#ChangeboardFT 2018
Future Talent and Changeboard are now synonymous together. An annual event, an iconic venue and lots of people in the HR, Leadership, Recruitment and Change industries converging on a theme. This year we’re talking about the diversity, inclusion and well-being of people in the 4th Industrial Revolution.
A revolution we’re in, has no predictable path despite what Futurologists might say and a revolution we’re seeing take some unforeseen turns. Just as we started today, several mentions were made of Facebook’s banning of Cambridge Analytica as they seek to bounce back from a public confidence shock of seismic proportions over the use of people’s data and planted content to allegedly influence voting outcomes.
Set against this is a day for us to get into receive mode around wisdom, experience and provocation from a diverse range of speakers and participants.
Tim Campbell MBE is known to some as the winner of the UK’s very first Apprentice programme. Many might say, the peak of the relevance of the show. Well, Tim ensured relevance was there from the get go with a warm and positive introduction from him and an invitation to be part of a conversation. Not a conference, a conversation.
And so we got underway with Time to Change and Sue Baker OBE.
Underway for some time now – the phrase Sue used was “we’re 10 years into a generational issue”.
Where 1 in 6 people are experiencing mental health issues in the workplace. And the work of time-to-change.org has made a real difference already. Sue reported that 4.1m people now report an improved attitude to mental ill health. A movement has been created and some high profile people have helped to de-stigmatise the words mental ill health.
We’ve made a good start in moving mental health issues from the margins to the mainstream but it’s only that – a start. We have the highest mortality rate among younger men due to suicide.
When asking the room, would you be prepared to talk to people about mental ill health around the following frames, not many people raised a hand
A. To an extended member of the family
B. At a job interview
C. and certainly very very few for a first date..
Sue shared 7 key principles that are helping the TTC campaign gain momentum:
- Senior leader buy-in
- Employee Champions
- Raising awareness as widely as possible
- Updating any workplace policies
- Sharing personal experiences
- Equipping managers with the skills to have conversations about mental health
- Signposting support services.
And with only one-year left of funding, it’s important to make the most of TTCs current status but already a lot of organisations have signed up and pledged to follow these 7 principles and helping their people with mental health because it really is, time to change.
We then were treated to a frank, comedic but hard hitting take on diversity and inclusion from Deborah Frances-White. The real reason we need to start including ourselves.
Hard-hitting maxims like “Being somewhere is not the same as being included” and “People in your company are likely to be peripherally included”. We talk a lot about inclusion, but in reality, we have much more we should do in creating the equality of opportunity we all deserve.
Picturing Toby, with his white, male middle-class privilege suddenly in the excluding environment of a Colombian Drug Cartel isn’t a story you’re likely to see, but even with 20 years in shipping isn’t likely to help him feel included in that environment.
And when the research shows you that women would rule themselves out of roles unless they feel they have 100% of the skills for a role, whereas men would go for it even with only 50% of the skills, shows a lot about the prevailing circumstances we might or might not find ourselves in.
Deborah talked about inclusion being Enthusiastic and Emotional and that 4 year old children are inclusive by nature. So we need to retrain ourselves to understand diversity and inclusivity.
We all deserve to feel the safest in the tribes we’re in and part of.
And with that tribe we segued into Matthew Taylor the Chief Executive of the RSA and author of the report on Good Work following his self-titled Taylor review.
Rather than repeat the text, here’s my sketch note of these key points.
Whilst I don’t agree with Matthew that we ALL want to work for an organisation (I’ve had enough of being an employee) we all appear to love being part of a Creative Community with a Cause.
And despite only a very brief slot, Matthew shared a lot that built on Sue and Deborah in terms of fairness, inclusivity and how we really do need to take artistic, design-led and humanly ways to craft the working proposition in this 4th Industrial Revolution (4IR).
And the 4IR was how Lord Chris Holmes came to the stage. Always funny, always spot on and always enthused. His inclusion in the Government’s work on Artificial Intelligence leads him to describe his view on the world we’re heading into as “rationally optimistic”. He also created the word “AI-ey” – that things are getting a bit that way!
It’s not good enough to talk about “I do ________; and someone she does digital” – digital is part of pretty much everything we’re doing. Everything changes and nothing changes.
Lord Holmes talked enthusiastically about the Everythingness of 4IR and that it is more about choices we make and less about the predictions we seem to be obsessed with.
Indeed so “everythingness” is AI, and data in particular, that the GAFA quartet – Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon – are worth more $ than the rest of the FTSE 100 and in many ways, all they have is our data.
Lord Holmes’s view is that talent will (if it isn’t already) matter more than capital. He also urged caution that we don’t overreact and recalled the story of the WWII research into ray guns as a weapon of significance. It didn’t manifest. But Radar did from this and therefore we know the rest of that story.
Back to rationally optimistic – Lord Holmes closed with our opportunity and challenge to be AI-ey with some values and ethics to balance in our favour.
With Digital being top of our minds, Avivia’s 300 year journey to 7.5 million customers was up next. Sarah Morris (Aviva) and Colin Price (Heidrick & Struggles) went into conversation to look into what it takes to be a digital business with 31,000 people.
Paradoxes are plenty when shifting to this new shape of business. 30% of the top team, were no longer right for this new shape. Whilst change and adaptation was essential, the new direction and vision was crystal clear and set. THIS was such an important step. And that new people and incredibly long-serving were mixed and a key part of the success of this programme of change to deliver a doubling of share value, an increase in Employee Engagement, and people who relish ambiguity.
A simpler business in a complex world where once, Aviva insured Sir Isaac Newton and now, they employ 600 data scientists.
And then our first panel. Expertly introduced by Amanda MacKenzie, Elizabeth Fagan, Chris Jones, Peter Cheese the outstanding Moya Greene, converged on the issue of Humanity in a digital era.
With so much of our time spent on digital platforms and so much doubtful practice in use of data and more. Moya perfectly summed it up when she said “with free use of the products we use, WE become the product.”
But Chris Jones summed it up best when he shared the story of Martin Gadd, paralysed in an accident and told he was “better on benefits”. Martin came to City & Guilds for work, and giving someone the chance to have opportunities to do the work they are clearly capable of.
Humanity through digital – where – as Moya said “we decide what’s permissible with technology.”
And then this man
Sir Lenny Henry then told his story. One of only 3 black men in the canteen in a 1970s/80s BBC. Responsible (in part) for over £1bn in Comic Relief; Award winning Othello performance, Tiswas and Delbert Wilkins.
Put firmly and simply Diversity, Inclusivity and Representation. Representation – not a word that’s been used much before but Sir Lenny did that. He urged us to think about people BEHIND the camera as well as those out front.
And it was Difference that left me humming about this morning.
Different people; different views; different approaches.
Tim Campbell is a different kind of host for an HR / Talent related conference. He’s so in tune with us as an audience. With his speakers and his panel members.
Changeboard FT 2018’s morning has been different. It has dared to tackle inclusivity and the issues of mental ill health that are resulting from more isolation, less understanding and working against difference and not with it.
I feel different from today. I feel more included with a group of people who chose to give themselves openly and inclusively today.
That’s a refreshing difference.
