The Chief Psychology Officer

Ep14 Success Begins with True Commitment to DE&I

• Dr Amanda Potter CPsychol • Season 1 • Episode 14

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For an organisation, department or team to succeed, they need the right environment for it to be great. As leaders, our success depends on our environment, so it is critical that we make sure what we are surrounding ourselves with the right people who will give us the energy, challenge, insight to thrive. To succeed, we need to surround ourselves with the right people, because you who you spend time with impacts your belief and your mindset.

The interview will look at the impact that diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) can have on the success of an organisation and how organisations can promote better demographic, cultural and cognitive diversity.

In this episode, Tim Hepworth will be interviewing our Chief Psychology Officer - Dr Amanda Potter and Tom Emery, the Chief People Officer at Brooks Macdonald to understand how organisations can create a cognitively and culturally diverse environment that sets the business up for success.

The Chief Psychology Officer website is now available https://www.thecpo.co.uk/  Please like and follow Zircon for more podcasts and articles at https://www.linkedin.com/company/zircon-consulting-ltd/

If you are interested in talking to Amanda about the cognitive diversity, diversity and inclusion practices in your organisation please contact her via LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/amandapotterzircon or email: TheCPO@zircon-mc.co.uk
To contact Tom please message via LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tom-emery-he-him-b8809818/ or to find out more about Brooks Macdonald please go to https://www.brooksmacdonald.com/

For more information about the BeTalent Psychological Safety questionnaire mentioned in this podcast please go to: https://www.betalent.com

Timestamps

Environment for Success

·       00:00 – Introduction to the Environment for Success

·       00:35 – Cultural Diversity = Success

·       02:26 – Impact of Diversity on the business

·       03:12 – Career History: Tom Emery

·       04:49 – Why talk about Diversity?

·       05:32 – The times they are a changin’

Learning from the past…

·       07:25 – Is it a sin?

·       09:30 – Inclusion is not an illusion

·       09:54 – Dos and do not dos (without being woke)

·       11:10 – Who we hire

·       13:05 – Diverse inclusion vs. inclusion

The Lay of the land

·       14:12 – Women in the boardroom

·       15:23 – Gender diversity around the world

·       17:13 – Ethnicity in the boardroom

·       18:40 – I don’t want to stereotype here…

·       19:32 – Women are from Venus & Men are from Mars

·       21:47 – With victory comes sacrifice

Managing expectations

·       23:17 – Equality vs. Equity (not the actors union)

·       24:18 – Privilege

·       25:02 – Cultural Beliefs

·       27:22 – Cognitive Diversity revisited

·       29:19 – Microaggression

·       30:26 – Anglicizing names

·       33:17 – Menopause deserves a Menapplause

Getting a grip on the situation

·       35:22 – How to

Episodes are available here https://www.thecpo.co.uk/

To follow Zircon on LinkedIn and to be first to hear about podcasts, publications and news, please like and follow us: https://www.linkedin.com/company/zircon-consulting-ltd/

To access the research white papers mentioned in this and other podcasts, please go to: https://zircon-mc.co.uk/zircon-white-papers.php

For more information about the BeTalent suite of tools and platform please contact: TheCPO@zircon-mc.co.uk

SPEAKER_02:

hello and welcome to this the latest episode of the chief psychology officer my name is tim hepworth and as ever i'll be joined by dr amanda potter charter psychologist and ceo of zircon today we'll be looking at the topic of creating the environment for success and i'm delighted to say that we have with us tom emery the chief people officer of wealth management company brooks mcdonald well amanda we normally start as ever with me asking you why you've decided to select this particular subject.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you so much, Tim. This topic, creating an environment for success, is very much built on the idea that successful organisations are culturally diverse. For an organisation, department or team to succeed, they need to have the right environment for it to achieve its aspirations and for it to be great. As leaders, our success depends on that environment. So it's critical that we surround ourselves with the right people who give us the energy, who challenge us, who give us insight and help us to thrive. Because if we surround ourselves with the right people, we create the right environment that impacts our belief and our mindset and motivates us to be the best we can be.

SPEAKER_02:

Sounds like it's going to be a good one. So Amanda, what's the focus for today's discussion?

SPEAKER_00:

So very much building on what I was saying earlier, in order to really create an environment for success, we need to make sure the organisations are as culturally and cognitively diverse as possible. There's some fantastic data about this because organizations that are diverse are more productive, more innovative, and are much more effective at problem solving. Tom has been working within Brooks McDonald to identify ways in which, as an organization, they can be more diverse. And I partnered with Tom across a number of organizations and invited Tom to share his experiences and and the difference it is starting to make in his organization.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay. So once again, mentioning diversity, we've come across that topic quite a lot in our various podcasts. So I definitely get that diversity is key. But what's the actual business impact of cultural and cognitive diversity?

SPEAKER_00:

So according to McKinsey, organisations that are diverse and inclusive are 35% more likely to outperform their competitors. And this has been very much concurred by Boston Consulting Group, who's shown that diverse management teams lead to 19% higher revenues. HBR, so Harvard Business Review, talk about diverse companies being 70% more likely to capture new markets. And finally, research from People Managed has shown that diverse teams are 87% better at making decisions. So some fantastic data to say diversity is absolutely king and

SPEAKER_02:

queen. So Tom, would you mind introducing yourself?

SPEAKER_01:

Of course, I'm Tom Emery. I'm Chief People Officer at Brooks MacDonald. We're a wealth management firm headquartered in London with offices across the UK, Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.

SPEAKER_00:

I'd love you to share a little bit more and help our listeners understand a little bit about you.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, of course. So I'll start at the beginning. I was brought up by my mum on the outskirts of Greater Manchester with my brothers and sister before going to the University of Manchester to study linguistics. I got a taste for HR through working in the personnel department of a branch of Sainsbury's part-time whilst at university. And after trying and failing miserably to secure a graduate HR job, Sainsbury's looked after me and trained me up as a personnel manager. And this led me to complete my postgraduate diploma in HR management at Salford University. And since then, I've gone on to have a fun and varied career across HR generalist roles in retail, telecoms, local government, and for the last 13 years in financial services, during which I was obviously lucky enough to meet you, Amanda. I've always been interested in helping others to be at their best. And this year, I completed a practitioner diploma in executive coaching. And outside work, I live in South London with my husband, Nigel, who is a primary school teacher and a budding author of children's literature.

SPEAKER_00:

I love the fact that... you and i met and in fact it was through one of our very mutual friends at sainsbury's is that right

SPEAKER_01:

yes that's right yeah long time ago over 20 years ago yeah

SPEAKER_00:

amazing how we keep those contacts i certainly do i keep all the good people close so it's been fabulous to work with you

SPEAKER_02:

thanks for tom it's great to meet you um amanda as usual do you want to tell us a little bit about why you've picked this particular subject for today's podcast

SPEAKER_00:

i've worked with tom as i said for a number of years and what i love about working with tom is his absolute passion for diversity. And so he is absolutely a shining light in this space. And he's someone who's prepared to put himself in difficult or challenging or risky positions by saying that the current situation is not good enough and actually things need to change. As an organization, Brooks McDonald's were recruiting fantastic people, but it appeared the business was struggling to secure a more diverse range of candidates. The organisation recognised that through Tom and his team's support, direction and coaching, that things needed to change. And so Tom and the team invited Zircon in to help with that change.

SPEAKER_02:

So again, as we said then, diversity is key. So turning to you, Tom, why has diversity become so key for Brooks MacDonald?

SPEAKER_01:

Brooks MacDonald was founded in 1991 and since then it's grown both organically and through acquisition and we always prided ourselves on our great culture but by the nature of our business as Amanda said we tended not to attract a diverse workforce in all areas particularly in senior manager and client facing roles.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah you're probably not alone in that are you I mean there's a lot of companies probably in exactly the same boat and there's pressures from varying places to to become more and more diverse these days.

SPEAKER_01:

As well as the pressure to increase diversity from shareholders, regulators and the government, we also recognise the commercial drivers that Amanda's mentioned. And if we don't attract and retain a diverse workforce, we miss out on talent and our performance will be negatively impacted. And of course, our client base is changing, so we need to change to reflect it. We recognise that we'll be less successful if we don't evolve our approach.

SPEAKER_02:

I hear you there. There's a huge wealth of potentially untapped talent out there that is definitely, I think, held back by a lack of diversity in the workplace but I know you guys have been putting quite a bit of effort into this space haven't you?

SPEAKER_01:

In some ways we've been leaders in our industry and promoting diversity particularly in successfully recruiting gender diversity at the most senior level. I recognise that like many organisations in our sector and beyond we've got some way to go and change takes hard work it's a daily investment and a daily effort and progress can be frustratingly slow.

SPEAKER_02:

It is hard work yeah I think I think we can all recognise that and why is it so important for you personally?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, as a gay person growing up in the 80s and 90s, it wasn't always easy and I didn't feel I could tell anyone that I was gay. So I was sometimes lonely and I sometimes found school to be quite a hostile place and not one in which I could be myself.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, that must have been tough.

SPEAKER_01:

And like others in that era, I grew up without positive LGBTQ plus role models. Section 28 meant that sexuality couldn't be discussed at school and there were daily headlines in the newspapers describing gay men as perverts and focusing on the devastating HIV and AIDS. As a result, I developed a deep sense of shame that influences my thoughts and behaviours today.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I'm old enough to remember those times and attitudes were certainly a lot different back then. But I guess unless you experienced it, then a lot of us probably went through those times not realising just the impact that the attitudes were actually having on the gay community. It must have been, like I say, it must have been a really tough time.

SPEAKER_01:

You know, often people say to me, we have gay marriage, we have equality, LGBTQ plus rights are sorted, but they're really not. LGBTQ plus people are still more likely to suffer mental health problems, commit self-harm or suicide, suffer abuse because of who they are, and trans people are particularly impacted by prejudice in society. I still don't hold my partner's hand in the street through fear of abuse, and I have to take the risk of coming out again and again to every new person that I meet. And I know I'm at my best and my happiest when I can be myself. And I recognise that that's the same for all human beings, no matter what their ethnicity, sexuality, gender, background or any other aspects of themselves.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I mean, everybody needs to be themselves, don't they? I mean, you can't be the best you can be unless you can be happier within yourself. You don't really want to be walking around life with a metaphorical one hand tied behind your back, do you?

SPEAKER_01:

We all need to be seen and valued for who we are. And that's why I'm passionate about building inclusive organisations.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I think that gets to the core of what we're talking about today, creating inclusive organisations.

SPEAKER_01:

Saying that, I also recognise the enormous privilege that I have as a white cisgender man in a senior role, and I know that despite being a passionate advocate of equality, I often get things wrong. So sometimes I use the wrong language or I make the wrong assumption, and like everyone, I feel the shame of being called out. But I'm also open to feedback, and when I get something wrong, I apologise and I'll change should I get it right.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, that touches a nerve with me. I mean, as a white man, I also worry about what I should or shouldn't say, what language language is acceptable yeah is what we used to say acceptable anymore it is a bit of a minefield

SPEAKER_01:

and overall this is about the life experience of individuals and i think that being inclusive is just simply the right thing to do

SPEAKER_00:

i couldn't agree more and it really does strike me that as a gay man you still worry about using the right language

SPEAKER_02:

yeah i mean the For me, I think one of the best things is that we're often talking about the need to create a safe space where all these things can be discussed without fear of retribution. It's probably the wrong word, but without fear of negative comments being muttered in the background or whatever. And it's forums like this that allow those sort of discussions to be able to be aired and certainly via the Internet aired a long way.

SPEAKER_00:

I love the podcast. I think it's a brilliant way for us to share thinking, share learnings, and also to help create greater understanding. I think it's fantastic. So, Tom, it strikes me that Brooks MacDonald for many years had good intention around diversity, but have struggled to recruit in a diverse way because as an organization, you appear to have attracted some fantastic people, but they are often quite similar in background and education. It's great that you are coming into the organization and challenging the organization and enabling the organization so that it can attract people from quite different populations and groups.

SPEAKER_01:

I'd probably talk about the opportunity that improving our diversity really offers us. And in a nutshell, I think it will make us even more successful in every way. You know, recent research by Donald and Charles Soule found that poor culture was the highest predictor of turnover through the so-called great resignation seen in the USA over the past 12 to 18 months. And they found that the second biggest driver of that poor culture was being non-inclusive with a lack of LGBTQ plus disability and racial equity being the most impactful. So on the flip side, this suggests that people are increasingly being driven towards values driven and purposeful organisations. So I believe that if we get the inclusive culture right, then the talent and the success will follow. And being inclusive has been shown to not only have a positive impact on marginalised groups, but supports everybody in the organisation to be more engaged and productive, no matter who they are and what their background is.

SPEAKER_00:

I love that you just told me off and told me to focus on the opportunity. I completely agree. We shouldn't be focusing on limitations. We should absolutely be focusing on the opportunity. So thank you, Tom.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, consider yourself told off.

SPEAKER_00:

I will.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I guess it's stating the obvious, but the more diverse an organisation you are, then the more diverse the views and experience that you're going to be embedding within your organisation. That can only a good thing, surely.

SPEAKER_00:

Totally. And in fact, Tom, you mentioned earlier a really lovely way of differentiating between diversity, inclusion and inclusion. Would you mind sharing that?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, of course. I mean, it actually brings in a third element and that's that of belonging. So those with a true sense of belonging feel that the organisation that they work in aligns to their values and enables them to express their identity. So there's a little analogy that you mentioned, if you'll endorse me. So basically, diversity is being invited to the party inclusion is feeling able to dance and belonging is being able to choose the song so if you feel like you belong you're going to be happier healthier more productive and more likely to stay and contribute effectively and we can build a culture of belonging by making sure that people are seen for their unique contributions connected to their colleagues supported in their daily work and proud of the organization's values and purpose

SPEAKER_02:

i love that so what was it diversity is being invited inclusion is getting to dance and belonging is picking the song. Yeah. I love that. That's brilliant.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Really helps you understand it, doesn't it? And each of the three bits being so critical. Do you know what? We did a piece of research about five years ago. Someone will tell me the actual date, but it's published on our research page of our website and you can download the white paper. But we looked at women in the boardroom and we interviewed senior women who achieved board level status to understand the decisions they'd made and the journeys they'd had in their career to get to that position. And the conclusion from the whole of that white paper, so a whole year's worth of research and interviews with these most phenomenal women across fantastic organizations like Starbucks and others, was that inclusion was key. I expected it to be about organizations wanting to be more diverse was the reason that they got to the top, but actually it wasn't. It was about inclusion. And interestingly, many of those women had been mentored and championed by men, which seems obvious because at the time there were much fewer women in those positions, but it was because they felt that they were being heard or being listened to. They were included in conversations. They were asked questions and they were part of which meant that they had the belief and the confidence that they were contributing and therefore they achieved their potential. So inclusion was the final conclusion of that research.

SPEAKER_02:

Amanda, you touched on gender diversity earlier. I was reading something the other day. that I thought was quite interesting. I thought, oh, we've got this podcast coming up. I shall write this down, try and dazzle everybody with my knowledge. I've written that globally at the moment, women occupy only 20% of board level seats and pretty much continue to be excluded from the very top tier positions with a few notable examples, of course. So that's the story globally. UK is a bit better. There's been a slow but positive increase in female representation on the boards. In 2004, we had about 9% female representation. I'm talking about FTSE 100 companies here. 2010, so six years later, we went from 9% to about 12%. Then we jumped to 2018, a big leap to 29%. And today, the research shows that we've got around 40%. So in the UK, we're at 40% female representation on the board, globally 20%, which has got to be good. A good UK success story, I guess.

SPEAKER_00:

A fantastic success story. I think it's in terms of gender diversity, I think we've been focusing on it for quite a long time and it's pretty good. So, Tom, what's the situation in Brooks MacDonald?

SPEAKER_01:

In Brooks MacDonald, 25% of our board are female, but I would also say that a third of our executive is female and we've made some progress there in recent years. So a little bit behind where the UK figures are, but ahead of the global figures.

SPEAKER_00:

So that's really good data, both from Tim, from your research. Well done doing some research for the podcast, by the way, very impressed. And also from Tom's perspective from Brooks MacDonald, that's great in terms of but we're not quite seeing the same from an ethnic minority perspective. I believe that's lagging quite behind in terms of the research and the data. Tim, do you have that data with you as well?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, I have indeed got some data. According to Parker Review, last year, which is the latest data that's available, around 16% of directors in the FTSE 100, in the UK we're talking here, are from ethnic minorities. which is not too bad, but what is better is that 89% of companies have some ethnic representation at board level. So whilst then that headline figure sounds great, if we go back to the actual number of directors, that's 16%, there is obviously something limiting diversity in the workplace. Amanda, can you shed any light on the sorts of things that are doing that limiting? both in gender and racial diversity?

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely. I've got three reasons, I believe, that organisations are not yet completely in the place they need to be. One is around stereotypes of leadership. Another is a lack of provisions for working women or socially disadvantaged people, or just the support that individuals need to go through the career progression in in an equal way. And the third one is cultural beliefs.

SPEAKER_02:

So let's dive into the first one, gender and ethnic stereotypes of leadership. Amanda. Expand, please.

SPEAKER_00:

So all of us are prone to biases or shortcuts. So a bias or a shortcut helps us to process information, helps us to make sense of the world. Unfortunately, one of the biases or shortcuts that we're prone to is stereotyping. And we have a stereotype of who we expect to see in a senior leadership position because of past history. around somebody being white middle class masculine and having extroverted traits and characteristics and so those characteristics are often describing men and when we conducted the research with the women in the boardroom what we found is that women who were empathic or compassionate or considerate were deemed to be soft or not tough enough to be able to deal with challenging situations But men who were compassionate or considerate or thoughtful were deemed to be emotionally intelligent and in touch with their emotions. And so we have a perception or a perspective on what's right on the basis of personal bias. These biases are developed as a result of heuristics or mental shortcuts. And whilst we recognize that they're not the right thing, we need to actively challenge those biases and those shortcuts. and educate ourselves and the people around us to understand that actually it's diversity at that very senior level, which is absolutely fundamental, rather than male dominated companies or white dominated companies.

SPEAKER_02:

I guess a lot of this reflects society as a whole, but if you're in a situation where you are part of a leadership team of a company, then you are in a position to affect change in that company and to make it more diverse. And the more companies that are seen as diverse, the more that diversity becomes the norm. And therefore, that can only help to actually lessen that stereotyping that goes on. The more diversity that is seen in those companies, the more it isn't seen that, oh, it's not just a white male world.

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely and it is changing isn't it truly is it really is changing so it's fantastic but it does lead us nicely on to the second one which is the support and provision for working women or the facilities and support for the more socially disadvantaged.

SPEAKER_02:

So I guess what we're going to be talking about here then are things like the big one is going to be child care and things like that.

SPEAKER_00:

So for this second one around the lack of provision for working women or for people who need that support, it made me think about two things. It made me think about firstly, the women in the boardroom research. That research identified that all of the women pretty much who got to those very senior positions made sacrifices, and the sacrifices were their personal life, their families, and their personal time. And so they weren't able to be the primary caregiver for their children. They had to hire nannies, or they got au pairs in, or they had a role reversal in the family where their husband or partner or wife would look after the children. And it made me realize that everybody who gets to very senior levels has to make sacrifices, but in the past, because women were the primary caregivers, they had to make more sacrifices, it appeared. The other thing it made me think about is as a senior woman myself I personally made quite big sacrifices I have had one child and I took two months maternity leave full-time and I went back after two months and started working part-time because I was lucky enough to have my mum locally and she was able to look after my son and so I was in a position where I wasn't socially disadvantaged because I had the support but I did make those personal sacrifices but something to think about how can we make sure that we put the support there for everybody so that they can fulfill their aspirations and can be the very best they can be and can really get to the their highest position in the organization that they would like to achieve

SPEAKER_02:

that's the number of it isn't it it's the how can you actually improve the situation from where we are now

SPEAKER_01:

one thing we haven't talked about is equity and equity is about making sure that everybody has an equal chance and removing barriers and so removing barriers It's a really good point.

SPEAKER_00:

So Tom, would you mind helping me understand the difference between equality and equity?

SPEAKER_01:

Yes, of course. Equality is basically treating everybody the same. Equity is accepting that you might have to treat some people differently to give them the same level of opportunity. So the very famous picture is of people trying to see over a wall to watch a football game. And the tall person can see over the wall without any help. The smaller person needs a box to stand on to be able to see over. But obviously the most ideal thing would be to remove the wall altogether.

SPEAKER_00:

That's a brilliant image you've just created in my mind. So Tom, given what we've heard about equity and equality, what is your view on privilege? That can be quite a contentious word, I think.

SPEAKER_01:

On privilege, one of the reasons that privilege is such a triggering term for people is because it suggests that If you are, say, white and you have white privilege, it makes people think that they are therefore privileged and it's being suggested that they've never had to work for anything in their lives, which isn't the case. It just means that they don't have to worry about how society has racialised them. That's all. And that gives them certain privileges that someone who is not white doesn't have in our society.

SPEAKER_02:

So, Amanda, you had three things in your meaning list at the beginning. We've done two of them. The third one was cultural beliefs.

SPEAKER_00:

so of course cultural beliefs depend on the culture that you're in patriarchal societies have very distinct differentiation of male and females of course describing the male very often as the breadwinner and the head of the household and the woman as the caregiver now in the uk that is changing fundamentally but there is particularly generationally a percentage of this still remaining that we still need to fight against so they're really the three reasons why organizations have struggled to bring in diversity it's around stereotypes or bias it's a lack of provision and some quite outdated now beliefs that have been hanging on

SPEAKER_02:

so um An open question here then. Obviously, increasing diversity is a big challenge for these global organisations. Legislation is going to rear its ugly head. What sort of legislation is in place to make sure that organisations are as diverse as they can be?

SPEAKER_00:

Organizations are starting to move towards initiatives known as affirmative action initiatives. These are very much aimed at increasing the number of people in certain groups that are usually defined by race or gender. For example, some organizations are even putting in minimum quotas. So Norway was the first country to say that they wanted a 40% minimum gender quota in organizations. And as of 2021, 10 European countries had mandated national quotas and 10 EU states had softer measures. So many countries are moving towards this affirmative action where they have either minimum quotas or they have softer measures where they would encourage people to have certain percentages of men and women. But what I found fascinating when I was doing the reading and preparing for this podcast is that in the UK, there is a requirement that large companies with boards have at least 40% women, but only one ethnic minority, which seems quite unbalanced to me.

SPEAKER_02:

So we've talked a lot then about demographic diversity, but in other episodes, because I've been listening and taking notes, we've done a lot of discussion of cognitive diversity. How does cognitive diversity link to success within these organisations?

SPEAKER_00:

So cognitive diversity is about how people think and how people therefore behave. And teams of people who are cognitively diverse are more likely to slow down the process of problem solving, they're more likely to ask questions, to challenge each other, and therefore to innovate and to identify more effective solutions. And interestingly, cognitive diversity is different from demographic or cultural diversity. But cultural demographic diversity does predict cognitive diversity. So very often, men and women, for example, are energized by different things. And therefore, statistically, we've shown that actually they have different strengths.

SPEAKER_02:

Getting back to you, Tom, with your experience within your own company, what is Brooks MacDonald doing to create an environment of diversity and inclusion?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, we're doing quite a lot and everything that we do, we're really focused on being more inclusive and giving people language and tools to disrupt bias in the workplace and really fulfil their role in contributing to a positive culture. So we're taking a multifaceted approach that comes at the challenge from several angles. So firstly, by educating and training our leaders and wider workforce, so all our people receive inclusive culture training to support them to be able to effectively create a culture of diversity, inclusion and belonging within their teams. And that includes thinking about some of the root causes of the issues that come up in the workplace. It could be bias, which is people not meaning to say or do the wrong thing. It could be prejudice, which is where people do mean to say or do the wrong thing. Or bullying, which is people just being mean. An education around the appropriate language to use and concepts like the concept of microaggressions.

SPEAKER_02:

Microaggressions, they sound really good. But what is a microaggression?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, basically a microaggression is is a sort of instance of indirect or subtle or unintentional discrimination against somebody from a marginalised group. So quite common microaggressions are to say to somebody, where are you from? And they say, I'm from Croydon. And the person says, no, where are you really from? It suggests that there is a difference there. My favourite microaggression that I've been subject to a number of times is people saying, oh, you're gay. You don't look gay or I didn't realise I never would have thought you were gay as if it was an achievement to have somehow hidden it And it makes people feel different. So, yeah, so that's what microaggression is. And they're very common across society and they have a cumulative effect on people that builds and builds and builds and builds and can be quite damaging.

SPEAKER_02:

Are microaggressions intentional then? Sounds like in the main they're not.

SPEAKER_01:

In the main, they're probably not, but they can be. It's more that they're subtle or indirect is the sort of most common characteristic. anglicizing names is another one so people that have names that don't sound English in origin that might be a bit complicated for people to pronounce or say suggesting I'll call you something different or something simpler or saying do you have a nickname because that's too complicated

SPEAKER_00:

and do you know what I've done that and I do that on my accreditation courses sometimes and that comes from a position of embarrassment where if someone has got a really tricky name I will ask them what do you need where what do you prefer to be known by because I I think oh my goodness otherwise I'm never going to come to you because I'm never going to be able to pronounce your name in order to include you because I worry about getting it wrong and I do and they have to tell me it sounds like sometimes

SPEAKER_01:

I think I think but I think if in that case you can say am I pronouncing this correctly there's nothing wrong with that we also continuously approve improve our policies to ensure they're inclusive so we have policies across several areas that impact on our culture and support a diverse workforce so that includes things like mental health at work dignity at work gender the transitioning and supporting people going through the menopause. We also support people with families or other caring responsibilities because we believe that supporting families of all makeups is important in retaining diverse talent so we're gradually increasing our maternity and paternity benefits and we offer all employees that go on extended family leave coaching with an expert third-party provider to help them transition into extended family leave and the transition back into the workplace afterwards. We promote flexible working so likely most organizations in our sector the pandemic completely transformed our approach to flexible working and we recognize that supporting flexible working is a fantastic way of encouraging diversity and that doesn't only relate to people with families so if you take some marginalized groups like neurodivergent people or perhaps lgbtq plus people that are not out may find the effort of assimilating into the office quite tiring and stressful so being able to work more remotely is beneficial for them and we also have a brilliant dni group and employee resource groups so our D&I group challenges our approach and gives their insights and helps us organise events. We have two active employee resource groups, one for black, Asian and minority ethnic employees and the other which supports people impacted by the menopause and we're really clear that it's not the responsibility of those from marginalised groups to drive our D&I agenda but we do recognise that they bring a lot of knowledge and a really valuable contribution that they make on a voluntary basis. And finally we run events and our events are there to educate and celebrate so these range from things like inviting the author and broadcaster David Olisoga to deliver a really hard hitting and educational session during Black History Month to having East London's Envy the Queen to host Drag Queen Bingo during Pride Month which was a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_00:

That sounds amazing. That sounds brilliant. And how fantastic that you do something around menopause. It's amazing how you connect with the things that are relevant to you and interestingly we've had a request from one of our clients for us to do a topic on menopause.

SPEAKER_01:

The interesting thing about menopause and we actually had a town hall that our CEO ran yesterday for the whole company and he mentioned our menopause employee resource group and said it's not just for women that are going through the menopause the menopause impacts everybody in some way because generally we all know someone and we're all close somebody that is going through the menopause or will go through the menopause in the future and it's not a subject that people traditionally have talked about and so something that's definitely valuable to start a discussion around

SPEAKER_00:

I think we have to thank Davina McCall for that don't we for her fantastic program on the TV which meant that so many more people were very comfortable talking about it and indeed my co-director Sarah wrote a very poignant article and published it on LinkedIn about this very subject and got some incredible messages private messages from people We've seen a lot of positive change definitely and that is not only

SPEAKER_01:

come from understanding more across the organisation about the positive things that an inclusive culture can bring to our performance commercially, but also the positive impact that it can bring to everybody to make Brooks MacDonald an even better place to work and make it a fantastic experience for whoever is working there, whoever they are and whatever their background. So it's really, I think, brought our culture on from already what was a strong place to make it even stronger.

SPEAKER_00:

The one thing I noticed is that as a result of the work that we did with you around the graduate recruitment and this leads us nicely into our final section of the podcast which is around how organisations can improve their diversity and inclusion we worked with you Tom didn't we to redefine and design your graduate recruitment processes and assessment strategy to be more inclusive the impact you and I have talked about as a result of the work that we did that was very successful I'm pleased to say meant that your senior leaders are now thinking quite differently about recruitment and they're being much more open to quite different type of candidate and they're actually encouraging you I understand to actually find and source candidates that are different from the existing population within Brooks Macdonald.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah well with your expert help Amanda like you said we've taken steps to change our approach to recruitment recently and we've longer done some good stuff around recruitment. So we've long mandated things like diverse candidate shortlists and diverse interview panels. But I think it's only lately that we've become a bit more sophisticated with our assessment approach. And so for our recent inclusive futures graduate scheme, which you mentioned, we removed the requirement, for example, to have a particular degree subject from specific universities to be eligible to apply. And we attempted to remove as much subjectivity as possible from the recruitment process by assessing against a suite of core capabilities across several different exercises. And we think that that went a long way to tackle some of the unconscious biases that might exist in the organization. So an example of that might be how we've traditionally defined professionalism, which could have previously been confined to candidate clothing choices or body language or accent. And because only at the last stage were candidates interviewed face-to-face by business leaders, the candidates had the opportunity to really show what they could deliver and what their capabilities were before they were seen face to face. Because the assessment criteria was very closely aligned to our values, which we call our guiding principles, we were able to find diverse candidates that were still a really good cultural fit for the organisation. We've now extended the approach to other senior roles in our organisation, and we think it works well in giving us both high quality and diverse candidates, and we're looking to do more of this going forward.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay, well, Tom, I could listen to you all day, but we are going to have to begin to move towards the end of our time. So Amanda then, how does everything we've been saying link to the research that you as part of Zircon have been performing? the actual research on how we actually improve diversity inclusion in the workplace. Or should I say, as I've now learned, as Tom says it, D&I. I didn't even realize that was a thing.

SPEAKER_00:

So in brief summary then, Tim, there are a number of recommendations. The first one is around educating staff and making sure that everybody understands the importance of diversity, inclusion and equity. The next is around implementing a strengths-based recruitment practice and removing bias. Another might be around flexible and agile working and being much more inclusive for homeworking, as Tom said, Brooks have moved towards. Another might be monitoring diversity and inclusion to make sure the organization is moving in the right direction. And finally, it's about creating an environment of psychological safety and having open and honest communication, which given our conversation earlier about most of us being worried about saying the wrong thing and Warwick being worried about our language i think this could be one of the most tough things to do when talking about this topic

SPEAKER_02:

yeah i mean that's a great little list as ever just touching on that last one the embracing of open communications and psychological safety tom here you've been running workshops on psychological safety is that true

SPEAKER_01:

yeah so we've been focusing on psychological safety across several areas within our organization and we've actually been using the b talent psychological safety questionnaire across teams at many levels including in our executive. The questionnaire is really insightful. It gives a great starting point for a discussion and it supports clear action planning around what we can do to change and increase psychological safety. Psychological safety is a precursor for talking about inclusion in an open and honest way and for making diverse teams successful. And as Amanda said, people can feel quite uncomfortable talking about diversity. And I've seen this topic become quite divisive at times during my career. While I agree, it's important to take into account how comfortable we feel about talking about the subject, Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00:

I personally don't always feel safe when I'm talking about diversity and inclusion, but it mostly comes from a fear position for me that I don't want to get it wrong. So sometimes I hold back from asking questions or from engaging in conversations when I should be probably a bit more upfront. And this preparing for this podcast has been really good for me in learning about it. And also I've learned a huge amount from you, Tom. So thank you.

SPEAKER_02:

Any final words to leave us with, Amanda?

SPEAKER_00:

My reflection, having prepared for this podcast with the brilliant Helen Hargrave, who helped do a lot of the research, was that we need to be more conscious as leaders about the environment we want to create. And we don't create success by accident. It's very much a choice. So we need to choose the right environment for our organizations. We need to build an environment that's right for our team, for our strategy and our goals, but one that enhances our ability to grow. Wise words indeed. Tom?

SPEAKER_02:

I'd like to thank you for joining us. I think your insight and eloquence was a joy to listen to. So thank you very much for your time. I'd love to get you back in the future sometime to hear your thoughts on one or two other topics.

SPEAKER_01:

Thank you very much. I'd love to. Thanks for having

SPEAKER_02:

me. Well, all that remains is for me to thank you for listening. I hope you've enjoyed it. As ever, you can get in touch with Dr. Amanda Potter using the details found on either her LinkedIn page or the webpage for this podcast. We'll be back again with another episode of the Chief Psychology Officer, and I look forward to you joining us. Thanks for listening.

People on this episode

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Dr Amanda Potter

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Tim Hepworth

Host
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Caitlin Cooper

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