Lean In Leeds May 2019
I attended a Lean In Circle yesterday which was hosted in the BJSS office. We had two speakers:
Alison Lowe – CEO – Touchstone
Touchstone are an exemplary example of a fair and inclusive company. Through commitment to training staff in different
ways to respect and support each-other, the charity is recognised by staff and its many accolades as being a decent
place to work for everyone. The training, around Gender Identity, Sexual Orientation, and more, is mandatory for all
staff. There are also internal groups for support, such Pink Pals for LGBT allies. Alison recently concluded duties as
a Labour Councillor in Leeds and was one of the most engaging speakers I’ve experienced.
Stuart Bullock – MD – BJSS
BJSS is one of the leading software consultancies in the UK. Stuart described some of the challenges in the industry
and the company, and measures that were being taken to ensure the diverse requirements of staff were being satisfied.
This aligned with the company’s core values. Flexible working and part-time roles were an important way to ensure
inclusion, and Stuart was clear that demanding clients would have to accept this as the way business with BJSS is
done.
We also had an unconscious bias exercise. This was new to me and I think a highly valuable experiment. I’ll be
proposing a similar exercise at Infinity Works. The exercise involves realising assumptions you make given a partial
description of a character, and then admitting and discussing the assumptions with your group.