits. And the environment around me allows me to 00:13:54.332 --> 00:13:58.038 succeed or fail on my own merits or gives me a 00:13:58.044 --> 00:14:01.882 comfort, blank insecurity to be able to work around that. So the work 00:14:01.936 --> 00:14:05.626 you do in your organisation at the moment, you really 00:14:05.648 --> 00:14:09.420 are focused on creating those environments, aren't you? Yeah, we really are. 00:14:10.130 --> 00:14:13.534 I think things started. We've always been really 00:14:13.572 --> 00:14:17.054 passionate about inclusion and I think the 00:14:17.092 --> 00:14:20.334 beginning, like most organisations, we probably were talking about 00:14:20.372 --> 00:14:24.154 diversity at that. Know, if we rewind 00:14:24.202 --> 00:14:27.534 years back, we were definitely talking about having diverse 00:14:27.582 --> 00:14:31.374 communities rather than inclusion. And I know that we've spoken 00:14:31.422 --> 00:14:35.086 before about this, Jo, but I think one of the things that really 00:14:35.128 --> 00:14:38.886 hit a lot of organisations potentially through the 00:14:38.908 --> 00:14:42.246 lockdown was the whole ed I kind 00:14:42.268 --> 00:14:45.654 of topic and became very 00:14:45.692 --> 00:14:49.146 commercial. There were lots of people popping up all over the place that claimed to 00:14:49.168 --> 00:14:52.634 be ed I experts and lots of folk that 00:14:52.752 --> 00:14:56.106 have some lived experiences that wanted to be involved in the 00:14:56.128 --> 00:14:59.798 conversations with corporates. And I think at Thales 00:14:59.894 --> 00:15:03.662 we were really curious about, well, what does that really look like 00:15:03.716 --> 00:15:07.454 for us and why would we be doing this? And one of the 00:15:07.492 --> 00:15:11.326 things that I became quite 00:15:11.428 --> 00:15:15.106 curious about was figuring out how you talk about Ed I in a 00:15:15.128 --> 00:15:18.882 business context. So how do you talk 00:15:18.936 --> 00:15:21.380 about the real kind of 00:15:22.150 --> 00:15:25.814 sensitive topics rather than just 00:15:25.852 --> 00:15:29.240 the real obvious ones? So we 00:15:29.690 --> 00:15:33.430 have measurements against gender 00:15:33.850 --> 00:15:36.966 and there are some complexities in our 00:15:36.988 --> 00:15:40.714 organisation because we're a global organisation as 00:15:40.752 --> 00:15:43.978 to data that we can kind of 00:15:44.144 --> 00:15:47.734 select and collect, Jo. 00:15:47.782 --> 00:15:50.990 But ultimately we had some gender 00:15:51.490 --> 00:15:55.054 targets, but beyond that there was little else. And I know that 00:15:55.092 --> 00:15:58.606 across the UK business we're really passionate about the 00:15:58.628 --> 00:16:02.138 topic of inclusion being beyond gender. 00:16:02.314 --> 00:16:06.066 So we started to think about, well, what does that mean? 00:16:06.168 --> 00:16:09.474 And I think one of the things that a lot of 00:16:09.512 --> 00:16:12.882 organisations are struggling with is to create a 00:16:13.016 --> 00:16:16.660 business conversation around Ed and I, 00:16:16.970 --> 00:16:20.786 not a conversation around it would be really great if we had diverse 00:16:20.818 --> 00:16:24.086 communities because, yeah, that would be really great. But 00:16:24.188 --> 00:16:28.034 folks struggle to put then measurements around that and what's 00:16:28.082 --> 00:16:31.190 ethically right to measure. How would we measure 00:16:31.790 --> 00:16:35.386 then? Would we need everyone to disclose? Would we need to 00:16:35.408 --> 00:16:38.666 have the conversations, Jo, that you and I have just been talking about, would we 00:16:38.688 --> 00:16:42.522 need everyone to share? Would they feel safe in doing that? What comes 00:16:42.576 --> 00:16:46.190 first? Do we create a if environment for everyone to share 00:16:46.260 --> 00:16:49.834 and then we need disclosure and then we can do this and that stops 00:16:49.882 --> 00:16:53.410 people having the right conversation. So 00:16:53.560 --> 00:16:57.314 I definitely think the maturity at Thales has been 00:16:57.352 --> 00:17:01.074 around how we talk in our organisation, around 00:17:01.112 --> 00:17:04.674 the importance of Ed and I and why 00:17:04.792 --> 00:17:08.614 it's important to us as a business, not just as an 00:17:08.652 --> 00:17:12.498 HR topic or as a diversity topic. 00:17:12.674 --> 00:17:16.374 So, yeah, we've been really passionate and been 00:17:16.412 --> 00:17:19.560 gaining a lot of momentum over the last couple of years, actually, 00:17:20.010 --> 00:17:23.466 as an example, in bringing in people like yourself, Jo, to talk to our 00:17:23.488 --> 00:17:27.274 leadership community, to help them to relate and understand 00:17:27.472 --> 00:17:30.694 to what inclusion really looks and feels like from a leadership 00:17:30.742 --> 00:17:34.400 perspective. I'm listening to what you're saying there about the focus, 00:17:35.170 --> 00:17:39.006 maybe over the last two years, around the COVID period, if you like, a 00:17:39.028 --> 00:17:42.000 lot of people talking around diversity, and I think 00:17:43.490 --> 00:17:46.834 it started off the Equality act, the Racial Relations Act, 00:17:46.952 --> 00:17:50.642 Discrimination act. It was all focused on characteristics, all focused on 00:17:50.776 --> 00:17:54.446 providing support, workplace adjustments, a pay gap 00:17:54.478 --> 00:17:58.274 analysis, focus on gender, focus on 00:17:58.312 --> 00:18:02.066 race, disability, with a bit of LGBTQ plus thrown 00:18:02.098 --> 00:18:05.430 in the background. And we're all focusing on single 00:18:05.500 --> 00:18:09.274 strand initiatives, how to employ more women or how 00:18:09.312 --> 00:18:12.986 to increase our ethnic diversity, or whatever it may be, 00:18:13.088 --> 00:18:16.934 without actually putting the structures in place around the belongingness, 00:18:16.982 --> 00:18:20.714 the welcomingness, the culture. And I always 00:18:20.752 --> 00:18:24.534 get frustrated when I'm talking to people about their hiring needs. 00:18:24.592 --> 00:18:28.378 Oh, we want to hire more diverse people, I say, okay, define 00:18:28.394 --> 00:18:32.206 what you mean by more diverse people. Do you mean people not like you? What 00:18:32.228 --> 00:18:35.906 do you mean by more diverse? So do you mean more women, more black 00:18:35.928 --> 00:18:39.698 people, more women of colour, more queer women, more lesbian women? What do you 00:18:39.704 --> 00:18:43.234 mean by that? Okay, 00:18:43.352 --> 00:18:47.114 unless you could be specific about what you're trying to achieve. 00:18:47.262 --> 00:18:51.046 Just by saying we want to hire more diverse people doesn't mean anything. It's not 00:18:51.068 --> 00:18:54.882 a quantifiable, it's a broader cohort or broader diversity 00:18:54.946 --> 00:18:58.754 of people in the funnel. But what do you mean? What's your objective? 00:18:58.802 --> 00:19:02.522 And I agree what you're saying there about the business benefit or the business 00:19:02.576 --> 00:19:06.298 objective, without overshadowing the people element. It's kind of 00:19:06.304 --> 00:19:09.660 got hand in hand, isn't it? But very often people don't have 00:19:10.430 --> 00:19:14.238 a trajectory. I talk about trajectory rather than a target or a 00:19:14.244 --> 00:19:18.026 quota. It's a statement of intense, statement of direction. Bit like the World Economic 00:19:18.058 --> 00:19:21.290 Forum talking about 70 or 80 years for gender 00:19:21.370 --> 00:19:25.134 equity in the western world. What the steps to get 00:19:25.172 --> 00:19:28.974 there because we're not achieving them. So it's more about the steps to get somewhere 00:19:29.102 --> 00:19:32.354 than it is around the actual target, as long as we're showing those 00:19:32.392 --> 00:19:35.300 steps incremental and making a difference. 00:19:35.910 --> 00:19:39.666 And I also think that Jo, that businesses are waiting 00:19:39.698 --> 00:19:42.674 for it to be perfect before they take action. So they're 00:19:42.722 --> 00:19:46.194 tentatively saying we want it to be a diverse 00:19:46.322 --> 00:19:49.738 business, but they're really worried about 00:19:49.904 --> 00:19:53.402 exposing themselves to not be perfect. So we're not 00:19:53.456 --> 00:19:57.306 perfect at Thales, we know that. Can we do 00:19:57.408 --> 00:20:01.114 more to make our culture more inclusive? Absolutely. Of course we can and we will 00:20:01.152 --> 00:20:04.606 continue to do so. Do we have a 00:20:04.628 --> 00:20:08.334 diverse group of talent in our business right now? We 00:20:08.372 --> 00:20:12.142 do, but not where we would like it to be. And when you say, 00:20:12.276 --> 00:20:15.220 well, where is that? Well that's a place where 00:20:15.910 --> 00:20:19.538 I sit around a board table and I see and feel 00:20:19.704 --> 00:20:23.186 difference in the room and there's a collective intelligence of 00:20:23.208 --> 00:20:26.902 difference. And that therefore means I'm not talking 00:20:26.956 --> 00:20:30.598 about gender or race and ethnicity. It's a 00:20:30.604 --> 00:20:34.134 lot more than that. It's about neurodivergence, it's about all of those 00:20:34.172 --> 00:20:37.494 topics and differences. And 00:20:37.612 --> 00:20:41.066 therefore I think you can't really have a 00:20:41.088 --> 00:20:44.842 strategy that's one dimensional. So you can't say, 00:20:44.976 --> 00:20:48.666 okay, this year we're going to be focused on ethnicity, or this year 00:20:48.688 --> 00:20:52.306 we're going to be focused on this. Totalis 00:20:52.358 --> 00:20:55.550 Veterans is a really important 00:20:55.700 --> 00:20:59.486 pool of people that we want to be included in our 00:20:59.508 --> 00:21:01.790 workforce. So there's 00:21:03.330 --> 00:21:06.466 various different pools of people that we want to be attractive to. And I think 00:21:06.488 --> 00:21:09.986 it's that intersectionality and understanding where all of the 00:21:10.008 --> 00:21:13.650 crossovers lie. And that's if we can create 00:21:13.800 --> 00:21:17.250 a safe, trusting, psychologically 00:21:17.330 --> 00:21:21.000 safe environment for people to work in, then 00:21:21.450 --> 00:21:25.046 if we talk about that, if we share outside of the 00:21:25.068 --> 00:21:28.794 organisation and inside of the organisation what we're doing to 00:21:28.832 --> 00:21:32.310 get to that place, then we will naturally 00:21:32.470 --> 00:21:36.202 start to attract talent from all 00:21:36.256 --> 00:21:39.418 different organisations that are not doing that, that are not 00:21:39.504 --> 00:21:43.246 being overtly explicit in what 00:21:43.268 --> 00:21:46.922 they're doing. So we've recently launched a number of new policies 00:21:46.986 --> 00:21:50.798 that support people in our environment, to leaders to 00:21:50.804 --> 00:21:54.590 have the right conversations and employees to have the right conversations. 00:21:54.930 --> 00:21:58.162 And we've won awards for those and we're really proud of that 00:21:58.216 --> 00:22:01.826 because does a policy change a culture? No, of course 00:22:01.848 --> 00:22:05.650 not. But it does mean for somebody in the business that 00:22:05.720 --> 00:22:09.382 might be, let's say, transitioning, that they 00:22:09.436 --> 00:22:13.190 can find that policy and say, what are my rights here? What 00:22:13.260 --> 00:22:17.058 should I expect this to feel like at work? And I know that's 00:22:17.074 --> 00:22:20.922 a topic that you and your wife have spoken at Tulis about. 00:22:20.976 --> 00:22:24.570 And that's really helped us to scope out 00:22:24.720 --> 00:22:28.554 what our thoughts are as a business and how we support people, because that's really 00:22:28.592 --> 00:22:32.346 important as leaders and as a business, we understand how we should do 00:22:32.368 --> 00:22:36.094 that. Right. So you need the policies, but you also need to then talk 00:22:36.132 --> 00:22:39.966 about that and say, we have these new policies, and 00:22:39.988 --> 00:22:43.806 this is what we expect of our leaders when someone in their team 00:22:43.908 --> 00:22:47.522 is talking to them about transitioning. Here you go. This is what we expect 00:22:47.576 --> 00:22:51.426 from you. And we're really clear that we measure that and we look at it 00:22:51.448 --> 00:22:55.250 from both sides. The experience of the employee and the experience of the leader. 00:22:55.670 --> 00:22:59.414 I think, Jo, that does help for people to 00:22:59.452 --> 00:23:03.238 understand what the culture should feel like and whether or not it would be a 00:23:03.244 --> 00:23:06.726 safe place to have that level of open conversation and 00:23:06.748 --> 00:23:08.760 disclosure that they might need to have. 00:23:10.590 --> 00:23:14.266 People generally get it. Let me 00:23:14.288 --> 00:23:17.674 explain what I mean by that. So do they understand why it 00:23:17.712 --> 00:23:20.954 matters, all the things we talk about, Edi, 00:23:21.082 --> 00:23:24.826 HR, positive experiences. Do you think people truly 00:23:24.858 --> 00:23:28.666 get the why, or are they just maybe latching 00:23:28.698 --> 00:23:32.462 on to wokism and politically correctness and we can't say anything 00:23:32.516 --> 00:23:36.258 these days? The average layperson is going, this is 00:23:36.264 --> 00:23:40.078 just too complicated today. Yeah, I think that's 00:23:40.094 --> 00:23:43.714 a really good point. I don't think they do get it. So in the 00:23:43.752 --> 00:23:47.062 communities that I kind of am part 00:23:47.116 --> 00:23:50.790 of, like, say, learning communities, HR communities, 00:23:51.210 --> 00:23:54.998 I would say that probably about 00:23:55.084 --> 00:23:58.714 70% of people still don't get 00:23:58.752 --> 00:24:02.522 it. And I think in 00:24:02.576 --> 00:24:05.850 a business it's even less so. I'm really 00:24:05.920 --> 00:24:09.686 clear when I'm talking about Ed and I that what I'm 00:24:09.718 --> 00:24:12.998 talking about is this collective intelligence notion. 00:24:13.094 --> 00:24:16.846 So that we've got. Let's take a problem. Let's take an 00:24:16.868 --> 00:24:20.174 example in a business. So you've got a problem, you're trying to solve a problem. 00:24:20.372 --> 00:24:23.970 Who would you best select to be around the table to solve the problem? 00:24:24.040 --> 00:24:27.554 Now, of course, if it's a technical issue, you've got 00:24:27.672 --> 00:24:31.342 the technical dimension of the people that will have the knowledge 00:24:31.406 --> 00:24:35.220 of that technical capability. But other than that, 00:24:35.670 --> 00:24:39.026 the same people from the same backgrounds, with the same lived 00:24:39.058 --> 00:24:42.422 experiences, with the same tenure of service, with the same 00:24:42.476 --> 00:24:46.246 sexuality, with all of those characteristics of the 00:24:46.268 --> 00:24:50.040