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Changing the conversation ā new approaches to race awareness
Dr Vilaiwan Fernandes has worked to bring insightful training on race awareness to a wider audience.
6 December 2023
Vilaiwan, a PrincipalĢżResearch Fellow in Cell & Developmental Biology,ĢżDivision of Biosciences, was inspired to work with , a drama-based training group, to lead this initiative in the Faculty of Life Sciences after attending ĀŅĀ׊ć Organisational Development's 'Inclusive Leadership: a conversation about race'Ģżworkshop.
āOne of the things Iāve seen is a lot of mentorship schemes created to address inequities,ā Vilaiwan says.āÆāTheyāre good schemes. But thereās often a lot of conversations about being less shy, being more assertive. Or a lot of conversations telling you how to find support, allies, and people to help you.āÆAll of that is useful. But it can also be exhausting, to always have to think, āI need to be more assertive because thatās the only way I can get ahead.ā Ultimately, you canāt address everything by working only with the minority. You also, at some point, have to train everyone else.āĢż
RemovingĢżlabels through inclusive creativity
At the ODĢżworkshop, the React facilitators enacted a conversation between two colleagues ā a black employee and their white line manager.
After the scene hadĢżended, the participants were invited to ask these ācharactersā questions about their perceptions, their motivations and their interpretations of the conversation.ĢżThe scene was then replayed, and the audience were invited to interrupt the performance, and offer suggestions to help facilitate the enacted conversation.ĢżBy centring the analysis around two individuals, the theatre group made it possible to discuss sensitive issues without resorting to labels or categories.Ģż
Vilaiwan was surprised at the range of different opinions and mindsets that were revealed, saying:ĢżāI was surprised that many people after seeing the scene play out said, āthis has nothing to do with race.ā It made me realise that people just often have a block. Itās not something personal, they just canāt see that these issues are related to race, or that other people might perceive it that way.
āThe facilitators were really, really skilled. The conversation at one point nearly went completely off the rails, but they could guide it back really well. You didnāt have to define a microaggression, you didnāt have to define or use all these terms.ĢżIt was just amazing to me that you could examine all these complicated race issues, without having to define anything.ā
Vilaiwan was determined to find a way to bring Reactās workshop to a wider audience within ĀŅĀ׊ć:ĢżāA lot of what they were teaching didnāt necessarily apply just to racism. It was trying to teach line managers how to lead better."
Vilaiwan then spoke to Steve Wilson, the Vice-Dean for Research at the Faculty of Life Sciences. With his support, she successfully obtained fundingĢżfrom the Research Culture programme to run the workshop for the faculty.
Broadening the audience, tailoring the content, and maximising the impact
The pilot workshop, for staff in the Division of Biosciences, was built around the same drama-based training delivered for Inclusive Leadership by React ā but with one important difference:ĢżāWe worked with React to tell them about the kind of conversations and incidents that could occur in our division. With a bit of back and forth, they managed to create a scene that was more academic, or researcher specific.ā
Over 40 members of staff attended the two Biosciences workshops, and unanimously fed back that the session had either āincreased or greatly increasedā their confidence in navigating conversations about race.
90% reported āan improved understanding of issues related to race and racism in the workplaceā, and 85% said theyād learned specific practices and tools to help them practise more inclusive leadership.
Based on the success of the initial pilot, the Inclusive Leadership and Race Awareness workshops were then made available to the entire Faculty of Life Sciences.
Embedding inclusive leadership at ĀŅĀ׊ć
The enthusiastic response from all attendees, both at a divisional and a faculty level, should ensure that the workshops will continue, so that increasing numbers of ĀŅĀ׊ć staff can benefit.
Vilaiwan hopes that these workshops were just the starting point, saying:ĢżāOne piece of feedback that consistently came up was that this was the best workshop on this sort of topic that the attendees had taken, and that senior management and academics should be strongly encouraged to attend.ā
Thereās also been some interesting discussions about how elements of the workshop could be adapted to further the purpose of existing mentorship schemes for Black, Asian or minority ethnicĢżindividuals.
āThere were a few people whoāve attended the workshops, with the goal of finding ways to talk more productively to their line managers about these issues," Vilaiwan says.ĢżāWe realised that maybe thereās an unmet need there. Although some of this is already covered in terms of finding your allies, maybe parts of this could also be incorporated into the mentorship schemes to provide advice on broaching these topics with line managers.
āI think ultimately, though, these issues are better solved by managers being more receptive to conversations that could get uncomfortable.ĢżIf we want to improve research culture ā for whatever group or category ā people need to do the work, and make the time to do that work.ā
ā"If we want to improve research culture - for whatever group or category - people need to do the work, and make the time to do that work."
- Dr Vilaiwan Fernandes,ĢżSenior Research Fellow in Cell & Developmental Biology,ĢżDivision of Biosciences,ĢżFaculty of Life Sciences
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About research culture
ĀŅĀ׊ćās Research Culture programme is developing a fair, collaborative and inclusiveĢżresearch culture, where both our research and research community can thrive. We work with ĀŅĀ׊ćās research community to support and deliver change against our 10-yearĢżResearch Culture Roadmap.