It’s an uncomfortable truth but many employers claim they value and practise D&I but it often amounts to little more than window dressing.
Stephen Frost, who delivered ground breaking D&I initiatives at the London Olympics and Paralympics, gives his frank and honest views on how to really deliver meaningful D&I in the workplace. Hosted by Barry Phillips, Legal Island.

Who is Stephen Frost?
Named in 2022 one of the top ten Most Influential HR Thinkers by HR Magazine, Stephen Frost is a leadership, communications and inclusion expert. He works with clients worldwide to embed inclusion in their decision making as CEO and Founder of Included. He was formerly Head of Diversity and Inclusion for the London Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) 2007-2012, and is currently a Visiting Fellow with the Women and Public Policy Program at Harvard Kennedy School. He is also Vice President (Diversity) of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.

Recording

Transcript:

Barry:  Good morning to everyone. My name is Barry Phillips. I'm the Chairman of Legal-Island, and it's my huge pleasure to welcome you all here today to this webinar, which is entitled "Beyond Ticking the Box: Creating Real Impact with Inclusion at Work". And delighted to have one of the leading UK D&I practitioners to talk to us about this subject, Stephen Frost.

Stephen was head of diversity and inclusion for the Olympic and Paralympic Games in London in 2012. His team achieved unprecedented workforce inclusion for the time across the 200,000 staff with 9% disabled, 40% ethnic minority, 46% female, and 5% LGBT staff.

Before joining the London Olympics, Stephen was the first ever director of Workplace Programs at Stonewall, establishing an LGBT Leadership Program, the UK's first LGBT recruitment guide, and developing the Workplace Equality Index. Stephen teaches at Harvard University, USA, Sciences Po in France, and organisations across the world.

As lead consultant in Included, a company he founded, he advises the International Paralympic Committee, BP, and the governments of the United Kingdom and Singapore on inclusive leadership, as well as many employers across Britain and the island of Ireland.

Stephen is author or co-author of numerous books on diversity and inclusion, including the "The Inclusion Imperative" in 2014, "Building an Inclusive Organisation" in 2019, and "The Key to Inclusion" in 2022.

Stephen, good morning. Welcome to the webinar.

Stephen:  Morning, Barry. Thanks very much for having me along.

Barry:  Not at all. It's always a pleasure working with you, Stephen. Out of all of that biography that I just read out to you, I think it's really the books I'd just like to ask you about. Is there a standout book? Was there one that was particularly easy to write, was really important to you, or that you think has made a particularly strong impact?

Stephen:  Yeah. I love your shirt, by the way, Barry.

Barry:  Thank you.

Stephen:  Yeah. The book, I think the last one, "The Key to Inclusion", because it was co-written with 11 wonderful co-authors. And it wasn't just, I think, the latest diversity/inclusion research and practitioner advice. It was the way it was done. It wasn't just the proverbial white bloke writing a book. It was generally the most diverse author crew you could imagine sharing their work, research, lived experience in a really helpful way for the hardy HR practitioner. So, that last book, "The Key to Inclusion", I think would be my standout fave.

Barry:  Great. And Stephen, your subject today is one that I know that you asked to speak about specifically, which is "Beyond Ticking the Box: Creating Real Impact with Inclusion in the Workplace". We've had over 500 registered, so a lot of interest. It's clearly very topical. Looking forward to what you've got to say there.

Stephen:  Great. Well, Barry, thank you ever so much again, and thanks to you and the whole team at Legal-Island. You've been delightful to work with, and for quite a few years now.

And yes, I'm very passionate about this session today, and I'm really thrilled that so many people have signed up, because clearly we've hit a nerve.

I've been working diversity and inclusion for nearly 25 years, and a lot has changed in that time. And it comes to the point really after a couple of decades where you don't just want to do another webinar. With all due respect to webinars, I'm kind of webinared out. So what you want to do really is have a useful conversation.

So it will be, I hope, good news to you folks joining us today that I am going to use zero PowerPoint, zero gimmickry, and just talk, quite frankly, from the heart and hopefully a little bit from the head about what I've learned over the last 25 years in diversity and inclusion and how, please, we can go beyond ticking the box and actually create some real impact in your organisations.

So Barry gave me a very kind introduction there, and that's lovely. But if I look back on a couple of decades plus in this space, on the one hand, you'd be forgiven for getting a little bit down or depressed, wouldn't you? There are still a lot of challenges in the world. We are joining this webinar today, but we know that there's a lot going on in the world, a lot still that needs addressing and fixing.

But I think to do this work, you've got to have a growth mind-set, and you've got to try and dig deep and find positivity and actually look at the evidence that's out there that can help fuel your energy for this work.

I'm always reminded of a quote by my old history teacher, Rob Tibbetts, who said that we often spend the time climbing the mountain looking back up at the summit at how far we've still got to climb, and that summit seems unobtainable. But we don't spend enough time looking back at how far we've already come.

And I think that's really important to do this work. It's not in any way to belittle the challenges that remain, the underrepresentation that exists, the discrimination that still goes on. It's not in any way to diminish that, but it is to say that we do have to take heart where we have made change, and we have made progress, because that will nourish us for the journey ahead.

And if I think about over the last couple of decades, there has been positive change. With my own self, as a gay guy getting married, I couldn't have done that even 10 years ago.

Republic of Ireland, of course, was the first country I think in the world to put a vote to the popular vote, and actually overwhelmingly back marriage for everybody a few years ago. That was unthinkable 10, 20 years ago.

We look at, for example, the Good Friday Agreement that, despite all the challenges, is holding. And the last 25 years have been far more peaceful in the north than the previous 25 years.

If I think about disability and certainly my involvement in the Paralympics, we've still got a huge mountain to climb on accessibility. But public consciousness and media representation of disabled folks or folks from racial minorities is higher than it's ever been. And we've got to take heart from that.

I think the conversation around menopause, paternity, maternity, wellbeing, these things are now more prescient than they've ever been. And again, we need to take heart from that.

I think this is very positive framing and essential framing for the work that we're going to do if you want to really create impact in our workplaces.

So look, I'd like to do three things today. I'd like to simply talk about the what, the state of the nation. What is the essential baseline for doing this work? I'd like to talk about the who. Who does it? Is it you? Should it be your responsibility? And I'd like to talk about the how. So what are those actual real techniques and real conversations that actually create change and get results? So, the what, the who, and the how is what I'd like to focus on in the time we've got together this morning.

If I look at back again at what I've learned in preparing for this webinar, my background in many ways is commercial, like advertising, consulting, and so forth. That commerciality is really important because D&I can suffer from a lack of commerciality.

And if you don't tie this to the P&L in a private sector organisation, you ain't going to create change and impact. And even in a public sector organisation, if you don't tie it to the key KPIs or the CEO, it isn't going to be driven through the business. So I think that commerciality, that background that I learned in advertising, was really, really important.

But I knew I think even back then that something wasn't quite right. There was, despite protestations, a lack of meritocracy. There was actually a lack of really good people getting promoted. It was a hands-up culture, and it was clear that justice wasn't always being served, let alone meritocracy and efficiency.

And I think what I learned at Harvard through race equality and gender equality, or Stonewall and LGBT, or the Olympics and disability, is that you've got to really get into the nuance of these issues. If you just treat different people the same, you'll get unequal results.

You've got to increase your own cultural intelligence. You've got to increase your own curiosity about difference in order to treat different people differently in order to get equitable results.

And again, if I think about teaching at various business schools, students will say, "Well, that isn't right", and they'll hold up their computer with a new piece of research, new evidence, or a new paper from a more recent publication. So again, keeping on top of the news and on top of research is really important, which is why webinars like this . . . Just keeping up to date with journals and so forth is really important.

So look, I think for me, how do we get into this what, this who, and this how? I'd like to really avoid platitudes, avoid PowerPoint, have a really honest conversation about how to get meaningful work done.

And please, if I'm provocative or even borderline offensive, I'm sorry. Ask a question, put something in the chat, get it to Barry, and we'll try and address as many of your questions and thoughts as we possibly can in a short while.

 So let's kick off with the what.

When I look at organisations, there are really four kind of levels of maturity, if you like, that they're exhibiting on diversity and inclusion. And I'd like you to think about how mature your organisation is on this.

Often, people approach this from the deficit model. What is the problem we're trying to fix? And that could be fine for the first stage of the maturity model, which I call Diversity 101, compliance. Staying out of jail, making sure we've done the basic hygiene factors, gender pay gaps, ethnicity pay gaps, making sure that we are avoiding lawsuits, that we're complying with the Equality Act, and so forth.

And that compliance is really important. It's essential foundation. We've got some good legislation in place, but that can often be a deficit model, right? Just checking that we're avoiding risk.

There's a second level to the maturity model, which I call Diversity 2.0. And this is really around kind of gaining value through PR, communications, marketing. And this is important too, right? It's important, I think, to put out there good practice, to get credit for good work.

But of course, treat this with a note of caution. If I think about Black Lives Matter in 2022, or the response to a lot of gender issues in the media today, we can look at a lot of pinkwashing here, like we have greenwashing in sustainability generally.

If I think about the noise that was created in 2020 about Black Lives Matter, and I look at those same companies today, the volume has gone down, right? So it's important to communicate stuff, but it's even more important to have substance to the argument. What I learned in advertising was that good communications has a product truth at its heart.

The third stage in the maturity model would be what I call Inclusion 3.0, where we actually get to embedding inclusion and diversity, equity, and inclusion in the everyday business of the organisation.

So examples here would be from pharmaceuticals where it's great that HR is doing diversity and inclusion, but it's even greater now that they're putting it into clinical trials. So we're seeing a director of clinical trial diversity at AstraZeneca or GSK, thinking about the composition of the population that are going through drug testing, which affects the quality of results and the efficacy of the drugs that are produced to ultimately save more lives, particularly of folks from minority background.

Or if you think about tech. I've had the pleasure to work with Kainos in Northern Ireland, or other great tech firms. We think now not just about HR, but actually about how do we think about algorithm design or general engineering or coding so that the products we create are more equitable and more inclusive to a wider range of users than just thinking about it from our own perspective. So this embedding in what we do is really important.

And then ultimately, the fourth level of a maturity model will be Inclusion 4.0, where we're actually changing the system to make things more equitable or inclusive.

If I think about Cloudflare, another tech company that I work with, there, for example, they actually changed their engineering/coding design process so that we'd think about equity and inclusion and we'd think about different end users before we actually progressed through the algorithm design and the end product user design.

Or if I think about the Wellcome Trust, the world's second biggest fund of health research, we found there that folks with a disability were less likely to ask for flexible working, even though they would disproportionately benefit from flexible working.

So we redesigned the process just to make flexible working the default. So rather than having to request flexible working, you just opt out of it. And that massively increased the safety and ability of disabled folks to take advantage of flexible working arrangements, which led to their better engagement, low attrition, and so forth and so forth.

So I hope those four kind of pillars of maturity make sense really from 101, deficit model, compliance, doing it because you have to; to 2.0, communications and marketing, which can be important, but check it's not pinkwashing; to 3.0, embedding it in what you do, which is great that everyone's doing it as a daily basis; to 4.0, where you're actually changing some of those processes to make them more inclusive and you're redesigning things to make them better for everyone.

So if you think about your own organisation right now, what I'd love to do is bring back Barry and do a quick poll with you, and ask you, "Really, how mature is your organisation in these four levels? Where would you put yourself?" So Barry, could you help us with that?

Barry:  Absolutely. Thank you, Stephen. And hopefully the poll should be dropping in. Here it is. How mature is your organisation on DEI? Please select one of these: Diversity 101, Diversity 2.0, 3.0, or 4.0. If you'd like to vote now, we can then see what the results are.

I'm just thinking about our own organisation at Legal-Island in terms of what I might select there myself. And I can do that as well.

Okay. And Arnold, can I just ask did the results come through there? They didn't come through on my screen. Yes, there we are.

Diversity 2.0 is in the lead, and then Diversity 101, and then Diversity 4.0 seems to have no votes at all. So it's Diversity 2.0, Diversity 101, and then Diversity 3.0 and 4.0. So thank you for that quick poll.

Arnold, if I can just ask you to go to the next slide before I hand back to Stephen and I ask, Stephen, for your views on that. This is, I think, an opportune moment for us to mention a certificate course that is starting in September of this year. It's an eight-week online course starting on 20 September, organised by Legal-Island in conjunction with Included. It covers the key components of D&I relevant to today's workforce and is intended for anyone concerned with devising and implementing meaningful D&I in the workplace.

It will be delivered by some of the finest D&I practitioners available. It will be led by Stephen, but he'll also be joined by others, including Lydia Collins, who's a highly experienced practitioner, and Raafi-Karim Alidina, who always gets fabulous reviews whenever he works with us at Legal-Island. More information on this course will be sent through to everyone at the end of the webinar.

I might add that numbers are strictly limited on this course, and there is an early bird discount that expires at the end of this month. So if you are interested in that, please do pay attention to the email that will come through and to follow that through as quickly as you can.

So, Stephen, were you surprised by the results that came from that? Diversity 2.0 seems to be where a lot of organisations are at the moment. Does that surprise you, or disappoint you?

Stephen:  No. I mean, I think that's fair. Thanks to everyone for giving us that feedback. I think that it's fair. I think a lot of folks overstate the maturity, when actually we do a quick diagnosis and we find out that a lot of people are still really driven by compliance.

So there's a fair amount, I think about a third, 38%, on that poll, that were still at 101, which is honest, right? Which is fine. It's getting that basics right. But I guess it's how we then progress up.

And so yeah, 42% or something I think at Diversity 2.0, that's great. People are obviously talking about it, entering awards, doing stuff, and that's fantastic, but it's about how we then push it further and make sure that the basics are there.

There was a CIPD report published last year that said that actually under half of employers, I think 48%, said they had a standalone D&I strategy or action plan in support of their wider strategy, which is great. But I think over a third said that they were not planning to focus on any I&D areas in the next five years. Only 7% of organisations had a specific I&D budget, which is interesting.

I think it really is at that interesting stage. And I'd love as we go through this webinar to kind of get thoughts and questions from folks on how we can push us from Diversity 101 to 2.0, to 3.0, to 4.0 to see some really great impact.

Barry:  Stephen, thank you. And just on the question of questions, just to remind everybody if you have questions for Stephen as we go through this, do put them in in the chat as we go through. And assuming we've got time, I'll be passing those back to Stephen.

So, Stephen, I'll see you at the end of the webinar, and I'll just disappear for now. Thank you.

Stephen:  Thanks, Barry. Again, thanks, everyone. I hope that was kind of an interesting start on the what, the state of the nation, those four levels and where you think you are.

I think it's really important to be honest about where you are and where you want to get to, and ultimately to have a strategy, to have a plan, and to really frame it not as deficit model, but if at all possible as value-add. How can we frame this positively for the business and link it in to the key KPIs from the CEO down?

So the second thing I want to talk about is the who. Who's doing this work? Is it you? Should it be you? Who's responsible? Who's accountable? And in my experience, I've seen a wide variety of folks lead on this, and to greater or lesser impact.

What often tends to happen is you've got various folks who've got a stake in the game, who've got a slice of the pie, who've got some seat at the table on this issue.

You might have a diversity and inclusion lead themselves. This person might or might not have a team. They might be relatively junior. They might actually have quite a convoluted reporting line to where the decisions actually get made, and they may well not have a budget. Therefore, there's a big debate about whether the D&I person is actually empowered or not and has got the resources, the capability, maybe the credibility to get things done.

Then you've got the HRD, of course, who's critical in any organisation. Where are they on this issue? Twenty years ago, they were often quite sceptical or even resistant to diversity and inclusion because it was seen as a change programme and extra work. Now they can be the biggest advocate of that programme. So I think knowing where the HRD is, is really important.

The CEO, clearly. Where's the CEO on this? And are they educated on it? Are they aware of it? Do they recognise it's their responsibility?

Other C-suite folks, particularly legal, finance, comms, they can be real enablers or real blockers of this work.

And so I think getting the key folks in an organisation on message and briefed and educated is critically important.

You might then have employee networks who can really help and be a resource primarily for staff, but ultimately for the organisation themselves. Can they help and inform and navigate the organisation to the external market?

And ultimately, if you think about all these people and you think about the stakeholder map in the organisation, who's doing the work?

Included partners with organisations to get work done. We are a global impact-led D&I consultancy, and generally speaking, the person we'd be offered from the organisation would be the D&I lead. That might be the right person. They might have the capability, the capacity, and the credibility to get things done, but they might not.

And so it might be that we partner with them and triage with the C-suite, the CEO, the HRD, a board member, but triage between those people, act as a broker between those people, to join the dots and get things done.

That triaging is really important and it's often what doesn't happen in organisations. This work is often siloed when it's the work that needs to be the least siloed possible.

Ultimately, if it's just a D&I person that takes this on, it won't be in the job description, or the KPIs, or the compensation, or the incentives of the key people in the organisation, like legal, comms, marketing, finance, delivery, that ultimately will make the organisation more inclusive. So I think it's important to think about the education of these folks.

The theory of change we use at Included is "understand, lead, and deliver".

Do they understand what this is? Are they operating from a deficit model or value model?

Do they lead? Do they get that it's their work, not your work? That you can't outsource leadership, and if you want to change behaviours, it starts with your own, the self-awareness, and so forth?

And then are they delivering? Are they actually doing things for inclusion or just talking about it? Do they actually have linked KPIs and so forth that they can be held accountable to, 360s, and so forth?

So understand, lead, and deliver is our theory of change. And if you go back to that stakeholder map of the D&I person, C-suite, the HRD, and so forth, who's doing it? Are we triaging? Are we holding people accountable and responsible to get work done?

Generally speaking, the workload needs to be commensurate with power, decision-making authority, and ability. And the three Cs I often think about are capacity, capability, and credibility. Do they have the capacity to get it done, the resources, and so forth? Do they have the capability to get it done? Do they know what the work is, can operate at the right level? And do they have the credibility to get the work done? Will they kind of have the impact and the intended impact on the audience and their internal clients?

So if we kind of think about the stakeholder map, our theory of change, and capacity, capability, and credibility, we can start to work out who is doing the work and who should be doing the work. And critically, how can you co-opt other people to share the burden and lead on this work?

So that's, I think, really important. And when I see things not go well or a lack of impact in organisations, it's often because the right people are doing the work, but the right people aren't kind of taking responsibility and accountability for that work.

So I hope that kind of makes sense. The workload needs to be commensurate with power, decision-making authority, and capability, and think about capacity, capability, and credibility. That who is really important.

So I think we've got a second poll on who's doing this work, and I'd be really interested to hear from you all on an honest appraisal of who is doing the work in your organisation. Who advocates that work? So Barry, perhaps I could pass back to you and we could do that second poll to actually see from folks where they're at on this issue.

Barry:  Yes, absolutely. Our techy, I think, is on the case, and here we go. So who actually advocates DEI in your organisation? Please select all that apply. And I'll just give a few moments for people to make their selection there.

And just to remind everybody as we wait, if you've got any questions, just please put them in the chat and fire them through, and we'll try and get to them in about 10 minutes' time.

Okay. Arnold, I think we could then go to the results. That would be useful. And there we go.

Stephen:  Very interesting.

Barry:  So there we are. HR director, clear lead there. Then it's neck and neck between employee networks and DEI lead, and then CEO.

So back to you, Stephen. Any surprises there for you?

Stephen:  Well, that's really encouraging. I'm going to assume that not everyone on this call is an HR director and therefore they're saying, "It's me, it's me, it's me". But that's really encouraging that we've got a lot of HRDs really leading on this. I think two-thirds there.

But again, we could see there that the lowest score, I think, was other C-suites, which kind of demonstrates my point. We've got to do the work to get others bought into this, the legal folks, communication folks, marketing folks, finance folks, that they can realise what their role is in this too.

So that's really interesting, actually. Thanks for sharing that. And I hope that's an interesting reflection back to everyone else as well.

I guess the final point I wanted to land on . . . If we think about the what, the state of the nation, the who, who's doing this work, we've just had some really interesting insights there on HRDs leading the charge, then I guess it's about the how, right? It's about how are we actually going to really create this impact in the workplace?

And I've had the real privilege and pleasure to discuss this with lots of clients over the years. I was discussing with a Danish client actually yesterday. And if I think about how, I'd kind of like to run through a few questions really that perhaps you can reflect on, as well, as we go.

If we think about what the goal is here, what have the changes been in your organisation in the last few years? Have we increased diversity on the board of the exec? Have we increased inclusion scores in the employee engagement survey? Have we lowered attrition from underrepresented groups? Have we positioned the organisation more positively to stakeholders? Have we achieved the goals we've set ourselves?

And when I talk to clients, they work with us because we're credible and we can get work done and so forth. But ultimately, this goes beyond the business case to a kind of heart thing, right?

Ultimately, I think most people who want to advocate this work do it because they care, and they're perhaps a bit activist by heart, right? They're passionate about it. They want to take a stand on issues related to social justice and equity and so forth, and they want to see change.

And so that passion, that activism is wonderful, but it's got to be combined with professionalism if you want to be taken seriously by that other C-suite, by those folks who are the internal audience of this work, by those folks who are not yet on board.

So there's this balance to be struck between the activism and the passion and kind of the rational professional, as it were. Getting that balance right is critical to be taken seriously and credibly by the people you need to get on side. So balancing that activism and professionalism as a professional is really important.

And if I think about this, it's not in any way to belittle passion. Passion is the essential ingredient. It's that nourishment I talked about at the very beginning of this webinar, right? You need that passion to push for change, to address systemic injustice and inequities, and you need that really to keep you going on a tough day, that you believe in a bigger prize.

But it can come across to other people as disruptive or even unprofessional, because people can then stereotype you as being biased or lacking neutrality or objectivity. And therefore, it can lower your ability to create impact.

One of the things I've seen D&I advocates get wrong is they've overstated the business case. Now, there is a business case for this work, absolutely, in terms of talent attraction, promotion, retention, in terms of engagement scores, productivity. There's absolutely a business case, right? We can prove the correlation between diversity and performance very easily. But it's not the only thing that impacts organisational performance, right?

A lot of things affect organisational performance, from budget, to market conditions, to all kinds of things. And so don't overstate the case, because people who don't like diversity inclusion or aren't on board yet might feel threatened, and they'll ask you for the business case. If you overstate it, they won't take you seriously, right?

So I think it is about saying that, of course, there is a business case, but it's one of many, many factors. And you acknowledge that from the CFO's perspective, they've got a margin issue right now and they're trying to cut costs. You understand from the legal perspective that the lawyer's trying to deal with a major organisational risk issue right now, and you get it. You get that from the marketing perspective, the quality of the product might be really, really important as well as just the diversity and inclusion stance.

So yes, there is a case for this, but putting it in context, situating it in the multiple issues impacting performance is really important to get buy-in and credibility.

I think the other bit of the how that's important is really packaging passion. Passion is a double-edged sword, right? So as I've said before, clients love passion. People love the passion. I could be an accountant or a consultant, but I'm a D&I leader and professional because it's what gets me out of bed in the morning. So that passion is important.

But that passion often comes from a very personal place. My sister being disabled, my own experiences of homophobia, and seeing injustice based on class or background, right? That passion can be really inspirational for people, but it can also be terrifying or intimidating for others.

So you've got to package that passion in a way that helps achieve the goal. And if it's getting buy-in, or getting funding, or getting a decision that you need in a meeting, package that passion.

And linked to that is the fact that it's not about us. People often go into diversity and inclusion because of personal passion, because of your race or your sexuality or your gender or the discrimination you've experienced. That is valid and good, and I get it. But ultimately, the work is about the other person. It's about the person who's not yet on board, and they might not come from the same background as you.

So actually, it's really hard to tell colleagues in this space that it's not about you, it's about the client. It's about actually the person you're trying to get on board. That stakeholder who's an amber or red, not a green yet, right?

And often, these folks can be white, middle-aged men. Not always, but often. And it's actually how we can listen to them, get them on board, reduce the defensiveness, kind of deal with what's in it for them to get them on board to help everyone benefit from this.

So, as a white guy myself, I've clearly got privilege already, right? In the sense that clients and other stakeholders can perhaps already expect me to be smart, professional, and so forth. I've got that privilege already.

If you're female, you've got the double bind, the stereotype threat, that if you play into the stereotype by exhibiting traditional female traits such as warmth or compassion, then you might be perceived as likeable, but often less competent or credible.

Or you can behave assertively, outside the stereotype, but then you potentially have the risk of being perceived as bossy or unlikeable.

So, that is a really, really important thing to be aware of, and how we navigate that double bind is really important.

We can think about packaging the passion, realising who is the audience we're trying to get on board and how we can best get that change through.

Another final top tip that I've got on the how is really walking this line between colluding and challenging. You've got to dance on the dance floor to get people to dance, right? So you've got to kind of be in it to win it. But if you only entertain and you only go along, you don't challenge or create change.

So the tactics we use vary, right? You've got to kind of think about this as a symphony. You've got to go with the music. If you're constantly being noisy and playing a symphony that no one's listening to, no one is going to listen. But if you play a piece of music that they already know and they listen, then you can kind of move them onto the next section, which is maybe a bit louder or a bit softer, but you can kind of make it more your tune.

So you've got to think about this as don't blast them out of orbit to start with so they're never even going to listen. Play their tune, get them on the dance floor, and then subtly change the music as you go, right?

So build that trust. Establish that positive relationship with stakeholders, which may require some collusion, collaboration, and compromise. But then it's using that affinity bias to then get them on to challenge their confirmation bias and actually doing things a little bit differently.

I've met so many colleagues and clients who really don't like sports, and you might hate sports, but if you can talk about it for 30 seconds and get folks into the conversation and then change the subject, fantastic.

If they drink alcohol and you don't, can you at least kind of have a conversation with somebody and then get them on to something different?

These small actions are so important if you want to build trust, the foundation of relationships with people who are different from us. If you've earned that trust, then we can use that trust to create change.

So look, I'm really conscious of time. There's so much more I could talk about in terms of adapting our approach, change management, and so forth, but I'll try to just have a few final thoughts before I hand back to Barry for some Q&A.

In all this work, which seems enormous, there are things we can do, right? I've talked a little bit about the state of the nation, being honest about where we're starting from, and framing it really positively.

I've talked a little about leadership, and actually who's doing the work? How can we get people to take responsibility for that work?

And I've talked a bit about the how, that balance between passion and professionalism, not overstating the business case, passion being a double-edged sword. It's not about us. It's about them. Walking that line between colluding and challenging.

But if I think about all the stuff that's on our plate, there are a lot of biases out there. One is affinity bias, who we know, and one is confirmation bias, what we know.

And if you can actually play into affinity bias and do that relationship building, do that trust building, get people on board, get their defensiveness down, then you've got permission to challenge confirmation bias, what they already know, what they think they already know, and get them to change their worldview on diversity and inclusion.

Diversity and inclusion is change management, ultimately, and it is about leadership. If at the end of this webinar you're thinking, "Crikey, this is tough stuff" . . .

Look, you might be a brilliant manager, and if you want to do management, that's great. Management is about operating within established parameters already. But diversity and inclusion work is about leadership, and leadership is about changing those parameters. It's about changing what's possible. It is, in a sense, about asking for forgiveness rather than permission.

All of us have got a lot on. There will never be enough time. There will never be enough resources. But one thing that we do have that's free, that's infinite, and completely within our own control is our own capacity to lead. Diversity is a reality. Inclusion is a choice. So how we think about that is really important.

Thanks ever so much for giving up your time this morning. I hope that's been an interesting overview of "Beyond Ticking the Box", how we can create some real impact in the workplace with a few honest reflections from my heart and head over many years in this space. And I look forward to your questions and follow-up. Thanks very much.

Barry:  Stephen, thank you for that. As always, a really, really fascinating presentation, and you've taken us through some really important points there. I'm delighted to say I'm not surprised we've got some great questions in. So I'll see if I can just perhaps group a few of these and get probably the best questions over to you as quickly as I can.

There's one question in which I think I can group with another, and this is, "Any specific research you would recommend on the benefits of strong DEI for a data-driven senior leadership team?" And I'll just pair that with another question that's in, which is, "Are there any books, films, articles you could recommend for a CEO who just doesn't get diversity and inclusion?"

Stephen:  Thank you for those questions. Really appreciate the honesty. And the good news is yes, yes, yes, we absolutely can.

It's not just what you give the CEO. It's how you give the CEO, right? It's just the framing.

There's a ton of resource on our website, Included.com. We've got zillions of things on there, case studies, reports, stats, facts. So Included.com, there's loads on there.

But off the top of my head, a really great book, apart from my own of course, is "The Difference" by Scott Page. Brilliant book. It's a good 10 years old now, but it stands the test of time. And Scott was a mathematics professor at MIT and he proved the case for the added value of diversity mathematically. So "The Difference" by Scott Page, I would highly recommend.

The CIPD report from last year is great. I'm talking at the CIPD actually on Thursday in Belfast, so I might see a few of you there. But the CIPD report from last year was fantastic with a bunch of stats.

The "McKinsey Quarterly". So McKinsey do a quarterly report, which is really good and has lots of things in, which get on well with business leaders.

"The Economist" has loads of great articles on diversity and inclusion and is weekly, and the C-suite read it. So there's a ton there.

Films, there's loads. And again, that might provoke more of the passion, a different part of the brain to the rational. Again, loads there. We've got some clips, again, on our website. And if there are any specifics you want or there's a particular CEO you have in mind, very happy to follow up and tailor that to the needs of the person.

Barry:  Great. Thank you, Stephen. I might throw in my own, if I may dare, which is Matthew Syed's "Rebel Ideas: The Power of Diverse Thinking". It's always popular with people I speak to in the D&I space.

So next question would be . . . Let's have a look. This one. "I'd be interested to hear thoughts on socioeconomic inclusion in industries which rely heavily on graduates, specifically Master's graduates, which, making a generalisation, excludes a lot of people from poorer backgrounds and a way to avoid internal red brick/Oxbridge C-suites". Big question there. In the next four minutes, if you can manage that, thank you.

Stephen:  I'll go quickly. Thank you for that. I really appreciate the thought you're giving that's behind that question, because we don't just want to perpetuate, I guess, privilege.

There are some amazing organisations that are addressing exactly this question. Academy run by a wonderful CEO called Ash is doing exactly that. We've partnered with Ash on a few projects. They take folks from very underprivileged backgrounds, underrepresented backgrounds, and really put them through a three-year boot camp to get folks the skills and the opportunities that they deserve to absolutely be the kind of graduates you want to hire. So check out Academy.

UpRising does that as well, another great organisation that focuses particularly on social exclusion and folks from lower socioeconomic backgrounds.

So there are a couple off the top of my head. Again, more resources on our website.

But I would also encourage you to think about not just the what, but also, again, the how, how we frame it. And I've looked at many, many organisational graduate recruitments or even senior recruitments, and they think they're objective, but they're not because they ask a ton of biased questions.

And if, for example, you use psychometric testing, which has references, which are basically very privileged male references, like analogies or references that only certain folks know, it's not going to be objective.

So if you do a quick audit of your recruitment process and assessment process, that will be just as helpful as looking at the source of your actual talent in the first place.

Barry:  Stephen, thank you. Next question. We've got three left, so three in about 13 minutes. So next question. "Can Stephen give advice on how companies can successfully move from Diversity 101 to Diversity 2.0 that is genuine and authentic?" I suppose that's how to do that other than send somebody on our course, which is starting in September, just to drop that quick plug in. Stephen, back to you.

Stephen:  If you think about what is the work we've got to get done, and if you think about the maturity curve that I outlined on the vertical axis, and then the scope of what you've got to get done on the horizontal axis, you've got to think about strategy, right? Is it tied to the CEO's strategy?

You've got to think about data. Have you measured the baseline? Do you know what your targets are in diversity and inclusion?

You got to think about governance. Who's responsible? Who's accountable?

You got to think about leadership. Have you got buy-in? Are you educating or training people?

And you've got to think about systems. What are your key systems you've got to check? Recruitment, assessment, performance, marketing, procurement.

And if you think about those on the horizontal axis against your vertical maturity curve, you can plot a journey and we can plot a journey of how you get from where you are to where you want to be.

And it might be that if you are at 101 at the moment . . . Actually, you might feel you're nowhere, but you might have a really, really good database or really, really good buy-in from a key member of the C-suite. We can use those to build on success, to get some quick wins in those areas, and get us up to the next level where we can then fill in the gaps.

So if you think about mapping what you've got to get done, the scope, against the maturity curve and start plotting this journey, that's a way to do it.

We've got a helpful tool which you might find helpful called the Impact Index, and you can just kind of answer a few questions and see where you are, where the gaps might be, and where you might want to get to if that'll be helpful for you.

Barry:  Okay. Thank you, Stephen. Next question. "Is there such a thing as privilege guilt? As a white cis woman and newly appointed as a D&I lead, I find myself playing small in some areas". Great question. Thank you.

Stephen:  Wonderful question, and thank you for whoever asked that. Yes, and I think I've got it, right?

I mean, when I was at Stonewall 20 years ago as a gay man, I didn't, because there was clearly work to do and we were clearly facing a load of legal inequality. So, I felt, "No, let's go". Now, as a very privileged white man, of course. There are clearly many, many people, the majority of people, who are less privileged than I am.

But it's about what you do with it, right? Don't just sit there, read "The Guardian", and donate to charity. How do you actually use your privilege to get things done? I think that's really, really important to own it and to do things with it.

You've not done anything wrong. You're not a bad person. It's about how you actually deploy your wonderful skillset to bring others up with you. And I think ally-ship, mentorship, sponsorship, doing a good strategy, networking, these are all wonderful things that you can do, which will be great for you and great for others.

So really appreciate the question. Not enough people ask that question. And yes, there's absolutely something about it and something you can do.

Barry:  Stephen, thank you for that. And last question. "Which research tools would you recommend for an organisation wanting to carry out an EDI audit? We don't know what we don't know".

Stephen:  Sure. Well, obviously, I humbly recommend Included. We love doing those. But in addition, there are loads of free resources online that you can find as well, which will give you kind of a ready reckoner.

But I think that the most useful would be perhaps the Impact Index I mentioned earlier that we've got. You can just do it quite quickly, 10 minutes or so. It'll give you an initial starting place on holding up the mirror, if you like. So it gives you a little bit of, "Oh, here's what you now do know about where the gaps might be". And then from that, you can see if it resonates and you can kind of go towards creating a more full strategy.

Barry:  Stephen, that's great. Thank you. I think that just leads me to wrap up and to say a huge thank you for your thoughts and your expertise in sharing that with us this morning, Stephen.

Before I conclude and say goodbye, I'd just like to remind everybody about the certificate course in Diversity and Inclusion in the Workplace, which starts in September. And just to remind everybody that an email will be coming out to you very, very soon this morning with further information. And if you would like to apply to attend that course, it starts on 20 September.

It runs for eight weeks. There's a calculation of about 30 hours of work that's required. It's about 16 hours of class contact time online, also study time and a bit of time for an exam and some written work at the end.

We're really excited about this course. We believe it to be the most relevant to the workplace in the D&I space at the moment. So really looking forward to starting that off in September.

Stephen, see you in Belfast on Thursday. Really looking forward to that and hearing more from you then. But for now, I'd just like to thank you, Stephen, and thank everybody for attending what was a really enjoyable webinar and a very productive hour indeed. Thank you.

Stephen:  Thank you all very much. Take care.

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