Have you had any eureka moments with Equality Act training? Equality Laws, Diversity Issues or Cultural Awareness?
"Hard headed" delegates from the private and public sector attending our Equality Act training have sometimes initially looked askance at the topic,often resenting their invitation to attend. "Pink and fluffy" and "What's this got to do with our products?" are the most polite adjectives and industrial language responses! But.....
The reality is that if you follow the actual footprints of the new equality legislation, a pragmatic and hard headed objective approach can be found within the pages of the statute and those which preceded it. This,I have found, has been the "eureka" moment for delegates with "folded arms" when they have juxtaposed their existing pro active risk assessment models for health,safety,environmental and other areas. The mantra "What is reasonable, practical and proportionate" threads all our courses together and by the way, is readily received by the hard headed private sector trainees seeking to engage with the public procurement clauses within the Act. We often see the penny dropping in equality and diversity courses for the private sector when they recognise not only the foregoing points but see the connection between economic,demographic and cultural communication factors that shape the modern equality and diversity agenda. Our trainers are often told, we have actually been doing this for a long time.
But it's not all about the law of course.
When you add to the training some empathy models with case studies of the worse kinds of bullying,harassment and discrimination coupled with techniques for challenging inappropriate behaviour and managing your own prejudices, you get close to some "eureka" moments.
What's worked for you?
Dominic
qedworks.com
4 Responses
Eureka moment
I worked for two years for a large airways company who had an excellent approach to euqal opps, race, religion, culture, and diversity. The breakthourgh on each course was the relalisation of the delegates that they could talk about things openly, often questionning their own actions and behaviours and not be pilloried for it and were then much more open to suggestions about a more appropriate way to behave.
Cheers.
Nick
Eureka Moment
Absolutely agree
We all have prejudices and managing them is sometimes hard. When we tell people about real cases we have helped represent, juxtaposing the details against the empathy model for challenging inappropriate behaviour and giving feedback can help reinforce the learning points -ANDpost course actions
Dominic
QED Training qedworks.com
Eureka moment
Dominic
Many years ago I trained a guy in customer service. He was a white South African brought up with a pretty racist family background. He was not a bad person, he was just deeply ingrained with some very racist beliefs and behaviours. He did a skills practice interview with a black interviewee and it brought all this into sharp relief. To be honest I was struggling to work out what to do for the best. It is not easy to change a life-time of powerful messages in a short skills training programme.
I opted, more out of instinct than any thought through strategy, to ask him to imagine how he would interview a white person. I then asked him to demonstrate that approach, to act it out, but with the same black interviewee, who kindly agreed. The difference was stunning. At the end there was spontaneous applause. The black woman leapt up waved her arms and ran around to hug him. For a moment he looked like a rabbit in the headlights. But as soon as we all sat down there was a sudden unmistakable change in his face. A light bulb had gone on. He just said “I’ve got it”…three times.
I was obviously pleased we had made progress but I still had a nagging concern about how he might be back in the workplace with real customers, especially if a tricky situation came up and really tested his resolve.
Anyway, a few years later I bumped into him quite by chance. He told me that that course had been a real life changer. This had not just been about customer interviewing skills, it had been like “…someone had turned on a switch in my brain…”. It was heart-warming and was one of those occasions that affirms why I am still in this game after so many years.
I think legislation is important, but it wasn’t a feature in this particular example. I think I have also learnt that change like this can either be a long, slow evolutionary process, as it is for most of us. But if you can press the right button powerfully enough at the right time in someone’s life – stimulating that eureka moment – you can help them make quite revolutionary changes.
Hope that helps
Graham
Euruka moment
— Graham
Genuinely that is one of the most moving and poignant things I have read for ages in this field. You are quite right about the limitations with law – and absence of other factors
THANK YOU!!!
Dominic
QED Training qedworks.com