To Ask if your workplace has ever held diversity and inclusion training?

Yes when I worked for the NHS a trans woman gave a talk. I couldn't take it seriously then nor now if it were to happen again

All the time and no. Not useful IME, very large international corporate and you can just run it in the background and it ticks off that you have completed it.

I work in the VCFSE sector and this type of training is something we do quite often - done right it’s very valuable to think about the judgements we all make, unconscious bias, levelling up and making sure we are inclusive and that our services are open and accessible to everyone
Some of it is very subtle - we talk about the terminology we use - are you a ‘client’ ‘service user’ ‘beneficiary’ ‘partner’ or just “Jim” who we’ve helped with X

@Itsausername91 Thank you!

We had an excellent company do some training/awareness with a set of managers in the organisation I work for owing to the link to slavery in the foundations of setting us up.
This is alongside a slightly more formal network of lived experience and allies on topics from previous posters.
It was great but the company recognised owing to our feedback that this didn't translate into how we operate for a number of reasons.
Our CEO has outlined future plans which sound great (however I'm working my notice for other reasons).
I think it can add value but as previous posters have said it can if not delivered correctly it can be patronising and hollow.

Annually online. Nothing about women or elderly and very little on disability.
Tick box exercise and mostly irrelevant (sample question -“what year was Equality Act passed? “ knowledge of which doesn’t change attitudes in the slightest.

I had some 'diversity and inclusion' training way back in the 90s. It was delivered by a black man who, as part of it, said that we, as white people, should be down on our knees apologising to him

Fuck the fuck off. This was the only time in my life I felt racist and justified. BUT only against that entitled (and overpaid) individual. He told us that 'only white people are racist' and that we are all evil and should apologise to the rest of the world.

I believe people are individual and should be treated that way. I am responsible for my actions (and values and beliefs) and I am not responsible for anyone else's. I challenge discrimation on any gounds when I can. THAT MAN WAS (AND PROBABLY STILL IS) A TWAT

I have to do a one hour training session on it every year. Since COVID it has been online, and ends with a quiz where you have to get a certain number of questions correct to get a certificate of attendance.

Yes, we have it annually. Over recent years, it's main focus has been to tell us all the ways we can be nice to men who like to pretend they're women. Women are ignored almost completely. Disabled people get a small mention. All else is ignored. The only trans woman in the whole company gets chance to feel special and gets very annoyed if challenged. It's a joke.

Oh, and unconscious bias training can be really valuable if it’s done well, but again I think the only way it works is in a tailored group session, not a bought in e-learning.

Yes, we all had to do an online training module which took a couple of hours. It was, of course, a load of simplistic patronising bollocks pitched at the intellectual level of a six year old.

I certainly didn’t need to be told that not only is it both morally wrong & commercially stupid to discriminate against people because of their age, sexuality, ethnicity, disability etc etc it’s also illegal.

Are you part of the decision making on this OP?

I think the reason it tends to be awful is that it’s generic, bland, tries to cover everything in 45 minutes. What companies actually need to do is to identify their barriers to inclusion, and then commission targeted training to address those. Instead they just buy a standard package which tends to be patronising and just lectures people to be nice to people who are different to them - if that’s all your employees need I suggest you have the wrong employees!

A friend of mine said she had some excellent training recently, where a woman who had suffered horrendous domestic abuse talked about her experience and about how her employer had helped her. Learning from actual lived experience, with concrete examples, is very valuable.

Other DEI training I’ve had which I thought was very good included a Deaf Awareness session with two Deaf trainers who gave us an insight in to the challenges they faced, and then a discussion with a Deaf colleague about the specific ways in which we could work effectively with her. And a session on dyslexia, learning about the impact on people, tips around things like fonts and line spacing, etc - at that time I managed a colleague with dyslexia so we were able to put really helpful processes in place for her to excel.

I'll dust off my laptop tomorrow and find the info (on maternity leave atm!)

Now it's online but at the start it was in person.

Everyone lied through their teeth and swore blind they wouldn't be predjuced against anyone for any reason ever.

Even the instructor knew it was shite.

I've done an online course. It's was largely irrelevant, they had obviously bought it in rather than having one made for our specific context, because quite a few minutes was on religious diversity, yet I'm in protected characteristic position that requires you to be a practicing Christian! I switched off at that point or rather started playing word games. I've also done enough other courses to start my own course giving company, including train the trainer so i can now give the courses to volunteers

I've had 3 lots of D&i training. I find it so patronising.

Are you able to divulge the company name @Itsausername91? I'd be really interested

Yes. Some of it is common sense, some
of it is quite thought provoking and makes you think about your own behaviours and how you react to the behaviour of others.

I've had some. It was something like a 30-minute module.

Yes but similar to a previous poster, I tend to steer clear unless it's mandatory. We're short staffed at present and it's crazy busy.

And this.

I still remember the hilarity in my 80% ethnic minority workplace at a diversity ‘training video’ in which two actors in suits standing by a photocopier pointed at another actor sitting at a desk on an otherwise empty set. ‘Look at the new guy!’ one said. ‘Yeah, he’s — black!’ replied the other.

It had the (unintended) effect of bonding everyone who failed to keep a straight face.

Except we can't because we all have to do our rainbow badge training and not question how inclusive it is really to be excluding women from female spaces by allowing men who feel they are women in.

Annually when I worked for the nhs. It was just a PowerPoint tick list exercise, not actually affecting anything in a meaningful way.