Sustainability and Inclusion:  A concrete conclusion

In this episode of #The Equity Edge our industry focus is cement.  Hosts Professor Sue Black OBE and Jo Stansfield are joined by guests Veronika Elfmarkova, Innovation Manager at Lafarge Cement, Ollie Folayan, Head of Process and Safety Engineering at Optimus Plus Aberdeen, Masoud Ahmadinia, Assistant Professor in Sustainable Manufacturing at University of Leicester, and Jack Daly Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Leeds University Business School.

The conversation covers the link between equality, diversity and inclusion and sustainability, and how cohesion may be an answer to some environmental challenges.  They discuss the importance of the second most produced material in the world, concrete; and why Engineers are the midwives of sustainability.  They explore how the creation and recruitment for high-quality part- time roles will attract, engage and retain more people to the sector.  With the quest to achieve Net Zero 2050, they share how and why a greener future has to be a global and inclusive discussion.

Meet our guests

Episode Transcript

Episode Transcript

Sue Black

Welcome!  The Equity Edge is all about shaping tomorrow’s foundation industries, with a focus on EDI – that’s equity, diversity, and inclusion, and how it can help us achieve a sustainable and fairer future.

I’m Professor Sue Black. I’m Professor of computer science and technology evangelist at Durham University, leading pioneering initiatives like our award winning TechUPWomen programme championing diversity in STEM

Jo Stansfield

And I’m Jo Stansfield. I’m an engineer-turned-business-psychologist specialising in equity, diversity and inclusion in engineering fields. Welcome to The Equity Edge podcast.

Sue Black

Together we are working with TransFIRe, a programme investigating how the foundation industries can develop innovative solutions to reduce waste and energy use, and to accelerate the development of clean technologies.

Jo Stansfield

These are the industries that make 75% of the materials we see around us, and are fundamental to modern society – they are: cement, metals, ceramics, glass, paper and chemicals.

 Sue Black 

Hi everyone. In this equity edge episode we’re talking about cement sustainability and Equity Diversity and Inclusion. We’ll hear from experts who are working at the forefront of innovation in decarbonisation, and explore the links between a diverse, equitable and inclusive workforce and the ability to deliver innovative solutions to achieve Net Zero 2050 and more. Who’s joining us today, Jo?

Jo Stansfield 

Thanks. So, today we are joined by Veronika Elfmarkova, Innovation Manager at Lafarge Cement, a civil and materials engineer who’s focused on decarbonisation in the cement and concrete sector. Welcome to the show, Veronika

Veronika Elfmarkova 

Thank you very much. Hello, everyone.

Jo Stansfield 

And we have Ollie Folayan, a chartered engineer with a PhD in the environmental impact of fuel combustion, and Head of Process and Safety Engineering at Optimus Plus Aberdeen. Olli has been awarded an MBE for his services to equity, diversity and inclusion in the engineering sector, and his co founder of the Association for Black and Ethnic Minority engineers. Welcome Ollie.

Ollie Folayan 

Thank you very much.

Jo Stansfield 

We also have Masoud Ahmadinia, an Assistant Professor in sustainable manufacturing dedicated to steering the UK foundation industries to Net Zero 2050. Masoud Welcome to the show.

Masoud Ahmadinia 

Thanks, Jo. Hi, everyone.

Jo Stansfield 

And finally, we have Jack Daly postdoctoral research fellow at Leeds University Business School. Jack’s recent work has investigated the link between EDI and sustainability in the foundation industry businesses. Welcome Jack.

Jack Daly 

Thanks, Jo.

Sue Black 

Thanks, Jo. So we’ll go to you first Veronika.  Concrete and cement all around us in the built environment and concrete’s a fundamental material for modern construction. But people might not realize that concrete has been used as a building material since ancient Roman times. How are cement and concrete formed and what makes them such special materials?

Veronika Elfmarkova 

It’s very true, Sue.  Cement and concrete have been around for ages really, and at the moment is one of the best performing materials we have in the construction industry. And it’s a crucial building material to play a vital role in construction and infrastructure projects, as we know. There are differences between similar and concrete and people still confuse the two of them. They are two different materials. But essentially, there is a link between cement and concrete and always will be. Cement is the powder material, which is produced from limestone and clay and other minerals, which essentially are mined, then it goes through process. This process is very carbon emission intensive. We are it’s a big, huge kiln and we put all the material in. There are high temperatures, and during these high temperatures, there is a chemical reaction, which is going to create clinker, which is the first step to create them cement. That clinker is then grounded to a very fine powder, and then you get cement as we know it. Concrete, on the other hand, is a blend of cement, aggregates admixtures and water, which over time is creating hard solid rock as we know it, you can see it all around us. Concrete a second most world produced material in the world. So it really plays a big role in our life.

Sue Black 

Wow, that’s amazing. So Jo and I went to a cement works. I don’t know it’s about a year ago now, Jo, isn’t it? And yeah, I was utterly amazed at the whole process because I’d absolutely no clue about it at all. How, you know, what cement was and the process to manufacture it, I guess and put it into bags.  And yeah, from the massive kind of rock crushing machines at the beginning through to the, kind of like, massive rolling, kind of, is that a kiln? I don’t even know.

Veronika Elfmarkova 

Yeah, it is a kiln. Yeah.

Sue Black 

Yeah. Which is really hot to know. Like you stand near it, and it’s absolutely baking. And then the cement powder comes out at the end. Yeah, it’s just utterly incredible. I think if anyone gets a chance, I should definitely visit a cement works, because it’s just so interesting. That’s really interesting. Thanks very much, Veronika.

Veronika Elfmarkova 

Thank you.

Sue Black 

So over to you, Masoud.  Can you tell us a bit about the environmental challenges of cement production?

Masoud Ahmadinia 

Sure. So when producing cement, we’re releasing a lot of CO2, if I’m not wrong, I think is contributing to about 7% of global CO2 emission. And also yeah, and also for that, for the energy that is very energy intensive, we use fossil fuel mainly, which is causing a lot of issue and the raw material that we extract, which is the mainly limestone, it leads to several problems such as the habitat destruction, biodiversity loss, and we destroyed the soil in that area, and we use a lot of water as well for both cooling and also as you know, I was in that visit as well. If you remember, there was a there was a lot of dust everywhere, and the water is used to lower the amount of dust, which leads to, again, pollution. And also there’s a lot of waste generated, which there should be some, actually, hopefully some use for those ways to become someone’s else input and not become landfill.

Jo Stansfield 

Ollie, over to you. You’ve described engineers as the midwives of sustainability. What did you mean by that? And can you tell us how the Association for Black and Minority Ethnic Engineers, helps the impacts that our professional can make.

Ollie Folayan 

I’ve often described engineering as, or engineers, as the midwives of sustainability, because we start off with the problems that we have, and many of which are described by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. And you’ve got two sets of actors who play a very important role. We’ve got the scientists who try and get us near the problem. And the moment you start to think about a solution, especially a solution at scale, you must involve engineers. And it does mean that we have a massive responsibility, not just to ensure that the design that we put forward is sound, but that they’re guided by certain ethical principles that go beyond just compliance. When I speak about engineers being sustainable, the midwives of sustainability, it’s the idea that none of those skills will be delivered without us.

Jo Stansfield 

That’s amazing. What a great analogy. And can you talk a bit about your work with the Association for Black and Minority Ethnic Engineers, and how this interacts with these sort of considerations of building that sustainability, into our engineering practices?

Ollie Folayan

When we talk about the ethics that must guide what we do? There is an element of perhaps that utilitarianism adventure in that what we do provide the greatest good for the largest number of people. And it’s, it’s guided by those principles. But there’s also a very important aspect of the ethical question, which is who’s around the table when decisions are being made. And that’s really where the work of AfBE comes in. Engineering, as great as it is, has a problem, the greater demand for talent than there is talent available. And when it comes to ethnicity, for example, we have 1/3 of all British engineering undergrads, who are from a minority ethnic background, but the industry has 9%. And so what we at the AfBE have tried to do for the last 17 years, is work at increasing the number of people that take up STEM, we do a lot of work in schools and communities and faith groups. And we try and get more people into the sector, we try to address the retention question by ensuring that more people who go into study engineering at the university have the support that they need in order to get into the industry. And we want to encourage people who desire to do so who are senior professionals to aspire to even greater leadership. Because we believe that those three goals, attraction, retention, and progression are intertwined. And so we’ve done work in schools for years, we set up a program in the inner city in London in 2007, Onwards.  And there was a program we called Making Engineering Hot, which is all about getting more people into STEM. We’ve thought about calling it Making Engineering Sexy, but maybe not. We call it Making Engineering Hot, instead.  The program has reached more than 5000 people since it started. We’re now seeing people who we first met in school, who are now working with engineers in the industry. And there are so many other stories like that, that gives us a lot of encouragement. But that’s the work of the AfBE.

Jo Stansfield 

Wow, that’s amazing. And what stark figures as well about that drop off and people from black and minority ethnic backgrounds, from education through into the engineering workforce.  Jack, I think this relates to some of the work that you’ve been doing around looking at EDI in the workforce and how that links to sustainability. Can you tell us a bit more about what you’ve been doing? What motivated your research?

Jack Daly 

Yeah, of course. So the motivation research did really build upon exactly what Ollie said, where we could see that the industry themselves were saying that there was a bit of an issue with a lack of diversity in sectors still remaining, very white male dominant. And this then incurring a future potential issue of a looming skills shortage as it’s aging and people are moving to retirement that there is a real difficulty now of attracting and recruiting workers to step into the sector. So us as diversity scholars looking at workforce diversity, we wanted to see is there a way in which improving diversity within sectors can not only address those lacking skill shortages, but also by pulling on different talent pools, different demographics, can we access new innovations required to really help push towards decarbonisation environmental sustainability?

Jo Stansfield 

And what did you find, Jack? What were the outcomes of your research?

Jack Daly 

Yeah, so the research, it was really a case study within a singular firm.  But some of the findings did have quite a lot of applicability to not only the concrete sector, but the foundation industries and perhaps the wider supply chain of the built environment as a whole. One of the things that we did see is there is some fantastic work being done to improve diversity in the FI industries, not only from our research, but personally as a researcher then going to conferences and events and speaking to people, seeing the risks and really good work there. But obviously, always more progress can be made. One of the big things that we found from speaking to people working in the sector is that flexible working across careers is something that really needs to be pushed further, not only in terms of hours, but in location of work as well, looking at more remote work and working from home, but including really high quality, part time roles across the entire career span within senior management and not just at the beginning of careers. And this is something that can really help parents, people with disabilities or anyone who has any needs for adjustment within work to help them not only move into the sector, but also progress within there.  Whereas at the moment, we’ll see in that people who did need these adjustments, it wasn’t really being made accessible for them within the workplace. And they are potentially looking at leaving the sectors in order to get that flexibility or not moving into the sectors when these are really highly talented people. So some adaptations need to be there and flexible working really embraced. But I think really building on that, one of the big things want to do was link diversity and inclusion with sustainability. One thing that we’ve found is that a lot of the policies with sustainability can really help with equality diversity and inclusion, and vice versa. If we take that flexible working, as the core example, again, that holds quite a lot of potential of not only reducing barriers of entry into the sector, but helping people progress within the sector, while at the same time helping actually reduce workplace based emissions. There are empirical links between reducing working hours with reducing carbon emissions that in itself can hold potential there. But we started to really develop this need for not only ensuring that you have a diverse workforce, but then having an inclusive culture within firms.  The company we’re working with did have quite a lot of really good policies. And they made really good progress with that diversity and they had some really good demographic diversity. They had people who had migrated to the UK specifically to work in the foundation industries. And with that they bring a wealth of knowledge, they bring a wealth of resources, but they often felt a bit of a difficulty of having their voices heard. And they didn’t feel empowered to actually raise their voice and say where we could improve the sustainability. And one fantastic example we had was concrete wastage, some people had moved from the Global South, and we’re seeing that they were quite shocked at the acceptable level of wastage here in the UK, compared to their home countries where they had processes in place to almost eliminate wastage, where here in the UK, it was quite high. But even though they’d be brought in the UK, they were working in the UK, they didn’t feel empowered enough to actually challenge that speak out, and have their firm actually act on that. So it really is then moving beyond just recruiting people from underrepresented demographics into the foundation industries. And looking at using that as a building block, let’s say, and then having a real truly inclusive culture where these people feel empowered to then actually speak up, challenge the norms, and bring forward the innovations that they have from their own wealth of resources and knowledge that we’re not really pulling upon.

Jo Stansfield 

Wow. That’s amazing. Thanks, Jack. And what a great example that really highlights how we need to really work to be inclusive, to bring in all of the diverse perspectives that we actually bring into our businesses to really get all of the value and benefit that they’re bringing.

Sue Black 

Yeah, absolutely. So I can see you nodding away, Veronika, and Ollie.  Veronika, have you’ve got something that you’d like to add to what Jack’s been saying,

Veronika Elfmarkova 

That’s great, thank you. Ollie? I absolutely agree with him. And as well, not being from the UK, it’s the example honestly, I came across with that as well, during my career in the UK. And sometimes you feel like the odd one, you know, but I must admit it’s improving, since I started at university and being in cement concrete sector. When I left academia, I really wanted to come to the industry, but it was not always an easy journey. It was sometimes I had times when I just wanted to leave because I thought I don’t really need that. But over the years, I see the improvement. And I see massive potential for the foundation industries really to grow into more inclusive and really enjoyable environment. And it is, it’s amazing to work for the foundation industries, and it would be great to see a more diverse environment, really.

Ollie Folayan 

That’s right. And you know, completely agree with what Veronika has just been saying and what Jack’s example actually showed in a really practical way. There’s a sense in which this discussion around Net Zero, around a greener future, is a global conversation and needs global teams or diverse teams in order to ensure that you’ve got a more complete outlook. And it’s not just the fact that we come up with new ideas and new, innovative ways. It’s the fact that we then factor in the end beneficiary. Who are the end beneficiaries of a greener world? It’s often people in the Global South. Well, if we have teams that reflect those people, we’re more likely to get to the solutions. Absolutely.

Sue Black 

Great, thank you. Masoud.

Masoud Ahmadinia 

I just wanted to add, there’s a lot of positive things going on. But there’s also some downside, that I think what we need is that the upper level, that they have the decision making power, that one needs to be diverse.  We can have a diverse team. But it depends how you define diversity, like you can have a diverse set of employees, but employees, they have much less power to make bigger decisions than those who are in upper levels. From my experience of what I’ve seen in the last couple of years, thanks to TransFIRe, I was invited to some important meetings, which, technically, most of them the PI  couldn’t make it, and he was so nice to give me the opportunity to be there. I was literally surrounded with many British males. And like they were like, above the middle age. And I was thinking, in one of the meeting, there was a stand up comedian who wanted to make a joke. And he wanted to know exactly how many non British are in the meeting. And I was there among two other people. And they were like, 200 people. So there’s just three, and I was not supposed to be there.  So we’re talking about 1%. And also, I saw so many males. And those were people who were making the big decisions for the metal industry in the UK. I literally don’t care, like how many, like the numbers that you report on the website, like if you have 50% of like female 50% of non British or whatever it is.  What’s the leadership, how many non British or how many female are there? Because those are the ones who make decisions. But there’s some improvements. But yeah, I was thinking, if those who have the power, they don’t have any sense of what the other group might need, they cannot make the workplace comfortable and suitable for them at all.

Sue Black 

Yeah, absolutely. That’s a great point, Masoud about diversity and leadership as well as across the whole company. Jack, I can see you nodding there.  Have you got any experience or case studies or anything of that situation?

Jack Daly 

It was really interesting, and one thing that Masoud was saying that’s really resonating quite strongly with me, where we have seen in a lot of academic research, where there is increasingly this push of recognizing that you do need diverse leadership teams, but almost a shift towards being framed as cognitive diversity of different ways of thinking rather than looking at demographic diversity. But then it’s often just as Masoud was describing, people will look at different groups of white men, of how can we bring these into leadership boards? This isn’t an example from foundation industries. But if we use foundation industries, as a hypothetical example, bringing someone in from the automobile industry, or the finance industry to lead a company, because technically, they have different ways of thinking. But all you’re really doing is bringing in a different white man to lead that and you’re not actually going to change and challenge things. And there needs to be much more support, I think, for identifying women, people of color people with disabilities within organizations and supporting them throughout their entire careers, to then move into those leadership positions. And I think that’s when you will actually start to achieve that change and start to challenge those norms. It’s bringing people up from within the firm, rather than looking at recruiting externally, as often happens within leadership positions, I think that’s when you really start to improve the diversity. And also, I think, the knock on effect of that, as I think Ollie has done with a lot of his work is then showing, providing those role models for people in the companies. They know that there is good career paths within the sector.

Sue Black 

Yeah, that’s great. And Ollie, I’m sure you’ve got something to say about this, too.

Ollie Folayan 

Through our work with companies, I found certainly five elements that are there with all companies where there is a real transformation, and these ones will start with C, so that’s quite easy to remember. So first one is Candour. That’s having an environment where genuinely people in that organization, and I’m talking majority and minority are able to share their thoughts about the rate of change. And you know, there is genuine fear sometimes that the rate of change, that’s the disadvantage some people. There’s fear there’s a zero sum game and creating the space where such conversation can be had is important. Having some Cohesion because within a lot of organizations, there’s been huge amounts of efforts towards diversity and inclusion. But quite often, they are very divergent efforts, there’s no one actually sitting there and connecting the dots. How do all these efforts that we are making actually benefit the bottom line, the future workforce, the things that we say that we’re here to achieve? And there is a need for somebody to sit there and just have a look at how this all ties in. There is the question of Consistency. And you know, we’ll have big events that happen during International Women’s Day, or Black History Month. But it’s those things that we do on a regular basis, just like we’ve learned from the world of safety, or bring about real change.  There is this question of Continuity. I have often worked with successive heads of diversity within organizations, and it often happens that the moment one person leaves, whoever takes over, is starting all over again, because we haven’t yet seen this as an operational issue. We still think of it as an other, not something that the organization needs. And then finally, there’s this idea of Coalition’s and this is where we talk about allyship. Allyship is quite a popular topic. And we would often talk about it almost as though we were donating some of our goodness of charity to a poor and weak minority, when in actual fact, it is in our collective interest. And that is those points were experiences intersect that real allyship comes about, and real change comes about. Because then it’s for all of us, it’s not something we’re doing for another. So that certainly I’ve noticed that where there are changes in organizations, they often have those five elements.

Sue Black 

That’s really great, thanks very much Ollie.  And absolutely, I think getting that message over that it’s better for everybody is a really important message, which I think people don’t always realize that that is the case.  And Veronika, so you’ve worked in various countries and companies. It’d be good to hear from you about leadership in the organizations that you’ve worked for. And whether it’s kind of similar in terms of kind of demographics, or different in different companies. And if that’s made any difference?

Veronika Elfmarkova 

Yes, I did work in different countries, and each country is very different. And I must say that the UK is quite upfront. You know, you could see, I think, from my personal experience, I feel most comfortable here. Because there is a voice, I can have a voice, and the topic is there. You can openly talk about it, you can have a discussion. And of course, it goes down to a business as well, if the environment is created, that you have safe space to share, how you feel and what would you want to do? So definitely, from my perspective, as a foreigner coming here, it’s great. From the different sides, because I used to work in different companies, small, big ones, I think it is really, probably the smaller companies are – and I don’t know if people would think that it’s the other way around – but I think the diversity and the comfort, I didn’t feel there. I feel it more on the corporate side, you know, on the bigger companies where you have various people, a good number of people and on all different levels. So that was my personal kind of struggle that I was more, felt more alienated in the smaller businesses than in the bigger ones. And the bigger ones really want to drive it forward, because they are recognizing that the diversity and different ideas and attitudes are going to make a change are really going to make and move the industry forward and from different views. It’s not only the ideas, but it’s really changing the dynamic, changing the attitude and acceptance, that the changes are coming and that they must happen. Because in a future, otherwise, I believe that if there is no change, the best businesses are not going to anymore, be there within that sector.

Sue Black 

Yeah, I think I think that’s true across all sectors, right, because I say the same sort of thing about technology. So I don’t think it’s not just the foundation industries. Thank you. Thanks. That’s really insightful. Thanks, Veronka. So Masoud I’ll come back to you to talk a bit about sustainability and decarbonisation.  It would be good to hear a bit about your work on the TransFIRe project. Because a lot of what TransFIRe’s project is about is about taking waste from one industry and using it in another for sustainability.

Masoud Ahmadinia

So for example, in one of the cases that we were working on, there was this company that was using printed circuit boards to get gold out of it and make jewellery. And so they had several waste. So part of it was copper and other products. And there was another startup business, which took care of that copper, and instead of downgrading it, they actually use it to make high grade copper. And this was something really interesting. And there was some other waste coming out of that route that went to other partners as well. So in general, like, for example, we had this industrial symbiosis, we had several of it, some of it in Leeds, some of them in person, some of them online. I remember one of them that was in person in our table, we had like about 10 different companies, and all of them were keen to work together, it’s just about linking them. And something which I really like is the industries are open, to kind of change the process, they are open to work together. It’s all about having a program like TransFIRe to link these together. And it wasn’t like they are afraid of change the process, they were open to risk many of them. And I think it’s also because of the awareness of the customers. Maybe 10 years ago, things were different, they were not going to take this risk of putting something unknown or less known to their process, just for sake of environment. But now because the customers are more willing to, and also the investors are more willing to invest in companies which are taking care of the environment. So I think the companies have become more open to risk and do something which is not necessarily good for their finance, but good for environment. So yeah, it was really good experience to see these positive reactions from companies.

Sue Black 

Great. Thanks, Masoud.

Jo Stansfield 

So I think that’s a really interesting link there, actually, between some of the drivers for sustainability coming from the supply chain and from investors that we also see reflected perhaps with diversity and inclusion as well, you know, as that’s becoming expected more in society actually it’s becoming more expected as people are looking at procurement and looking to make investments. I see lots of nodding here. So from Jack and Veronika and Ollie, let me go to you first. Ollie, have you seen this happening?

Ollie Folayan 

Just whilst we were speaking, Veronika, we’re talking actually about the role of sustainability, I certainly see within the energy sector, the use of a lot of waste materials for the development of new fuels. And what’s interesting is, in some ways, the teams that deliver this, there’s a huge diversity and inclusion element here. Unlike a lot of the technologies that we’ve all worked on for years, and the industry has worked on for decades, these processes are often either completely new, or they are the utilization of an old technology in a new context. And for that reason, everyone’s kind of new to it. And I sit there sometimes in a team, you got to you’ve got people there with 25 years experience others with 10, others with five. And in many ways, everyone’s at the same level, because to some extent, it’s new to everyone. So that’s the connection that I see actually, in the utilization of some of these new technologies, they probably make a bit more obvious than would normally be the importance of just having those diverse and inclusive teams.

Jo Stansfield 

So some real linkages there. And Jack, what are your thoughts about this?

Jack Daly 

Yeah, so for me, it was a, I think similar to Ollie. One of the big things that again, we found in our research was a real need, I think, for collaboration, not only across the entire supply chain, but linking in with central government in terms of investment. And also I think networks such as TransFIRe, because it’s almost as if companies can only do so much in terms of both diversity, inclusion and sustainability. And a company we worked with a lot of the employees felt like especially with sustainability, that they were putting as much investment as they possibly could into technology. And they were putting as much innovation and even with EDI as well, they were doing really good work in progressing that. But there’s only so much companies can do by themselves, especially well with sustainability and with EDI, it needs to be looking at much wider in terms of what the supply chain as a whole is then doing in terms of production. If we just focus, I think on diversity as well looking at the talent pipeline, is that companies can only recruit from what is there. And I think, when companies are especially trying to meet project goals and deadlines, it’s quite difficult to ensure that they are recruiting at the best practice where sometimes they need to simply just recruit to fill up roles on projects. So they were really highlighting and emphasizing that there needs to be much more collaboration across the entire supply chain, and also investment from central government then into education and training to ensure that companies are actually well positioned to recruit and promote and retain diverse demographics within their firms.

Jo Stansfield 

I mean, that really highlights how we’re such a connected ecosystem, you know, both on the sustainability and on the diversity and inclusion. It’s not just about individual businesses, it’s about forming those connections. And it’s about engagement with governments and policy to really drive change through in many different ways. Ollie over to you.

Ollie Folayan 

Just to build on that even more. I do think and, you know, ties into what Veronika was saying, actually earlier around SMEs, and sometimes the environment in there as well, is that you’ve also got the problem of just being able to allow enough headroom within budgets to enable a substantive and meaningful EDI initiative. The difference often between larger companies and those small companies, if they don’t have that, and every hour that we spend at work ought to be spent on something that is seen as billable. Perhaps now, sort of following up from what Jack was saying, perhaps there is a little bit more that can be done from a incentive level and government incentive level to ensure that these EDI initiatives are seen as part of what helps the business grow. And therefore are incentivized so that even smaller companies can have the headroom so that they can sustain the diversity and inclusion program these things often costs money and cost time. And if there isn’t the space to do that, then it just doesn’t happen.

Jo Stansfield 

Absolutely. Veronka, do you have anything that you’d like to add to Ollie’s thoughts?

Veronika Elfmarkova 

I absolutely agree with what if all what was said to be honest, then the initiatives needs to be really driven forward. It started, do I think if it is slow pace? Yes, I do. I would love to see more and more of that. And it goes as well to the talents, young talents, and bringing the people along and trying to really make it happen rather than sometimes just talking about it, you know?

Jo Stansfield 

Okay, so we’ve we’ve heard about some of the amazing impacts that all of you our panellists are making. But we do need to get real as well.  Our industries aren’t the most diverse, equitable, and inclusive places that we need them to be just yet. What are some of those challenges that people are facing? What needs to happen to change that? Masoud? Let’s go to you first.

Masoud Ahmadinia 

I think about EDI in general, in UK. What I figured out is that sometimes it’s many of the organizations, they are not aware of it, not that they don’t want to do anything about it. They’re not aware of it. So for example, one of the example that they had was I was working for this big organization that everyone knows their name. But when I wanted to complete my profile, I couldn’t choose Iran as my nationality. It wasn’t in the list. And it was so surprising, and I was receiving emails from HR that please complete your profiles that I cannot complete my profile, because my country is not part of it. And later, I saw that they change the software and they add citizenship and nationalities, because they couldn’t add to the previous one. So they added a new section, citizenships I could choose, which was really nice. And the other thing was that several of the people that I discussed, which are like in the level of line managers and directors, when they talk about like work environment, they say like, yeah, it’s really important to work in a place that you’re comfortable. If you’re not comfortable, just change your job. Life is too short. But as someone who needs a visa to work in UK, it’s not like “okay, I don’t like this one I’m just going to quit my job”. I have just three months max to find my next job, otherwise I’m kicked out of the country. And also, this visa process is so complicated, so expensive. So it’s not like I have the freedom that okay, I’m going to work for this startup. No, they don’t sponsor you. There are very limited companies that they sponsor you another increase the cap for the sponsorship, which means I couldn’t work for Derby University with this new regulation because the cap wasn’t what they given to me and I had a PhD I’m thinking like to a Bachelor’s or Master’s, who wants to work with this new rule, upcoming one, who can get a job. There can be so many limited companies that hire you. So I see, several of my friends, or internationals in general, particularly one of my best friend who was working in a very toxic environment. But he couldn’t change his job. Because he knew that if he’s changed his job, then he has three months to look for other jobs. Otherwise, he needs to go back home. But I talked to some of the managers like directors, they’re like, Yeah, we have only three months, they were not aware of it. And that’s something that they should know. Like, because they are hiring us to work. So they should know what the employees need, what’s the requirement, what’s the legal requirement of them. So yeah, I think, that was like something I wanted to talk about, like about, if you want to bring a skilled workers, then we need to also see what does a skilled worker need to provide the environment for them, so they can freely change the job, they can freely come and possibly bring their family, not just the favorite child.  Like, okay, you can just bring one dependent, choose between your children, which of them you want to bring? Yeah, these are things that I think still needs work to be done in UK.

Jo Stansfield 

And Jack over to you.

Jack Daly 

Yeah, so I think really building from what Masoud said there, and I think Ollie’s touched upon it earlier, is that companies themselves often do just rely on assuming that they are doing as much as they can, and often do. And I will say, this isn’t something that’s just specific to the foundation industries, I think this is a challenge for a lot of big companies across the entire UK is that they will continue to prioritize the income producing functions without recognizing how important quality diversity inclusion is. And it’s taking the time and rational steps for senior leaders to actually look introspectively within the firm, but what is causing a lack of diversity and what is stopping underrepresented demographics from progressing within their careers, and then taking steps to actually deconstruct those barriers. And it’s recognizing within that that firms will face their own unique challenges. So not just relying on what the rest of the industry is doing in their EDI approaches that can only get you so far. It’s then moving forward and investing in well resourced and meaningful EDI policies that target the specific issues that those firms are facing. And that takes a lot of work and a lot of effort. But it’s recognized that that’s something that needs to be done. But importantly, workers really value that as well.  Yeah, thank you, Jack, that’s so important, you know, just to recognize that there is no uniform solution that works for everybody. And the businesses do need to work out and implement their own approaches to really solve the challenges that they have.

Ollie Folayan 

I think a bit of qualitative and quantitative data gathering by companies. And that can be really, really hard. But it takes a process of building trust over a period of time for people to volunteer, not just their data, maybe related things like pay and so on, but also with their experiences. And, you know, some of the things that Masoud was just sharing, I have had numerous conversations with people who don’t often feel like they can find the space, actually, or the understanding for those conversations to be had. And the other aspect that has been really helpful, and we’re seeing more of that in companies now is, is reverse mentoring. It’s leaders having, for example, we have with some of our partners, we have their VPs linked to young members of our team for a period of six months where they will learn about their experiences. And you hope that what that means is that when they are sat around the boardroom, some of that information influences the decision that they make, and hopefully, eventually stops the organization from looking a bit like somebody said, most of our organizations look like a pint of Guinness. And our intention is to turn it into a latte. So that’s the intention, but you hope that that happens over time.

Jo Stansfield 

What a brilliant analogy. Veronika would you like to add any thoughts to that?

Veronika Elfmarkova 

I just absolutely agree with all what was said. And probably I will just add that even if the policies are there, it needs to be acted upon. People really need to feel that they are heard and that there is a you know, further action, or even consequences, that there is actually something happening. It’s not just on paper and you know, next meeting next talk is going to be the same topic, but it needs to be acted upon, otherwise, nothing is going to change. I really think it’s more about the attitude than anything else.

Jo Stansfield 

Enough talking time for some action.

Sue Black 

Yes, absolutely. And you know, like Masoud, I didn’t know about this until you told me about it previously. And I think it’s something that we really need to raise awareness around because I think so many people potentially in leadership just don’t know about it. And Ollie, your point about reverse mentoring is a really great one to help people realize the issues that people come under.  Coming up now for our quickfire questions at the end here now. I actually love doing these, it’s really interesting to see what everyone says. So first question is, what’s your favourite thing about the foundation industries and why?  And we go to Jack, you first.

Jack Daly 

Yeah, so for me, things like before, I’m relatively new to the foundation industries and have only been researching them working for the past year or so. But for me, I think it’s the diversity in terms of companies, and the challenges that they face, but also the people within there as well. So it’s been fascinating for me to see the work that goes on across the entire supply chain, the built environment, but also, I think, a lot of the passion that people in the sector hold towards their work, and I think the outcome of their jobs as well.

Sue Black 

Great, thank you, Masoud, how about you?

Masoud Ahmadinia 

What I like about foundation industries that is critical to our modern life. I mean, we see it everywhere. And even if you want to work on sustainability, and going to order still, we need material from the foundation industries. So it could be part of a problem, but it is part of a solution as well. So it’s like every everything in general.

Sue Black 

That’s great, thanks, Masoud. Ollie.

Ollie Folayan 

It’s the innovation. And it’s the fact that you never quite feel like you are an expert. You’re constantly learning and constantly seeing different ways, even using old tools to solve new problems. And it’s that constant change that I find the most exciting.

Sue Black 

That’s great, thank you. Veronika.

Veronika Elfmarkova 

It’s the dynamic environment. Why I like it, because there’s a huge potential to make a positive change.

Sue Black 

Right. Next question. Which foundational material would you find it hardest to live without? And maybe same order. Over to you Jack.

Jack Daly 

I was thinking about this for a while. And I’m gonna say concrete, mainly because I do a lot of running when I’m not working. And I’m scared to go off nice concrete roads and into the hills where a lot more of the impressive runners go off, running up mountains and things. So yeah, I think without concrete, I’d probably just pack in the hobby. Just sit at home and do nothing. So yeah, really critical, I think.

Sue Black 

Thank you. How about you Masoud?

Masoud Ahmadinia 

Along with my previous answer, I will go for steel, as we see it everywhere, it’s needed every everywhere. And I think it’s very, very essential. And I cannot imagine living without it.

Sue Black 

Thanks. Ollie.

Ollie Folayan 

Just to be different, I will say paper, and I will say that it’s there in everything, especially money. So, I’m going to say that.

Sue Black 

So it’s all about the money. That’s funny. How about you, Veronika?

Veronika Elfmarkova 

For me, it is concrete. And just because we are surrounded by it.

Sue Black 

Great, thank you. So my favourite question, which material is most like your personality and why? And again, it goes to you first Jack.

Jack Daly 

As someone else has some pretty terrible music, and it’s based by personality of it a lot. I think metal probably would describe that quite well. But admittedly, I think as I’m getting more into academia, I think paper metaphorically, as someone who’s stressing quite a lot about getting papers published and submitted, I think that more appropriate nowadays.

Sue Black 

That’s great, great answer. Thank you. Masoud.

Masoud Ahmadinia 

So my answer is not the material that we produce, but it’s something that we use, and that’s water. And the reason that I like is  about flexibility. I see myself like very flexible to changes like living in different countries, work in different environments and changing what I’m actually settled into something else, somewhere else. So I think I would like to be water.

Sue Black 

That’s great. I love that answer. Ollie.

Ollie Folayan 

I’m going to choose that one of the chemicals, and I’m going to choose nitrogen as a chemical. And I will say that I’m generally quite chilled out, inert, until you get to certain temperatures, and then I get active.

Sue Black 

Wonderful and Veronika.

Veronika Elfmarkova 

Oh, I will be sounding like a concrete geek, but I will go for concrete again. And the reason why I think I kind of match myself as the strength, durability and versatility as the material.

Sue Black 

Wonderful. Well, thank you all so much. I mean, what a wonderful conversation we’ve had today in it. And you know, I absolutely love the answers to the quickfire questions. I think that is my favourite bit. So thanks very much for joining us today. It’s been great.

Veronika Elfmarkova 

Thank you as well.

Jack Daly 

Thank you.

Masoud Ahmadinia 

Thank you.

—

Sue Black

Thank you for joining us for this Equity Edge episode.

Jo Stansfield

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Sue Black

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