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About this episode
In this episode of all about business, James is joined by Dr. Heather Melville, OBE CMgr CCMI FCBI, to explore how inclusive business practices can drive growth, retain talent, and align organisational values with commercial strength. They shed light on understanding different needs and demographics within the workplace that go beyond mere diversity so you can make impactful cultural changes to help your business thrive.
02:25 defining inclusivity in business
03:58 challenges and misconceptions in diversity
06:55 practical steps for inclusivity
10:57 leadership and inclusivity
17:09 the cost of ignoring inclusivity
22:59 real-world examples and stereotyping
26:23 gender pay gap and organisational accountability
27:33 creating fair and equitable workplaces
27:59 inclusive hiring practices
29:23 the importance of leadership in inclusion
30:17 employee advocacy and organisational response
31:00 personal experiences with leadership
36:12 balancing work and personal life
44:45 recruitment strategies and positive action
48:16 looking forward: future goals and reflections
50:45 conclusion and final thoughts
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About the speaker
Heather is a Trustee and Senior Advisor, the Chancellor of York University and a Partner at Stork and May. She’s also the Chair and Non-Executive Director of CMI Women, where she empowers and develops women in leadership. In 2017, she was awarded an OBE for services to business and gender equality, which is why she’s the perfect person to talk to us about building an inclusive business.
[00:00:00] James: Welcome to all about business with me, James Reed, the podcast that covers everything about business management and leadership. Every episode, I sit down with different guests of bootstrap companies, masterminded investment models, built a business empire. They're leaders in their field, and they're here to give you top insights and actionable advice so that you can apply their ideas to your own career or business venture.
If you want to drive growth and build an in demand business. Then inclusivity is a must. But what does it really mean to be an inclusive business? And how can you avoid making headlines for all the wrong reasons? Joining me today on All About Business is Dr. Heather Melville, OBE. Heather is a trustee and senior advisor.
She's the chancellor of York University and a partner at Stork May. She's also the chair and non executive director of CMI Women. where she empowers and develops women in leadership. In 2017, Heather was awarded an OBE for services to business and gender equality, which is why she's the perfect person to talk to us about building an inclusive business.
Heather, thanks so much for coming in to talk to me today. It's really good to see you and, and our subject is driving success through inclusion. in business. And I know you have a lot of knowledge and experiences to share. But I wanted, I wanted to start just by asking you, what does inclusivity look like?
I mean, what are we striving for here?
[00:01:42] Heather: So I always describe it like this, and I'm sure it's been described like this many times. So for me, it's diversity, diversity about getting invited to the party, inclusions about having the shoes to dance at the party. And to me, what that means is, So we talk about we want diverse businesses, so we pick a few people from backgrounds that we think might look good and fit those criterias, but they don't necessarily fit into the culture of the organization that we have, because we haven't done any work around creating an inclusive place where they can be the best that they can be, irrelevant of their backgrounds.
And that's the real difference for me. So if I think about it, the driving force is to walk through any organization. as you are and feel that I can strive in this organization despite having a disability, despite my gender, any of that stuff. It's about me getting the opportunity to shine a light and be bright and be successful.
[00:02:43] James: We're delighted that you're listening to this episode. Hit the follow button so that we can continue to bring you the best business insight and actionable advice to help your business and your career. So, is, is this sort of going beyond diversity? Because the diversity has been a word that's been in business parlance for a long time.
[00:03:05] Heather: Diversity, to me, gives people the opportunity sometimes to do nothing. And that's a bit of a challenge. And the reason is, because it's so easy to say, right, as an organisation, we need to have an or two black people, just to make sure we fit that criteria. Somebody who's LGBTQ, let's have a look who there is out there.
And then, by the way, let's get a couple of women and sprinkle them around, and a few people who've got disabilities. Put them into your organisation and work out and see how they fit. Because the organisation isn't welcoming. And maybe an easier way to describe that is, I went along to a very big bank a couple of years ago, having broken my foot, and arrived in a taxi with crutches.
And the poor security guard was ushering me to go through He hadn't thought that anybody with a disability would be coming into the office. Therefore, who would need to get through the door. So, that's why I say, and on that, on their board, it's all about, you know, we welcome people from all kind of different backgrounds, they win loads of disability awards and all of that kind of stuff.
But actually, I can't get into their building.
[00:04:18] James: So that experience alone.
[00:04:19] Heather: And that experience alone, for me, is what it's about. Another experience I could say is I went to a large organization, shall we say, and I was going to meet the chief exec and the chief people officer. So I drifted smartly, walked into the offer, into the reception area, and the receptionist said to me, I think you might be in the wrong area, love.
And I smiled and I looked at him. I said, today's your really lucky day. I'm in a good mood. What area do you think I should be in? Because I'm coming to meet your chief exec and your chairman and he went bright red. And I felt for him. This is
[00:04:57] James: recent.
[00:04:58] Heather: This is recent, the last two years.
[00:05:00] James: Right. I'm shocked.
I'm genuinely shocked by this. It's
[00:05:03] Heather: interesting because I am not shocked. Because had we spent time on educating this individual about making everybody feel welcomed, without making an assumption, this wouldn't be a problem. And that's why I say, the organization that I was visiting is one that shines a light around being diverse.
And yet still, the mere entrance to their building, I was being, I was being ushered, shall we say, to the back, to the service area, rather than the main part of the organization. And trust me, I was dressed extremely well. So it's just the mindset of the individual.
[00:05:42] James: So this is really interesting. So, so creating an inclusive environment involves Actions.
[00:05:49] Heather: Yeah. Action. Make people feel welcomed.
[00:05:51] James: Yeah. Which is a very human thing. Exactly. But so how do you, how, how would you advise an organization or a, or, or someone starting a business or manager to create that feeling in their team or in their office?
[00:06:04] Heather: So what I find is quite interesting, the young people today who are often setting up these very successful businesses, it's right at the forefront of their minds.
because they've been to university or they've grown up in schools or in areas where their friends are poorer than them, um, they're from different backgrounds or they've got disabilities, all sorts of things. And so they don't see it as a stumbling block. They see it, this is my friend. They don't look, I mean, my son would never say to me when I've grown up, um, Mum, I'm bringing a white friend around or I'm bringing an Asian friend around, this time I'm bringing my friend around.
And that's, that's because of how I've brought them up. But that's how they see life. I think the much older generation who probably have struggled over the years because they've come from a certain background. And by the way, this isn't just about race. It's about everything else as well. It's even about disability.
Um, people have a much more knowledgeable way about what it feels to be different. So having a disability doesn't always mean it's one that you can see. So for example, for me, when I, You know, when I give clients gifts or things, I don't make an assumption I'm going to give them a bottle of champagne, or I'm going to give them flowers, or I'm going to give them chocolates.
And the rationale for that is, unless I've got my EA to do some research, they could be a recovering alcoholic, they could be somebody who's diabetic, or they could be someone who's got an allergy. So I give them a really nice notebook, or something that feels, makes them feel special, that they're getting a gift just as everybody else.
Because I've seen it where somebody has probably whispered to somebody. I don't drink anymore. And that straightaway is either there's a medical condition why they don't drink, or they're recovering alcoholic. And most recovering alcoholics will actually say, I'm a recovering alcoholic, so I don't drink.
So, and what that is, that's about inclusion. You've made them feel special because you haven't put them in that position. by giving them something they can't receive.
[00:08:07] James: Yeah, and I suppose in the past, I remember in the 1980s when I worked as a young guy in advertising, you know, everyone would go to the pub at lunchtime and their clients would And that's quite, you know, and it was a very male, sort of, macho sort of environment.
And that doesn't happen in the same way now. And I think it's a good thing, personally.
[00:08:25] Heather: Yeah, people still go to the pub. Well, I must say that. But the tolerance is different. So, you can invite someone to the pub and they'll say, I'll just have a glass of water. And they're very comfortable saying that.
[00:08:36] James: Well, these new zero beers are really good.
Actually, I don't drink, so I like zero beers. And I stopped drinking a while ago for all sorts of reasons and it suits me not to. And you're right, because there's often an assumption that you do, and if you don't that can be awkward, I suppose. Well,
[00:08:56] Heather: the work that I've always done, and I've always been in a male dominated environment, particularly, you know, 20 I remember working for one particular organization, which I will not name.
And, um, my boss said to me, I've got a concern over you. And I said, well, what might that be? He said, you don't drink enough. I said, you didn't employ me to drink. You employed me to do a job. He said, I know, but, you know, we like to go to the pub or whatever. I can socialize without you and alcohol doesn't have to touch my lips.
It's not that I don't drink, I do like to have a social drink, but I do that with my friends.
[00:09:27] James: Yeah exactly, so this isn't, so, so, so it's about you say creating an environment where people are welcome. I mean, clearly, you know, when people come in and welcome them in a friendly way, that's smiles and handshakes, but how do you do that in a business culture?
I mean, what, what, what are the sort of levers that people should be thinking of pulling or focusing on to make sure that that actually happens, that some of these mistakes don't occur and that everyone there feels they can give of their best?
[00:09:56] Heather: So I think it comes from the top, but it always comes from the top.
Leaders who drive an inclusive environment. and culture will always have really successful businesses. One, the talent wants to stay with them. Two, people want to do business with them because of their values. And three, they're commercially strong because what they've done is they've bound up that to work in our organization, we expect the behaviors that look like this.
And to be a leader in our business, you have to be inclusive in your thought process, in how you deal with your staff, in how you deal with our clients. So from a procurement of services, making sure we're not getting the same people who are our mates that look a certain way to do business all the time, but we're opening it up to other people.
You know, whether we're interviewing people for roles, we need to understand the demographics of the people that we're interviewing. And I don't mean that we need to lower the standard because that's often an excuse that people use. If you have somebody coming in who's autistic, shall we say, who's brilliant at data capture, and you need that individual into your business, they're going to shriek because that's not who they are.
So it's an understanding actually, we might need this skill. But the interview skills might be completely different. I've mentioned that I didn't go to university, but I quote, I go to University of Life. I've been a quick learner. I've worked with some amazing leaders who have always given me an opportunity to shine.
So they might give me an opportunity to do a project that at the time I was thinking, oh my goodness, that's really tough. But actually what they did, they were sponsoring me, and I didn't understand it at the time. And I wanted to be the best that I could be at it, because I needed to earn a good living, I wanted to have a great career.
So I would find myself working really extra hard. Unbeknownst to me, that person was actually putting their neck on the line for me by saying, in an audience that I didn't know about, around that boardroom table, we've got a project coming up, and I really believed that Heather could do this. If we create the right environment for her to be successful.
[00:11:59] James: That's interesting. So, I mean, to, I mean, I'd like to make the point, you are now a Chancellor of a university. I mean, not gone to one, your university, one of our best universities, finest universities. And you have doctorates from two universities, also in very good foresmithing. So, this is real. And you've put that work in and had these wonderful sort of results and recognition.
But that point about taking a chance with someone, or pushing someone into a situation where they may fail, you're saying is actually a sort of sponsoring, friendly, supportive thing to do?
[00:12:32] Heather: Yes, and look, most good leaders have got their eye on somebody. in their business, who probably is that quiet person that doesn't say very much, but actually delivers what they need to deliver.
And if you're looking at your organization, and right now organizations are struggling on the war on talent, being able to attract talent, being able to retain talent, and being able to develop them, that's your biggest commodity. And we knew, we know that because during lockdown, we had all these fantastic buildings that no one could go into.
So it didn't matter how nice your building was. That wasn't driving your business. What was driving your business was your people, your most valuable asset. And we saw how people from all walks of life really shone. But we also saw how if you weren't a good leader, you didn't know how to bring the best out of your people because you didn't know how to lead from afar.
You only knew how to lead from being in the, in a, in an environment where they are coming through the doors with you. So for example, for me, I think about people who I've led in the past especially when they're doing Zoom calls. I could tell somebody was a bit withdrawn and when I'd finish that call, I'd ring them personally or message them and say, have you got five minutes?
Is everything okay? All right. That's a certain kind of leader and that's where I kind of look at the difference between a leader and a manager. Managers are waiting to be told to do that. A leader would instinctively do that because you're not getting the best from that person. You're looking them in the eye and you can see that something's missing.
And that particular individual, when I did that. She'd just lost her dog. She lived on her own, and she, she couldn't go out, and she was grieving. And she didn't feel that she could tell anybody that she'd lost her dog because everybody had lost an aunt or an uncle or a family member. And in the scheme of things, in her mind, she was thinking, Oh, I don't want to bother with them.
But she was grieving as well. And so the fact that I picked up the phone and said, What's going on? You don't seem your normal self. She just burst into tears. And we had this conversation. And so that taught me as well, the value of looking at the people who work for you while we're working in this really unusual way and making sure that when you ask someone how they are, you wait for the answer because there are lots of people say, how are you today?
And by the time you've turned around to answer, they've gone to ask the next person how they are and they haven't heard. So we, we then have to invest in our leaders because quite often Our leaders are made from people who are great because they've delivered an amazing, uh, commercial results or a great marketing strategy, but we haven't invested in them in leading people and it's a bit different.
I have had in my past bosses who want me to, to work the way that they've worked. Different times, different experiences. I'm a different person. I take a different approach at how I have run my businesses, um, all in line with what the organization is going to do, but I have a different approach in doing it.
So you know, beating somebody with a stick doesn't get the end result that you want. You might think it does because it worked back in your day. And so if they don't do this, I'm going to make sure that, you know, we don't reward them or whatever. Actually, if you spend the time to understand why that person is struggling, then you'll And actually, what are their superpowers?
Instead of focusing on what they don't do very well, there might only be one thing they don't do very well, and there's probably about an abundance of things they do really well, but we've only focused on that one thing. What you then do is push that person away, and then they shrink. And then ultimately what they do, they leave your organization.
And then when you start looking at the cost of that, it's a huge amount to an organization. You only have to ask a CFO. A CFO or the HR person, when you start looking at replacing people who have left, the cost that it brings to your bottom line far outweighs the cost as if you spent that time investing in creating an inclusive business where the leadership from the top know what it should feel like.
[00:16:31] James: There's a lot there that you've, you've said, um, but I mean, distilling it down, it actually sounds to me it's about caring about people, you know, you, their well being and, and getting to know them to an extent. But what's the part of it? Being interested in them, isn't there?
[00:16:45] Heather: Absolutely, but I love it that we care about the clients we do business with, right?
When there is a new client we want to wound. We find out about their families, we find out about their business, we find out about the hooks that we need to sell to them. So we know that we have to do that. So we should be doing that with the people that work for us, because our people are our greatest assets, not our buildings.
So it's a, it's an ability to bring the two together so that it becomes the way that we do business. It's the way that we lead. So if you imagine, and I love organizations who put some kind of inclusion targets in their overall commercial targets. So for instance, if you're, if you're the leader of a big commercial business, actually you want to understand the demographics of an area which might be populated by a different segment of society, because you want to understand how do I get their business, how do I get them to do business with them, or how do I get them to buy from us.
But if you don't understand that that segment exists, you're missing a part, an opportunity And that's the mindset. That's why I talk about it from a commercial perspective rather than, you know, as we say, from a nice, fluffy environment, because this, for me, is the way we do business. We do business where we care about the people we do business with.
Actually, there's also some people that we don't want to do business with because if their values don't tie in with us, actually, we might wonder whether or not we do want to do business with that. And I think a measure of that. Are the kinds of RFPs and RFIs, requests for proposals, that we get in? If you look at some of the questions that are being asked now as to the questions that were asked 10 years ago, tell us about your green policy.
Tell us, do you have any of these employee resource groups in your organization? What is the, the, the, the differential, the pay differential between females and males? Those questions people are asking you before they've actually issued you a contract. to work with you. That means it's important for them.
And if you can't answer some of those questions, or you answer them and the words and figures don't add up as they do do their research, they won't do that business with you. And so there's a commercial mindset around that. Equally, I see this with some organizations who are saying, we want to work with a graduate recruitment process that allowed us to have access to all of the great talent.
That means we've got to look across all the spectrums of universities that are out there and look at all the different pockets of people that work, that study in those universities to see how we can get them into our organization. And an example of that for me now is where we're recording right now, we're just a few miles away from Stepney, Stham, all those areas, some extremely.
impoverished areas, but some extremely talented people live in those areas. And if our organization is one that we've made up our mind that we're only going to recruit people that look like me, that sound like me, that have been to the universities I've been to, actually you're missing out on those talents.
Many of the entrepreneurs that are operating in those areas are actually selling their businesses and being multi multi millionaires. And then they have a choice. whether they want to do business with you. And then what happens is that they say, actually, how inclusive was that organization? Let me see what they've done in the past.
And then they won't do business with you. So it's, it's actually quite a vicious circle. And that's why I feel this whole thing of building inclusive businesses around it, being commercially strong, having access to the best talent, having access to businesses that have the same mindset. Not around innovation, but definitely around values because values is what really brings an organization together.
And for me, that's where, that's where we start to make change. And sometimes when we just focus on the diversity piece, we then think all we need to do is have a certain subset of society working on our organizations without changing our culture, and then off we go, we think it'll be fine. Well, anyone that does anything like that, you'll know that they only succeed for a short period of time.
It's not sustainable.
[00:21:06] James: It's not part of the DNA of that organization. So, so, in our business, we have simple values and, and the first of those is we're fair, open, and honest. And I, I think this fairness aspect sounds to me quite important. Because we all know when someone being treated unfairly somehow, and if we, if our starting point is we want to treat everyone fairly, that's the sort of expectation that we treat others like ourselves, isn't it?
It is. Is that enough, or is it?
[00:21:37] Heather: Well, it's a, it's a great starting point, because treating someone fairly means that you need to know what unfair treatment looks like.
[00:21:45] James: I'm your host, James Reid, Chairman and CEO of Reid, a family run philanthropy company. If you'd like to find out more about Reid, visit us at reid.
com. Thank you.
[00:21:57] Heather: During the whole, um, death of George Floyd,
[00:22:00] James: Yes.
[00:22:01] Heather: lots of great organisations started to talk to their employees To understand what it felt like for them as employees who are diverse coming to work. And I remember this, there was a gentleman, a young black guy who was working in a professional services on a big deal.
And he'd gone out at lunchtime. Suit and tie or his shirt and tie to go and get his lunch because they were just about to go and do a big pitch to a big client and he was arrested by the police because they said he met the profile of someone who they thought had just done a mugging. So he then rings his office at the police station to say, look, can you, can somebody talk to these people?
I mean, the poor man was in shock. Can someone speak to these people? And they said, well, stop messing around and hurry up and come back because they thought he was joking. And then he ran back against an arm at the police station. And I remember the partner went to the police station and said, how could you do this?
This young man works for organised Asia. He's shown you his path. Oh, it's just that, you know, he looked like the person. That is happening. That was less than five years ago. Right. So that's stereotyping of what a typical mugger could look like was in that mindset of those two arrested officers. Now, it doesn't always have to be race.
It could be a gender thing. If you don't get into people's minds that actually we need to understand the demographics are of the crime that's been committed, not of the person. And it's, and what I mean by that is a crime happens, it's irrelevant what colour you are, what gender you are. It's irrelevant that you have the details of who did the crime or who the victim is.
We've had the other side where we've had You know, a young person who's probably suffering from epilepsy or something like that. And someone's may, or even diabetic, and someone's made the assumption that they're intoxicated because, you know, their sugar content has dropped and they, or they've just had a fit.
And because they haven't got that understanding about that disability, they've made the assumption that they must have been drinking or taking drugs or something like that. So I just feel there is an education piece around. What, how we treat people in today's world, the illnesses that are around us at the moment, but the situations that people find themselves in without judging.
And the judging has to come from a fair place.
[00:24:27] James: So, not trying to educate, actually, like you are now, sharing these stories with me, but also raising awareness that these things happen and people jump to conclusions too quickly, I suppose. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, someone's not drunk, they've, they've got a
[00:24:43] Heather: There's something, you know, physically, you know, there's something, there could be something wrong with them, rather than making the assumption.
Yeah,
[00:24:48] James: the worst case is applied here, sort of thing. But as I was saying, I think it was Peter Drucker, the business guru, who said, you know, culture eats strategy for lunch.
[00:24:56] Heather: Absolutely.
[00:24:56] James: And this is sort of core cultural. Um, it's the spine of our culture, isn't it?
[00:25:02] Heather: It is, and then I look at the young people who are growing up today, they don't take us for prisoners.
So, if they're going to work at an organization, they do their research. They'll go and they'll see, because all this is in the public domain now. What the difference of pay is between the men and women. They want to know why there are young men that work in organizations It's that will question why Sarah isn't getting paid the same as Ben when they do the same job And and that that's the shift that we're starting to see and and we're also seeing that Organizations who have thought that they could get away.
There was a recent I won't name the company, a recent thing in the press where they happened to pay a huge amount of compensation to their employees, to their female employees, because it was discovered that they were paying the men substantially more than they were paying the women.
[00:25:54] James: That is a company called Next, I mean, a very well known retailer, and I thought it was a very interesting case, because the warehouse workers were getting paid more than the shop workers.
And the shop workers were predominantly women, who not only had to move stuff around, like the warehouse workers, but had to do with customers as well. And I thought it was quite interesting that that parallel had been made. Um, I thought Even more interesting Good for them for bringing the case, actually.
They won their
[00:26:18] Heather: case, because what that's then done is opened up a whole bag of worlds for other organizations in that sector to start thinking, have we done the same? And let's find out what that looks like. And I think organizations that say We want to create a fair and equitable business. It starts from actually making sure you're paying people fairly.
You're giving people the same opportunities when it comes to interviewing them. You're not making a judgement about this person's name sounds like they could live or come from a certain country. I'm not sure they're going to fit into our organisation. Because that still happens. Right, so some, there are some organisations that say, well, I'm going to do blind CVs.
I just want the details of the person. I don't want their name. And I definitely don't want their age. Um, so those are the kind of steps that you take to create, uh, an inclusive environment. Not just these great statements that people put on their buildings that say we do this and we do that. Because, as I said, the example of me, this organization had won many accolades around disability awards and here I was, on crutches, couldn't get into the building.
You know?
[00:27:31] James: Yeah, I mean those sort of stories you've shared suggest we've got quite a long way to go. Actually.
[00:27:37] Heather: We have, but there are some organizations that are doing great stuff and I think what happens, we need to showcase those organizations and the people that work in those organizations a lot more to encourage the others that perhaps.
And not on that same journey yet.
[00:27:52] James: But from what you're saying, those organizations you'd expect will be more successful because they'll attract more talented people. Absolutely. The next generation will join them, they'll stay. Um, so the expectation over time is this will be sort of selective process. It will change.
Well, yes.
[00:28:07] Heather: Because actually, at the end of the day, it's about the bottom line. It's about being commercially strong. You can't be commercially strong if you haven't got the right talent. You can't have the right talent if you're not fishing. in all the best places where all the best talent resist, uh, exists.
So it's a, it's a like catch 22 situation. And that's why I said it comes from the top, a great CEO and chair that actually implement this into their business around us being an inclusive organization. And this is what it will look like. And these are some of the things that we're going to do. We can't, this won't happen overnight, but we've got to have a plan.
And I'm going to compensate my leaders on the basis at the end of the year that they have demonstrated that they have done. X amount of things have led to us retaining our talent and attracting the talent as well as all the commercial stuff that they do to make us a great organization. Now what happens, what gets measured, absolutely gets done, gets rewarded.
And if you make inclusion something that we just talk about or you leave it on their heads, Oh, just the The HR division or in some instances just the employees to do something about it, but their experience is something else. It doesn't work. We see that organizations where they haven't done anything for their employees, they go to, they go to LinkedIn, they go to Facebook, they put message on there, and the example of that was just the whole George Floyd situation where some organizations were a bit scared.
They didn't know what to say, so they said nothing. Their employees said a lot. They went on and said I'm working with an organization and they haven't even mentioned it. And then a whole discussion continues. People work out where those people work and then they decide actually I don't want to work there.
[00:29:48] James: You've had experience in your career of working in places that maybe weren't that inclusive or where you've found yourself in situations where you might feel uncomfortable. How, how, how would you advise someone to react or respond if they're in, in an environment where, you know, they're perhaps not feeling as welcome as they should?
[00:30:11] Heather: So I'm an old, an old girl now, as I'm going to call it, which means I've got a wealth of experience. I've been privileged to work for some really awful leaders, and I say, and I'll explain that in a minute, and I've also been privileged to work for some amazing leaders. The amazing leaders have inspired me to.
be the person I am and giving me the platform to operate on. The ones who haven't been good leaders have also inspired me to be the best that I can be. And I'm going to show them how I can, just because you think I can't. So it drives me.
[00:30:44] James: The awful leaders you think, I'll show you.
[00:30:47] Heather: Yeah, in my mind, that's what I do.
And if someone tells me, I don't think you can do that, I think I'll go away. I think I'm going to show you how I'm going to do it. And I will make sure that I do. And then when I've done it, I'll make sure that you know that I've done it. And then I'll film. And then, and then what actually happens with some of those leaders is more of been about an educational thing with them, of not probably understanding how they should support somebody.
So I remember many, many years ago, going through an interview, it's been more than 30 odd years ago, it wouldn't happen in today's world. My children were quite young at the time. I just got recently divorced from my husband. I had to work. And I had to work because my children, I told them that they were going to go to university whether they wanted to or not, because they would have the choice whether they swept the streets or they were a corporate lawyer or a banker.
And choice was important. And I remember I went for this interview and I was in this room with this gentleman. It was a bank for the best part of an hour and a half. It was almost like it was a war between the two of us. Because his first comment was, I don't believe that women who have children should work.
He couldn't say that in today's world. So let's be clear, this was 30 odd years ago. So the two of us had this big debate in that room. I was absolutely sure I'd never wanted to see him again, and I'm quite sure he felt the same about me. And that was a lesson number one for me. When I walked out of this office, his EA shook her head.
She goes, Definitely got that job. And I thought, absolutely no way. Not the way the two of us were having this debate in the room. I got home and the agency called me. And they say, how did the interview go? I said, it was horrendous. He was awful. I would never want to work there and da da dum. Then she said, do you want to know how it went?
I said, no. She said, well, I think you need to hear how it went. He was so impressed with you. With your ability to communicate with him. With you being honest and your integrity. I was thinking, really? that he not only does he want to offer you that a job, but a different job to the one that you came for, paying you at the time.
It was a lot of money, 5, 000 pounds more than it was 5, 000 pounds in today's world is a handbag for some women. But for me, that was a big, huge amount of money. And I learnt on the day, and I often wonder if he's still alive. It was such a long time ago. I often wonder if he's still alive today, because I would love to shake his hand and say, thank you very much for giving me that opportunity.
And he would probably say, thank you very much for being open and honest with me. And I learned then there's a way that you do it. So it's been elegantly challenging.
[00:33:27] James: I'm sitting here thinking you went home and you didn't like this guy. I didn't. I don't like that experience. I don't like this guy. I don't like the company.
I don't want to go there. I don't want to see him again. And now you say he's offered me a job and I'm already happy. Well, no, the fact is. What's the story? How did you get over that? The thing that did it for
[00:33:43] Heather: me was when they explained to me just exactly how being me is what he found attractive. Right.
And what he felt was what his business needed. Right. Right. So at that really early stage, he'd had this assumption that I think that mothers should stay at home. And by the way, I did say to him in that interview, it's okay for you to say that because you're earning a huge salary so your wife can stay at home.
I am by myself and my children will have the same opportunity that yours have had, but they're gonna have it single handedly from me. So that was the kind of conversation we had, which for me was about being honest.
[00:34:21] James: It's interesting in, you know, you say that conversation wouldn't happen now and I can see all sorts of reasons behind them.
But it's a very, um, I mean, by being a sort of confrontational type of conversation, it actually pulls out quite a lot of It does. content, which is interesting. I don't know how you, how you, how you would have, how you would have got that across to that person. So your tone of voice,
[00:34:43] Heather: tone of voice is really important.
I think your values, we've talked about values quite a lot. And I know the values within your own organization are at the top of everything that you do. And my values are really intrinsically linked in who I work for and what I do. And if I go somewhere, which might pay me a lot of money, but the values aren't in line with mine, I'll feel it.
And I know that I can't, I won't, I won't survive there. I won't survive. And, and so, and this is what I'm seeing from the generation of young people that are coming up. A lot of them are saying, I am not working five days or traveling five days and going in the city. I'm not doing it. So what I'll do is I'm going to work for myself for part of that day and I'll do some other job before I do part time.
But I'm going to choose how I work. And that's creating a much more flexible, opportunity for them. And organizations are now saying, well, hold on a minute. How do we make this work? We've got senior men who are probably also looking after elderly parents, or maybe a wife that's not well, or maybe a single father.
And I use that because we always say women, but there are lots of men that do it. Or somebody who just wants to have a few more days to themselves to study or do something. So our culture needs to be, how do we make that work? And do you know what people throw back at us at the moment? They say, We've just had two years of working from home delivering tough results, working without all the equipment that we've needed, working completely by ourselves, and we've done it.
So now we've got the accessibility of our offices back, uh, uh, and our people, we've got the restrictions lifted. We should be able to work in a more flexible way that helps us to, to balance our home lives, but also our careers. Now, you might say, yeah, but how do we do about people's buildings and, you know, they invested in all those buildings?
I'm also a firm believer that you have to come into an office where your colleagues are at some point, because you need to be able to bounce off of them and learn from them. You know, I set my own business up and I worked on my own for two years. And it was great, but it was also very lonely. I miss the banter of my colleagues.
And even if you're doing it on screen, it's not quite the same, bumping into someone in the escalator. So I'm a firm believer of going into, into an establishment where you work for a couple of days. Um, a week and maybe one or two days a week. You might work from home, you might work from a different location because the time that you're not traveling is the time you can be working.
Um, so it's a win win and that once again is how do we educate leaders to make them understand that we've got to find a way to make this work because this new generation of, of employees and talent coming in are going to have different demands on us. But equally. We've got different demands on them. We want them to work longer hours.
We want them to do more entertaining with our clients and that kind of stuff. So we've got to, we've got to find a balance, which says this will work for our organization, but it will also work for our employees.
[00:37:50] James: I agree. I mean, it's the pandemic changed everything in that respect. And people have found all sorts of new flexible ways of working, which suits everyone.
Organizations are alive to that as an opportunity. To what? What should a sort of white male middle aged leader like myself be doing or thinking about that maybe isn't perhaps top of the agenda, typically for someone like me, that would help us, you know, make the most of that golden thread and make our organizations better, really.
I'm always trying to improve our organization. I know the people listening to this will be. You know, approaching it from a viewpoint of learning, I mean, are you able to summarize or pull out two or three themes that we should really keep front of mind?
[00:38:38] Heather: So I think the first thing is understanding the people who work in your organization.
What do they look like? What are the challenges they might be facing? What are the strengths that they bring to our organization? That person that sits there quietly. in the corner, maybe somebody who's a very talented person that could be autistic. But we don't know that because we've judged them on the basis that they are this, they're not the same as everyone else that's going out and that's loud and whatever.
And so we need to understand that, we need to appreciate that. We also need to think about, and I, and I'm a firm believer of, there's a program called where you, you exchange being a boss. I think it's the U. S. when you go work in your organization. Undercover boss. That's the one. I think business is where the boss, you know, regularly walks the floor, speaks to people, creates a very different inclusive environment because you're speaking to everybody.
You're, you know, bosses that say good morning to, you know, the person that's pouring the coffee as well as the person that's leading his big business. That says a lot to employees when they watch that, they think, Oh, he's a really nice guy because he cares about everybody that works in this organisation.
But bosses that understand and will challenge their leaders around how they recruit in, you know, I love it that some organisations will say, When we have a role, I want to see a mix of CVs. Don't just come to me with all men or all women. I want you to bring me a mix of CVs. I want you to scour the market to make sure that we've, we're getting the best of everybody, not just the best of one type of person.
Because one type of person that you bring into the organization will just multiply that because they'll keep bringing something that looks like themselves. And so for me, it's around understanding what it feels like to work in your organization. It's always interesting. And I think, you know, those staff surveys, and there's lots of things we're covering, but all these things are really important.
You know, some people say, Oh, you know, our staff survey said this. Well, actually, let's have a look at how many people responded. Because if you have a staff survey that 10 people responded, and you've got, you've got 100 people working in there, you've got an issue. People don't trust the organization. And they're thinking to themselves, When I put this information into the system, it's not going to change how I work or how I'm treated, so I'm not going to bother.
So, you know, an engaged staff, a happy staff, means that they will work even harder for you. And that doesn't mean accepting poor performance. I'm not saying that at all. And I'm also, I do want to bring this point, I'm also not expecting us to run a business where our staff tell us they're not coming to work.
They're going to work from home five days a week. I'm not doing that. What I am saying is we need to meet each other halfway. So for instance, we're going through one of the most toughest economic times in our history. That means the cost of childcare, the cost of travel, the cost of food, the cost of everything has gone up.
If it is that somebody working from home two days a week is saving an astronomical sum of money in their child cost fees, their travel fees, their food and all of that stuff. Actually, then that's a good thing because they're saving that, but at the same time, out of loyalty for their employer, giving them that space to work from home, they're going to work even harder.
I've seen people who will get up really early, do things before the children are stuck. They take the children to school, take children to school, come back, work, then work right through lunch, pick the children up, feed them, spend a bit of time with them, and then go back to work that evening when the children have gone to bed.
That's a really committed and dedicated employee. Now they're the ones that you really want to keep. in your business for the future?
[00:42:35] James: You certainly do, but I, I've seen recently, PwC, a firm, you know, you know, they've started monitoring where people are working and they've asked that night to report the hours to them.
They're obviously, there's some issue there about hybrid working.
[00:42:48] Heather: Well, the issue we have is that it's a people business. Yes. And your clients, you have to, you have to be available for your clients. You have to
[00:42:54] James: go see people, yeah. Right, so, so for instance,
[00:42:57] Heather: Ambulance drivers, doctors and nurses, they've got to be in the hospitals, right?
They can't all work from home. So we've got to take a balanced view, and I totally understand why organisations such as PwC and professional services are saying if you need to come to the office three days a week, we're paying you to do that because your job. means you have to be in front of clients.
And if you're not there to be in front of clients, that means that we're not going to be able to perform.
[00:43:23] James: So it's very much tailored to the work and
[00:43:25] Heather: Absolutely. who's doing what. It's about leadership as well. So it's about the leaders being able to communicate the vision. of the organization in a way that is receptive to people, but also bearing in mind the obligations of the organizations to their industry and to their people that, that they do business with.
[00:43:43] James: So we've been talking a little bit about recruiting and casting the net as wide as possible to make sure we, we invite, you know, as many people from diverse backgrounds to the party and then obviously when they come we want to make sure we have the shoes too. But What do you think about sort of recruitment strategies that maybe have focused on positive discrimination?
You know, we want people from a certain group and we kind of go out and find them specifically. What's your view on that?
[00:44:11] Heather: I'm opposed to that. And the reason I'm opposed to that is that it goes back to my original statement at the beginning about just going to pick people, bring them into an organization and the culture is not ready for them.
And also what you then do, you create an environment which people then say, you're only here because you come from a socially demographically reduced background, or you're only here because you're a woman, or you're only here because you're gay or any of those. specific areas of diverse backgrounds. What I would like to see is positive action being taken, which is very different to positive discrimination.
So the example for me is, in our business, we have a hundred people. Out of the hundred people, we have three that are female leaders. I've got the data in front of me. Organizations love data. So what we're going to say to change the demographic of that, we have got to take some positive action. to bringing more women into our business.
And to do that, it might mean that what we have to do is not dumb down the job in any way, but look at what are the reasons why those women won't apply to come and work for us. Is it because they don't see enough role models and they don't to survive, um, and they can't have a career here? Is it that there is, we don't have any flexible working?
And by the way, flexible working is not just available for women. It's available for everybody. We've got people at different stages in their life that want to do stuff. But we are specifically saying we want to try and encourage a certain demographic to join our business. An example of that could be, for instance, marketing.
Marketing is filled with amazing, talented women, lots of women. From time to time we want to bring in a male marketeer into the business to change the culture of that environment. So actually what we might want to do is be very clear in our, in our recruitment strategy to say, right, let's look at all the talent that comes through.
Okay. on the CVs, then let's break it down and see how many of those are women and how many of those are men. And I'm a firm believer that you look at the competencies of all of them but you also say in our final selection we will have a female in that group rather than just bring three men or just bring three black people or three brown people.
We will actually have somebody give them the opportunity because on, on paper. their criteria, their competency is the same. Our natural thing would be to go for the, the person that we perhaps is very much like us or like the rest of the people in the team, instead of thinking this individual is the same as in terms of their competency, but it's what we need in our, in the demographics of our business to start to build an inclusive business.
[00:47:02] James: So a positive action. Positive action, not
[00:47:04] Heather: positive, um, discrimination.
[00:47:12] James: Bye. First question. I mean, you know, uh, Reed, we love Mondays, so, uh, Eva, can you tell me what gets you up on a Monday morning?
[00:47:22] Heather: Oh, my goodness. So usually, my diary, and my diary's always varied, because I make sure there are things in my diary that I love for the week, things I know I don't love so much, but I've got to do.
But actually knowing what my week's going to look like. And knowing that in my week, I've got an element of people stuff, um, of entertainment stuff, of family stuff, fun stuff, and actually, I love where I'm going to work. So, if I don't like where I work, I don't like Mondays.
[00:48:02] James: Hmm, we can help you with that, if that should ever happen.
So, so, our next question, which is related to work, is an interview question that many people are asked, and it's one of the questions in my interview book, Why You. 101 interview questions you'll never make. And by
[00:48:18] Heather: the way, we've quoted that book in some of the work that I've done, so Okay. So I need a few signed copies to take back to my office.
[00:48:24] James: Oh, I've already given you a couple. So you know the book. And it's a question that many people are asked. And I think it's interesting for you as a leader. And it's, where do you see yourself in five years time?
[00:48:37] Heather: Well, James, I was hoping I would say to you, I see myself in five years time, on a beach somewhere, sunning myself.
But the reality of life is that I can't see that I'm going to retire and I'm, I've got that special pass at the moment, you know, that magic pass that allows me to use transportation free, which I absolutely, that's the most valuable thing in my bag. I continue with good health and with great people and doing a job I love.
I will still be doing that in five years time. Because. When you love what you do, it doesn't feel like work. When you work with people that you respect, it also doesn't feel like work. And when you work with people that you have fun with, and that might be your clients, as well as your, your colleagues.
actually it becomes another community. So, and if I win the lottery and then I can go and set up some sort of foundation in my name of some sort and do that, I don't think I'll stop working.
[00:49:37] James: Well, I'm pleased to hear that. And
[00:49:38] Heather: shopping.
[00:49:40] James: Here's to working and shopping. Thanks very much. Thank you to Heather for joining me on All About Business.
If you'd like to find out more about Heather's work empowering women in business, her LinkedIn is in the show notes. I'm your host, James Reed, chairman and CEO of Reed, a family run philanthropy company. If you'd like to find out more about Reed, visit us at reed. com. Thank you.
