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Talk 200 is a new lecture and podcast series from The University of Manchester, launching to mark our bicentenary: 200 years of making a difference.
This year we’re reflecting on our past, celebrating our present and looking to the future – and Talk 200 invites listeners to be part of the journey.
Our podcast host, Manchester aficionado, author, and University alumnus Andy Spinoza will be joined by a diverse line-up of guests from our community – pioneering academics and notable figures, inspiring staff, alumni and students – to discuss topics such as health, digital and AI, climate change, and equality and justice.
[Music]
Hello and welcome to Talk 200, a lecture and podcast series to celebrate The University of Manchester's bicentenary year.
Our 200th anniversary is a time to celebrate 200 years of learning, innovation and research.
200 years of our incredible people and community, 200 years of global influence.
In this series, we'll be hearing from some of the nation's foremost scientists, thinkers and social commentators,
plus many other voices from across our university community as we explore the big topics affecting us all.
Today we're having vital discussions around fairness, equality, and inclusion.
From historic contributions to the suffrage movement to wider social justice initiatives,
the University and its people have always been at the forefront of advocacy and activism.
But what does that look like in today's world?
Our mission is to ensure that research and initiatives developed here
not only advance knowledge, but bring real world changes that promote inclusivity and fairness.
We strive to create an environment where everyone, regardless of their background, can succeed.
In this episode, we'll cover everything from equal employment to health inequalities,
accessibility to social entrepreneurship, in sharing their knowledge and experiences
our guests will highlight the progress made towards a more inclusive and fairer society.
This isn't just about celebrating achievement, it's about recognising ongoing efforts to advance these goals
and create meaningful change.
Join us to explore how we can shape a fairer world for everyone.
So, I'm Colette Fagan, I'm the Vice-President for Research at the University, so I'm a member of the leadership team.
I look after the research strategy, but I also am one of the people involved in our EDI
(Equality, Diversity and Inclusion) action plans.
That partly links back to my academic research, which has, throughout my career, been on employment,
job quality, working conditions... through the particular lens of gender inequality
and contributing to advancing gender equality, I hope.
So, I'm Aisha Akram, the Well-being and Liberation officer at the Students' Union.
So, I was elected into my role in July 2023, and I'll be in my role until August 2025,
because I just got reelected recently.
I do a lot of work with working with the university to look at their EDI plans
and also asking the Union to do work on liberation groups
and ensuring that all groups have the same opportunities as one another and the same access.
So, I've been doing work on the Access and Participation Plan in collaboration with the University as well.
And it kind of stems from my degree in Psychology.
I'm very passionate about caring for other people, and I also like the mental health side of it
because I'm very passionate about talking about my own experiences
and reducing the stigma surrounding topics like mental health and liberation.
Yes, I'm George Obolo,
soon to be a doctor just finishing my medical exams now,
but also the co-founder of the Black Excellence Network,
which exists to remove all racial inequity seen in higher education,
but also in early careers for students, and so I have been on that journey now for three years.
I mean, it’s been going really, really well.
The acronym EDI is often used to summarise these areas.
Could you explain EDI?
Yes, so equality, diversity and inclusion is in the University rubric in relation to our action plans,
and is generally part of the everyday language, I think, and it's used in most sectors.
Over the last ten years perhaps, there's been a shift to “should we talk about equity instead of equality”?
Some organisations have dropped the “e” and just talk about diversity, which I think is wrong,
but that's another debate.
But whether we use “equity” or “equality” does shade into different emphasis on what actions you take,
and a number of our research activities within the University use the language of “equity” instead of “equality” for that reason.
The language of equality, if you dig under it into the early statements,
certainly in the women's movement, actually covered equity, but I don't mind language being updated.
So, there were principles of not just equal opportunities (everyone starting from the same point in the race),
but how to ensure equal outcomes: you need different provisions for different experiences.
And certainly, in the women's movement, it was about not just treating us the same as men at work,
although we'd like the law to do that, but to put what we would now call ‘equity things’
around it,
which is consideration of care, childcare, maternity leave, and things,
which are targeted to one group to enable them to be at the same starting point and
hopefully endpoint.
But the equity language, I think, has started to make that more crystallised and visible.
I think with equity, it's about giving people the opportunity when they're not from areas of privilege, for example.
So, for example, if somebody needs something extra, depending on the challenges they face as part of their identity,
then I think that's where equity comes into play, and I think it's really important.
Both terms are very important, I think equality just gives that extra opportunity.
George, have you got a view on this?
Yeah, yeah. This has been a conversation I've had with many different people,
and I see different views and understand both different views.
I typically, once again, to echo what you guys have said,
I stand in the place of talking more about equity than equality,
but I think both discussions are worth having.
And so, I don't feel like one discards the other,
and so often I like having discussions about both.
Thank you.
Can you tell us about some of the key moments in the University's past that have advanced equality and fairness?
Big question. So, let me give you some snippets from history.
So, the University was established in 1824, and it was established with some commitments at the time,
which were quite radical. So, it was to enable the education of working-class men,
and we'll pause on men, but it was to open education to everyone,
and it was secular. It wasn't based on faith, which again, at that time in the UK's history,
was a radical step towards inclusion.
Having said that, and the development of the University from those founding principles
and civic connection to its place in the region,
it wasn't until nearly eight years later that women were allowed to enter university and study,
again representing the historical development in the UK at the time,
but the University was one of the first to allow women to study.
And then it traced through, alongside, in the early 20th century around the civil rights movements,
the war protests and so forth. So, it's had a radical thread right through from the outset.
Of course, now we can look back and say, well, that took a while,
and we've still got a lot to do, and that's right,
but it was founded on some real radical commitments made by the philanthropists to help establish it.
Okay, I mean, just before we move on, the University has, in recent years, started to
investigate its own history
as regards to slavery, and also, I suppose, just exploitation of workers, generally.
I mean, is that something you can speak to just before we open it up?
Yes, a little bit, I can. So, I'm not a historian, but I think we have to, without apologising,
contextualise the origins of the University. And in some ways, it looks very paradoxical
because it was rooted in philanthropic donations from men who'd made money in industry,
and so, at that time, they were white men. They were Quakers, and the Quaker religion has quite a lot of fundamental
principles about pacifism: being pacifists, not going to war, and so forth.
But the way that they did make their money, and we are starting to excavate,
involved, to a greater or lesser degree, some involvement in slavery and enslavement,
because they would have had investment in cotton industries. Some had direct stakes, literally, in slaves.
So, we're not an unusual organisation, and it's the responsibility of all organisations to look back.
And that's what we're doing at Manchester, to represent and understand our history.
So, there are a few things which we can already point to, for people who want to learn more,
and we're learning about. So, the Bicentenary book, which will come out later this year,
the introduction addresses and outlines some of what we've discovered and evidenced.
There's an exhibition on at the John Rylands Library, and in our festival event early June,
we're running an event with The Guardian, and The Guardian did a fantastic exploration of our origins last year.
So, we're doing something in dialogue with them.
And it's not just about documenting, excavating history untold stories,
but there's future events and initiatives which will be coming out later in the year,
which I can't do the trailer on in any detail,
but that history has influenced and informed our equality, diversity and inclusion action plan,
both in terms of decolonising the curriculum, but also addressing our commitment to underrepresented groups.
So, one example is the recent scholarships from Raheem Sterling, who's donated
scholarships explicitly
for students of Black and Caribbean heritage. So, none of these on their own are enough,
but I hope they signal our commitment to moving forward.
When you came to Manchester, did you have some information about this?
There's been a lot of work done in the last few years, and maybe, have your views evolved?
I’d be interested to open it up.
I think when I was doing some research, a few weeks ago actually, just in terms of
decolonising the curriculum,
and the work that the Union’s doing with the University.
When I was looking into the acknowledgement of the role in the slave trade,
I thought it was really important that we addressed that,
and I thought it was a really good first step forward.
I think for the future work on decolonising the curriculum, obviously it takes a while,
but it is really important. Especially, there's obviously statues around the University
from people who we acknowledge within the conversations.
I think hearing the voices from the statues who may have been influential from minority groups
but aren't exactly there. So, ‘invisible statues’ in some sense,
from people who have already had a good influence on the history, but aren't necessarily in statues.
I think that would be a great development. I've followed closely how Bristol has dealt with their legacy
and how you can reshape public art and recontextualise it without just removing and making it go away,
because it doesn't go away, it has to sit somewhere, but be challenged and debated.
So I would love to see some... thinks that statues should have the contextual information presented very clearly...
but anyway, George, what's your...
Yeah, having talked to even different universities about it, to help them with their work,
even I’m in conversations with the Department for Education around their posture,
around the topic more generally, has meant I've done a lot of research,
but from a different perspective in regards to “how do things begin to change?”
And so, I have looked into a lot of kind of the behavioural science element behind how even institutions change
when they have different kind of backgrounds to where they’re looking to move to.
And one thing I've definitely found, that seems to be consistent, is that change requires a quite large institutional change.
It doesn't happen from people simply understanding that this was the case, and it doesn't happen simply from an intellectual perspective,
but sometimes we need institutional change to shift things that were institutionally put in at the beginning.
So that's kind of where my head is kind of at and what my research is showing so far.
Brilliant, thank you. So, we move into the section where we talk about the present day.
How does the University’s research and approach to research tackle inequality and the roots of inequality?
Who gets to research and how we build corrections to previous under-representations of groups?
So let me talk about the first one to start with.
So, we have a number of research groups tackling these issues head on.
One I would start by mentioning and trace through is the Global Development Institute,
largest institute in the world, world leading in its work on development and underdevelopment of countries and regions across the world.
And the existence of the Global Development Institute can be traced back to Arthur Lewis, appointed in 1948,
the first Black professor in the UK who really was the founder of Development Economics.
So GDI is one of the flagships of our beacon: global inequalities.
That's one of five beacons across the University.
We also have the Center for Research on Dynamics of Ethnicity (CoDE).
We have the Work and Equalities Institute, that I'm connected to, that looks at equality and diversity in employment issues, among other things.
And in Health we've also got people looking at health issues.
So, EDI is threaded through research which is designed to help correct the problems.
So, Colette, you mention the global inequality beacon, can you explain more?
Yes, so the University has five -what we call- ‘research beacons’, which we identified for both the scale (number of people) involved and the excellence of the research.
And that the research is addressing a problem or an issue and global inequalities is one of the five beacons.
And that covers both the sort of Global Development Institute around international
inequalities between regions,
much of which can be traced back to colonialism, imperialism under development and we're still sorting out the world there.
But it also includes centers and research activity focused on age inequalities, gender and sexualities and race.
So, that's one signal of the amount of work and the quality of the work which is going on at Manchester.
On the other angle that I mentioned, Andy, this really comes back to our action plans: to ensure that the students we recruit, the staff we recruit...
how their careers progress, enable everybody to move forward and contribute.
And so that's a big part of my portfolio.
And Aisha, I suppose your work is that...in relationship between University and the student body and...what sort of challenges are you working on overcoming in your work?
I suppose when looking at my area of work, it spans across a wide range, so there's obviously the mental health side and then there's the liberation side.
I think something that was key for me this year is ensuring that the Union’s voice was heard within the Access and Participation Plan,
and ensuring that key groups that I thought would be affected or marginalized were also included.
So, for example this year I've been doing a lot of work on transgender and gender diverse students.
And I think that's something that's really important and really close to my heart because I know that there are students that are struggling within University,
and so, we decided to do some research on that because we were given the opportunity to do the student consultation for the plan.
And I think it was my opportunity to ensure that the University was hearing that these
students are struggling, and they have made some amendments to the plan depending on the consultation, which I think is really important.
I think some of the challenges faced is that there are a lot of different groups that are struggling.
I think one main thing is looking at intersectionality of groups because there are some interventions that will work, for example, like it may work for Black heritage students, but if they also have an intersection, that they're part of the LGBT community,
And the intervention doesn't tackle both sides then the students experience will still not be the best it could be.
So, for example, for me, I'm South Asian, Muslim, I have ADHD, and I'm part of the LGBT community.
So, the interventions that the University put in for me, in different ways, they might not work if they only tackle one part of the intersection.
There needs to be a holistic way of improving the student experience.
And I think that's something that does need to be considered further.
Okay thank you. I mean, George, certainly to you now, as a medicine student and also a social entrepreneur, can we talk about the Black Excellence Network and what motivated you to start that?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, what motivated me to start it is, me and a couple of students, we either realised that we really benefited from having people who were a couple steps ahead of us who looked like us, but also knew our situation to a greater degree
or we realized that we were greatly at a disadvantage because we didn't have that.
And so, after realizing that and having conversations with a few other people we just realised that we wanted to start something.
We didn't know what that looked like this was August 2020 so during COVID times.
And so, we started off with a mentorship scheme and we started off with a campaign that was ‘100 for 100’,
where we got 100 undergraduates to mentor 100 sixth-formers.
And so that was really successful, but then that began to show us all the different things we could be doing and work we can be doing and it also taught us that the most important stakeholders weren't only necessarily us, but universities,
Certain companies, and different institutions and so we began to get in contact with them and formed this kind of symbiotic relationship with all of them that just fed into our organisation and just kept it growing.
Particularly for us, we also were looking at statistics, and because of the great disparity and disadvantage in regards to Black students in particular,
that's why we've decided to even put more focus on that than some other disadvantaged groups, because I feel like the natural assumption for us, as all the founders are of Black heritage, is to assume we simply wanted to do that because it's who we are.
But actually, looking at the statistics, it was the socially most imperative thing for us to do.
As a Black Londoner, how did the University present itself to you when you were thinking about it?
I mean, and has that process changed in the years since you've been here...and have you been part of that process?
Yeah, yeah, so that's actually quite an interesting question because when I was in London and then we moved out, outskirts, I was on the outskirts.
I had no concept of the North. Like I had nothing in my brain about what was in the North. It sounds really, really weird,
but back in 2018, 2019, I wasn't sure of anyone who I knew who was up in the North. Back then at least, when I would go to look at resources for universities that were up in the North, I wouldn't see anyone like me.
So, I guess that brings the inherent question that you don't ponder unconsciously but subconsciously which is: “do I belong in the North?”.
So, I kind of asked that question and just had to go on a deep search. And so, eventually found some people who assured me that there is definitely space because Manchester is actually one of...it's a very diverse city.
Some would say it's the most diverse city in Europe. And so having discovered that, that was like really, really beautiful, but it then made me aware that there is this gap of knowledge between young Black students who are down south or not necessarily up North and the information that is here and what the experience is like here.
And so, we wanted to do that, not only for Manchester, but for all universities, because we're seeing even different degrees of application to top universities because there just isn't knowledge that someone is there that's like me.
And so, we exist to kind of close that gap. And so, has your network been working with the University in a sort of...specific ways?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, so we work with the University on a program they have called
‘Manchester 10/10’, which exists to support Black heritage students, but we've also worked in regards to some policy things with the University.
But also, even our work with the University has led to work with Department for Education, which has been really, really neat.
And we're looking at how they think about access and participation as well. And then we also work with other stakeholders like your Magic Circle law firms or your Big 4 companies just to see also how they think about that because we are really passionate about
improving the progression of Black students through each stage all the way onto careers.
But we also want to improve the inclusion at each stage. And so, we like to focus on more stakeholders.
Because when I was on the board, I was aware the statistics showed that there was a dropout rate and component going that was markedly different. And I'm going back 10 years now.
I mean...is that kind of improvement, seen an improvement? Yes, so, I actually looked at that statistic very recently. Yeah, very, very recently. And it's still the same unfortunately in regards to one of the highest dropout rates we see in students are from Black heritage students which shows once again the
gap in information as to what university’s like, but also, the inclusion element that
universities have. And so, we're looking to do more work, approaching more investors, looking to scale things a bit more because we're even recognizing the demand from the Black heritage students across the nation is more than we can even currently handle as an organization. And so, we're looking to...
There's one thing getting people into university and then another thing, getting them to make the most of the experience so, still work to do there. Exactly. What are The University of Manchester's future plans for promoting equality and fairness?
So, two elements. The first is our own internal action plans to promote equity or equality in terms of race, ethnicity, gender, and all the protected groups. I am confident we will make progress. We have good plans in place.
On a more despondent day, I think we're not moving fast enough. When I put my social science hat on and look at the example for women. We haven't solved everything. There are still inequalities, but it's less than 100 years since we got the vote in this country.
When I became a professor, only 19% of professors were women. We're now edging up closer to 40. So, I can see evidence of change. It won't be solved in my lifetime. I hope it's solved in yours.
So that's the trajectory of our community and what we look like. In terms of research, I want our current excellence to continue to help advance those changes in society and two new things which are happening at Manchester, which I think I would like to see the fruits of.
One is a major initiative around health equity, to address, not just through medical
solutions, but also access to health care and how we research things. So, some research just looks at white skin and that doesn't really help if you're looking at skin cancer in other colours.
So really practical changes in how you do your research. And the second is our recently launched Strategy for Africa, which is strategic collaborations with a couple of African universities for our research,
but also, as we think about how we help educate without draining the huge population explosion of young people in Africa and the economic growth there. So we want to be part of that global journey.
I think that's something that's really interesting on the health inequality part because it was something that I discussed because we have an annual campaign against gender based violence which is ‘Reclaim the Night’ and we were looking at possible topics to explore and health inequality came up with that.
And when I spoke to fellow students who were doing a nursing course, they were like, they are of Black heritage themselves, but they don't know how to look at conditions on a skin that isn't white.
And also looking at trans students and gender-affirming care and the access to health care and also medical discrimination, also plays a big role in that.
So, I think a real focus on that would be really helpful for students. Well, it's Professor Dame Nikki Cullum, in the Faculty of Biology Medicine and Health, who's leading this initiative with a number of colleagues.
The website should be up and if not it's due to be up very shortly. But I think some
engagement there, in terms of what we do, and also identifying questions of what we
haven't started to address and should address would be really helpful to have.
George, how would you like to see the University, you know, evolve its approach to inequalities?
That's a good question. I would say I would agree with you. I feel like the direction, I'm very impressed with the direction of kind of where the University is going, but also where cultures go in regards to the UK generally.
And so, I think more of the focus is probably, once again I agree, with speed, rather than direction. And so, very hopeful that things can move faster so that less people have to experience just unfortunate events, right.
And so that's kind of where my focus is. I do think that sometimes it's underestimated the kind of level of radical movement that's required for actual change to be made.
I don't think change is ever made passively. It has to be made very intentionally. And so, I think it's important, even for organizations like the Black Excellence Network, to always
echo the message.
Remember to be intentional. Remember that you're going to have to do something that's uncomfortable to make change because changing of itself is different to the previous thing.
I think it's just a point that change comes when big institutions change, but they often don't change until they're almost forced to change. And this is part of Manchester's history, the suffragettes had to be quite extreme to get something as basic as the women's vote.
Absolutely. And if you look more broadly in Manchester's history the foundation of Trade Unions Congress, Battle of Peterloo, these were all parts of people demanding change.
And as a sociologist, you know, change comes from people. Institutions do not have a life of their own. It's about effective protest. It can be reformed from within, but you need the challenge to drive things.
Manchester has a well-known history of radical activism and protest. Today we have social media, culture wars, and debates around freedom of speech, all are part of the modern landscape. What are your thoughts on that?
Universities historically and into the future, if they do their job well, which is the origins and ethos of the university, is to provide a space for informed challenge, debate and protest.
And that's a key part of what we should exist to do. Other...very hard to think of other institutions that serve the same purpose. Of course, you get a genesis in primary schools and high schools in terms of thinking properly through the evidence and debating that and hoping to shift
minds, ideas, and actions through a combination of rational evidence as well as emotion. The reasons we look at questions are because they mean something to us.
That's one part of the debate with wider society. And the second is to continue to evidence in a way that reaches people through effective communication about the value of education for our students.
Some of that's about earnings and future careers but it's about enrichment, civic
engagement, quality of life... and our role as a major employer in the region, a contributor to economic growth and innovation.
We don't exist just to do the economic stuff, but that is one part of what a university is good for and useful for. We don't always get the message out, but sometimes even when we get the message out,
people aren't listening and we can't solve that bit on our own.
Does the culture wars discourse affect the work of you guys? Aisha first.
I think, a lot of the time, there might be a disconnect between the University and students at times and I think bridging that gap is really important and that's what the Student’s Union is there for.
To be that voice for students and listen to voices of students and concerns. Obviously, the University has a history of radical protest. Manchester as a city has been a pioneer in that sense and I think ensuring that students and the University is aware of that we're built on this history and we should encourage it and we should
encourage students to talk about things that they're passionate about and I think
sometimes the disconnect is there in between that and I think that's where some of the challenges come in with trying to get messages across or like being an mediator, in some sense, it gets quite difficult and challenging.
These negative messages are being read by parents and other people who you guys know, so does it affect you as well? George?
Yes, but what I often find is that there is a gift in storytelling and essentially good marketing. In a sense of, for example, I've seen a lot of times in which,
like you mentioned, students simply don't know about what the University is doing, what changes come in about, what conversations are being had.
So really, that conversation can easily become ineffective if the end user, if the student, has no clue about them because their emotion and the experience of the city of their university experience doesn't change simply because you're having the conversation.
It happens when they understand the conversation you're having and how it impacts them and so bridging that gap is just so important.
Which is why I'm a big believer in, even in regards to boards, and advisory seats, being given to people who are spokespersons to their community but also to the University and that bridge just being maintained well because where that bridge is broken, it's an ineffective for both parties.
I think it's also important that you're talking about if students don't know about it,
improving the communication between universities and students and being transparent and honest about the work that they're doing or why students just won't know about it and then they'll be angry at certain situations, but they won't always be aware that there is work behind the scenes being done.
I think that transparency is really important.
Yeah, and I think that's why even podcasts like these are super important, because it
creates a platform for everyone to hear about all the amazing work that's actually going on in the University and it starts the journey of bridging that gap.
We are in a hyper...like we're in a society that can be hyper influenced because of social media and other things and so we need to use that as a strength rather than abdicate ourselves from it.
In a hundred years time, how would we like the University to look in this area?
I would like to see no gaps on EDI grounds, our student profile and success and degree attainment, our staff, in terms of what our staff look like and how they progress in their careers to senior positions and what our senior teams look like.
EDI won't be a thing of the past, but it will be something we watch to make sure it doesn't unravel, but we've sorted the problem.
Aisha, for you?
I'd like to see EDI being data driven and the interventions being driven by student feedback, student consultation, co-create interventions and EDI strategy plans with students because obviously the action plans are aimed at improving student attainment or access progression,
And I think students are the best experts in their own experiences and I think that's
something that's really important.
I also would like to see, in our Access and Participation Plan consultation, there was a lot of talk of representation within senior management, and also lecturers and representation in courses. And I think that's something that's really important, because if you don't see somebody
That looks like you in a position of power or leadership, then it's kind of disheartening and it's demotivating and I think a lot of students struggle with that.
For example, attainment and success at university can often be linked to sense of
belonging and seeing other people that look like you, that have jobs higher up and you're able to see that success on university grounds
from coming to the University and getting those promotions like Collette was talking about.
I think it's really important for others to see it reflected within their leadership at the
University.
I'd really like the opportunity to see a more diverse University of Manchester and I hope that's what the next hundred years will bring.
Do you think that's where we're headed, George?
Yeah, yeah. Can you be optimistic?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I'm generally an optimistic person so I do believe that's where we're headed.
Even as an organization, we always say “we’re really weird because we exist to not exist”.
Our existence has the inherent hope that we're no longer need to exist at some point and so I am really, really, really hopeful.
I guess what I would love to see is also the results of EDI.
I think we talk a lot about the moral case for EDI, but there's also just even the research case and all that comes out in regards to that.
The business case for it, and so I'm just super excited to see even as an institution how we can shine to the world through implementing all of these changes.
What does the end result look like and how does that change even our reputation
worldwide?
Can I ask you both, George, first, where do you see yourself in 10 years time?
That's a good question.
That's a really, really good question.
I...
Aisha’s having a bit of time to compute that because she knows I'm coming to her.
Yeah, typically that question has always been hard about me because I always, I'm very driven by what I know I really care about and so I know I'll be definitely involved in those things to a greater capacity.
But what that looks like, if you asked me 10 years ago “would I'd be sitting here?” I honestly wouldn't have been able to predict it.
So, it's hard for me to put that within a job or career, but I can tell you things I'm currently passionate about.
I'll be 10 times more as passionate about in 10 years, hopefully.
I've had time to think of that, but I still haven't come up with an answer.
I do think I really enjoy doing work in like the EDI sector and doing work on behalf of
students and like listening to concerns.
So, I'd love to stay in the charity sector.
There's a few different paths I want to go down.
I also do like poetry, spoken word, that side of it.
So, I'd love to bring that into a job role, maybe like... working with other young people and encouraging them to find that outlet when it comes to talking about mental health.
I'm really passionate about talking about my own feelings and allowing myself to be
vulnerable to help others at the same time.
And I think that's something that I’d love to bring into a future role.
What that looks like I don't know, necessarily.
I think it's just about like one step at a time.
And I think having this job has made me realise that there's so many different areas that I could tap into,
And I think I would thrive in.
It's just about figuring out which one is best for me and which one I'll be involved in in 10 years.
Yeah, you've both got a host of options, different avenues open to you, haven't you?
Colette, you know the question? What will you be doing?
In 10 years time, I expect and hope to be retired from paid work, to be in good health and volunteering in two areas which are close to my heart: EDI issues and the environment.
Thank you everyone for joining this session on fairness, equality and inclusion. It's been great, thank you.
Thanks, Andrew.
Thank you.
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Thank you for joining us for this episode of Talk 200, a University of Manchester series.
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