The events of the killing of George Floyd shocked the world, and triggered a renewed and profound focus around the Black Lives Matter movement. Although the events took place in the USA, it was clear that this was the tip of the iceberg on a long-awaited discussion about race issues across the world.
I was locked up during the pandemic when the events took place. But like many people, I was keen to do something. Also, like many people, I wasn’t really sure what I could really do to make a change.
Ironically, I was probably as well equipped as anyone. At least in terms of knowledge anyway. At the time, I was still working in the UK government. I had been chairing the departmental race and faith network for two years. I was successful with it – we were recognised for our excellent work and gained awards.
I had also shifted into a new role, where half of my time was working on diversity and inclusion for my group of 600 people. This was about promoting diversity and inclusion more broadly amongst numerous different teams and directorates. I was good at it as well. So the issue was not experience.
Within the department, there was a flurry of internal activity, including numerous discussions around race with a concrete action plan coming out of it. It was genuinely inspiring – our department had already done a lot around race. So rather than being a knee-jerk reaction to an external event, this was an emotionally-sensitive, considerate approach which was respectful but also action-oriented.
I also recognised that there was more I could do outside of my formal workplace. I was in the midst of qualifying as a transformational coach, and starting to be far more active on social media. I found a creative side of me through the writing of these articles, and slowly but surely I was unveiling the mask of ‘corporate worker’ to someone who was willing to speak in public spaces around these issues.
I woke up one morning and reflected about what built my success around diversity and inclusion. I used to have direct one-to-one conversations with my director-general. I learnt that rather than looking to constantly push the agenda at them, it was really important to understand the person in front of me and help them see why this was important, and what role they can play. No doubt qualifying for a coach was all a part of this.
This was an approach that I didn’t see many diversity and inclusion practitioners taking. Whilst many are extremely passionate, I saw them trying to push ever-harder at the door. This often led to resistance from the organisation, and burnout for the practitioners. From my experience, I found open and collaborative conversations to be an extremely powerful way to shift hearts and minds. Senior leaders are humans too, after all.
Then, in November 2020 I had an idea to write a book. I even posted about it in a blog back then, with the rather ambitious goal to write it in one month. I had a spurt of inspiration one morning about creating the ‘CUBE’ model: looking at people’s Culture, Upbringing, Biases and (Lived) Experiences. The idea of the model was to give some basic prompts (what culture do you come from? how important is this for you?) to help people understand the importance of diversity for themselves. I’ve since run this in workshops and found it worked really well.
And so I started with plenty of enthusiasm. I got pretty far too. But then I ran out of things to say. Once I got past the section of my experiences and the CUBE model, I didn’t know how to take the book deeper to something more transformational for the reader. For the book to be truly life-changing, I wanted it to be a deeply shifting experience.
This year, I found what I wanted to say. I am experiencing a profound shift in the way I am living my life. A big part of this was reading the book, The Ultimate Coach. This details the life of Steve Hardison and how we can live into Being who we want to be each and every day. It sounds simple enough, but it is about how we live our lives when nobody is watching, and how we want to create the people we are being.
The prompt to reading this book was that I attended the London Ultimate Event in April 2022, where Steve Hardison was speaking. It was filled with hundreds of incredible, open people, many of whom were coaches.
It was actually there that I spoke to a friend. He was handing me a copy of his book, on the promise I read it. It is there that I spoke to him about the fact I had this half written-book.
We have a recording where he asked me whether I was willing to commit to finishing it. After some deliberation, I said yes. During the recording, he wanted to commit me deeply. And so, he asked me when I wanted to complete it by. After some deliberation, I said I thought I could complete it by March 2023.
He said, okay, but can you do it in half the time? I was taken aback but thought about it – yes that seemed possible. I said potentially – he said we do not do ‘potentially’.
After a bit of back and forth, he asked whether I could have it written by 20th November – his birthday. So in the end, I agreed. As a man of commitment, my book is now finished and is available to preorder on Amazon currently, with a release date on Kindle for 19th November.
It makes for a fun story, but this is also about committing to action. I committed to finishing a version of the book by 20th November. Whilst I could have made excuses or delayed the deadline, I decided not to. It was important for me to uphold my commitments. For myself, rather than anyone else.
The book itself is a manifestation of my commitment to love and serve others. I wrote it with the genuine will to help people understand the topic of diversity and inclusion for themselves. I truly believe that the book will be a powerful tool to help anyone who picks it up to understand themselves better and be an actor for change.
So if you’re interested in knowing more about it, feel free to drop me a message.
You can check out the site page on Amazon where I’ll be self-publishing. The Kindle edition is currently available to pre-order, but there will be a paperback version on the site shortly.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0BKTPPY1K?ref_=pe_3052080_276849420