We love having leaders in Diversity & Inclusion on the podcast.
Katrina North is someone we have admired for a long time at The Culture Ministry.
This episode peels back the layers of Katrina's story, revealing how her varied background led her to become a pivotal figure in creating inclusive work environments. She shares how the impact of mentors and a diversity of experiences can be harnessed to champion change.
You will love hearing from Katrina!
The Culture Ministry exists to create inclusive, accessible environments so that people and businesses can thrive.
Combining a big picture, balanced approach with real-world experience, we help organisations understand their diversity and inclusion shortcomings – and identify practical, measurable actions to move them forward.
Go to https://www.thecultureministry.com/ to learn more
If you enjoyed this episode and maybe learnt something please share with your friends on social media, give a 5 star rating on Apple podcasts and leave a comment. This makes it easier for others to find A Dog Called Diversity.
A Dog Called Diversity is proud to be featured on Feedspot's 20 Best Diversity And Inclusion Podcasts
Thanks for listening. Follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook.
We love having leaders in Diversity & Inclusion on the podcast.
Katrina North is someone we have admired for a long time at The Culture Ministry.
This episode peels back the layers of Katrina's story, revealing how her varied background led her to become a pivotal figure in creating inclusive work environments. She shares how the impact of mentors and a diversity of experiences can be harnessed to champion change.
You will love hearing from Katrina!
The Culture Ministry exists to create inclusive, accessible environments so that people and businesses can thrive.
Combining a big picture, balanced approach with real-world experience, we help organisations understand their diversity and inclusion shortcomings – and identify practical, measurable actions to move them forward.
Go to https://www.thecultureministry.com/ to learn more
If you enjoyed this episode and maybe learnt something please share with your friends on social media, give a 5 star rating on Apple podcasts and leave a comment. This makes it easier for others to find A Dog Called Diversity.
A Dog Called Diversity is proud to be featured on Feedspot's 20 Best Diversity And Inclusion Podcasts
Thanks for listening. Follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook.
Welcome to a dog called Diversity this week, and I have been waiting and waiting to have this guest on. And I've been waiting because I think our guest this week first is Katrina North, and I've been so excited to have her on because she is the epitome of the diversity and inclusion community, and by that I mean people who lead this work in organisations, and nearly everyone I've met in these roles are kind and generous and willing to help. And I really got to know Katrina when I was running an event for my business in Sydney and she popped up on LinkedIn and said, do you need a venue? And I was like, yes, I do. And she very kindly offered a room in her office, which made a massive difference to me in my building, in my business, sorry, and it meant that I could donate.
Speaker 1:I think I was able to donate $2,000 to Dress for Success in Sydney. Yeah, so such a fantastic person and she has such a way of thinking about this work that I wanted to share with my listeners. So welcome to Katrina. That was a big intro.
Speaker 2:Why? Thank you, Lisa. You're my number one fan club. I need to hire you out, I know I know, but thank you. You're awesome, very generous in that introduction.
Speaker 1:Thank you. Would you talk a little bit about, I guess, where you're based and what you currently do? Yeah, sure.
Speaker 2:So I'm based in Sydney, australia. I'm currently the inclusion, diversity and wellbeing lead for Avanade for growth markets, and I'll just unpack that for a few people. Avanade is a joint venture between Microsoft and Accenture. We do deep tech, b2b work, predominantly around the Microsoft suite, so we are a Microsoft zero client ourselves and we employ a whole bunch of techies who work with businesses. Growth markets for Avanade is pretty much the Southern Hemisphere, so it's Asia Pacific, japan and Brazil. So it's what it says on the box. We are the growing markets. So one is location, but actually it's around maturity and where we're growing. So that's my current role.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much, katrina. And one of the reasons I wanted you to come on a dog called diversity was because you've had, I guess, a bit of a winding path to the D&I roles that you're currently you've done in the past and what you're doing now and a very diverse path, and I love that, because I don't think there's one way to come to this work and there's not one way to work out how you make progress in organisations. I wondered if you would talk a bit about, I guess, when you first maybe left school or left university and was looking out into the future, about what you wanted to be when you grew up and what were some of the things that you did that led you to where you are.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, it's a great question and, reflecting on that question, I remember very strongly when I was at school. I either wanted to be an aeronautical engineer or an investment banker, and I am neat one of those things.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was really, really interesting. So I think I would say I've had a career in two parts. I kind of had a pre-children and a post-children career. So the pre-children career, you know. I went off to uni, I was working in a range of casual and part-time jobs and I ended up working in hospitality. So I worked in reservations. I was a reservations manager for a global hotel chain and so that was really interesting and taught me a lot about customer service and taught me a lot about engaging with the public and how that shows up. And then I had my children and I had a bit of a career break.
Speaker 2:So I was kind of out of the workforce for a best part of five years. I did some facilitation, I did some casual work in that, but I wasn't really in full-time work. And when I went back I went back to work as a research analyst for a bank in group strategy, in the office of the MD, so a really different role. And it was happenstance that I happened to get that role and I was incredibly lucky. I worked with the most generous group of people who shared their expertise, their experience, who took me along to meetings, who would say well, you better come to this. You're going to end up doing the work and you know it may have been selfish on their past I don't want to have to tell you, I didn't have to reply it but they gave me a platform, they gave me exposure, they gave me support and they let me into their world and that started, you know, my kind of more formal career.
Speaker 2:So I then spent most of my career in kind of that. You know the pointy end of the organisation. So with the C-suite I became a chartered company secretary, so I have formal qualifications in governance and then I achieved my MBA. So I have my background is actually strategy in governance and I stayed, you know, kind of working at the C-suite level with businesses about businesses from banking, professional services, membership organisations, a bit of a range of things. But yeah, I am the diverse one in the field of inclusion and diversity practitioners because I have a really different background and I came to talent and this worked quite late in my career.
Speaker 1:What did you? How did that happen? How did you transition from more governance and strategy roles into, I guess, quite a different a people space?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. So I was working for a law society. I was writing and helping some of the strategy from the law society that was going to be, or we thought there would be A national change and we would lose about 50% of our revenue because of that change. We sold CPD, we sold continual professional development points. It was a large part of our revenue it was about 25% of our revenue and we needed to prepare ourselves to grow that business. So I worked very closely on the strategy around how we would sell our learning, how we could maximise that, how we needed to position that. And I had had some time at EY and EY rang me up and said we're looking for someone to come and head up learning for an Asia-Pacific role. Would you be interested in that? I said I know nothing about learning. They said, yeah, but this is a serious role.
Speaker 2:At that time it was about 35, 40,000 people across furniture countries had a very serious budget and I looked at that and I kind of went as a next step in my career if I was looking at maybe CEO roles or other things that I was looking at at the time which were going to be for much smaller organisation. This was a much larger role. And so I said yes, if I think about the work that I'll be doing and how I could approach that, and I kind of jumped in. I was in that role for a little while and my counterpart, who headed up diversity and inclusion for Asia-Pac at that time, was heading back to the UK for family reasons and they went through a round of recruitment and they didn't find anyone. And then she kind of gave me a call and said I really would like you to consider taking on this role. And I said but I've just got this one. And she goes yeah, but we have this informal or she ran an informal type of champions or connection network. Anyone who is interested could come along for an hour a month and hear what was happening and share ideas. And through that I had been quite vocal as folks who know me would know me to be and said oh look, there's this opportunity coming. Why don't we leverage that and try and do this? Or maybe we could improve our flexible work in our office, fit out type things. And she said you've got a really unique approach to some of this work and I think you'd be great at it. So that's how it happened. Ey was incredibly generous to me. They gave me six months to get up to speed, so they let me transition into that role, but they also gave me this period of grace to go and find out about what it was I needed to find out to be proficient in this role.
Speaker 2:And one thing about inclusion and diversity globally is that there is a wealth, an absolute wealth, of open source research. It has to be one of the most researched aspects of talent out there. There is always a study, always a Harvard business review, and there's McKinsey reports. Everybody is in this space and there's 40 years worth of history that's easily accessible. So I had six months to really get myself up to speed.
Speaker 2:Again, I had this really generous global team. I had super experienced people who were in the equivalent of my role for a mayor on North America. There was a team. I had people in country who were already doing this role and a year I was able to transition and I was able, like you said, to bring a different perspective and a different way of thinking, which is sometimes quite challenging for people because I do think differently and see things differently to a lot of folk in our profession and in the practice. But it was an environment where you could safely challenge and stretch a little bit of thinking, and also I had people who were quite happy and quite comfortable to actually say no, katrina, you've got the wrong end of the that's, you're just wrong. That's a really interesting perspective, but yeah, let me tell you about why that won't work. So that's how I ended up really in talent and specifically within IND.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'd love to know what you bring to this work that is different and how you think differently about it, and I suspect having a background in strategy is a fantastic help. But I wonder what else you bring. Can you talk a bit about that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. So I think the way I talk and engage with leaders is different. I talk to leaders about their business. So, because they grew up, you know, in that C-suite and in in governance and in understanding a business, I can talk to the leaders about their business. So it's a really different way of engaging and I find it's a much easier in I'm talking to the leaders about what they're doing, what improvements they want to make in their business, what their business objectives are and how we might get there. So, one, it's kind of talking their language and it's talking to them about things that are important to them rather than things that are important to me. And secondly, I talk to them about their leadership style and their leadership step shadow.
Speaker 2:So I always ask a leader what do you want to be known for and by whom? Particularly new leaders. And I ask them to reflect on times when they've felt valued, when they've felt cared for, when they've been given a platform, where they've felt the people invest in them and how that impacted them, you know. And, conversely, when they haven't had those opportunities or they it hasn't been safe to speak up or they haven't felt valued, and then I kind of make it a bit pointy, like well, you're the leader now You're the person who can create that environment. How can I help you do that? What help would you like for me to do that? And what help would you like for me to do that in the service of whatever your business objectives are? So if it's, you know, growing a new, if it's expanding into a new area, if it's managing with a difficult client, if it's bringing a diverse team up to speed, whatever that is, but it is a subtle shift in terms of how we talk to folk and I think it's given me an edge.
Speaker 2:I think the other thing I and this is a bit controversial, but the other thing is people talk about the head and the heart and I think IND practitioners at time can get a bit too caught up in the theory. We have to understand and know the theory absolutely and then we feel sometimes I think compelled to share that and hope that we win people's hearts. And I remember, really seniorly, they're saying to me but how are you going to win their hearts, katrina? And I said I don't need them to win their hearts, I need them to behave differently. And I would bring it back to some other corporate processes.
Speaker 2:You know, like if you want to get your expenses paid, you follow the corporate process because you want to get your expenses paid, right? Yeah, we don't win people's hearts to get there. We just tell them follow this process, this is how you get paid, yeah. So I think there's a shortcut there for us. We can think about. What are the behaviors that we want to see and how do we create the environment where it's easy for people to do those behaviors? Rather than try and win this, win their hearts, because I think these are busy people, yeah.
Speaker 2:They have other priorities and we want to make it as easy as possible for them to behave in the way that we need them to behave, and I think we seem to be the only business unit out there striving for people's hearts.
Speaker 2:Finance isn't, marketing isn't, strategy isn't. So I'm not. I think we get a bit hung up on that, and it's not saying that the hearts are not important, but actually just make it that shortest distance for people to behave in a way that you want them to behave, make it as easy as possible for them to do that and tell them you know, in my experience, most people want to do the right thing, most people want to be a better leader Just tell them what they need to do, that Don't make them guess and don't give them a whole lot of theory and make it you know and hope that they work it out for themselves. Or give them a huge choice and hope that they pick the right one. Give them really practical, pragmatic stuff that they can do, and that doesn't simple, doesn't mean easy, right, some simple things that you can do may still be difficult and hard, but I knew they will need support and guidance through that. Yeah, that's the conversation I have, which I think it's a bit different and it's a bit controversial.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, I had to learn that lesson very early in my career between head and heart. And I can remember I was working for a Steve Adoring company. It was a very blokey, male dominated business, and I can remember going out to the port to watch some of the sexual harassment training or anti sexual harassment training, and we had actors and and I can remember having a conversation with one of the men who was part of the training and I was very young and he's 50s or 60s and you know him basically saying all this stuff is bullshit and and and me trying to convince his heart, me saying, well, what if it was your daughter who was being harassed on a work site? And but then very quickly realizing he can think whatever he wants, but the behavior that we need is that you will not harass anyone, whether it's a woman or a man or otherwise, on your site. And I think that's such a good learning.
Speaker 1:And I think one of the challenges we're seeing in diversity and inclusion is there are many people who've been appointed from a place of their identity. So they've been appointed to a D and I role because they showed interest in gender equity or they're gay and they're running the internal network for gay people, or there are some sort of minority that might have a disability, and so we make the mistake of well, it's not a mistake, but we appoint these people who have such a good heart for the work, and because they've been appointed, because who they are, they do lead that work from their heart, instead of being taught. You know how to, how to navigate the organization effectively and how to get the behavior change in the most effective way. Yeah, so I love what you said. It is hard to do D and I work, though I think if you don't have a value around the work, is it personally important to you? Have you? You know, is there something about the work that that sits in your heart?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. So look, I'm a very strong social justice lefty, so there is, there is this sense of, for me, absolutely what is the right thing to do, like what is what is just the right thing? And and there's this governance and strategic aspects. So, you know, through my training, you kind of go organizations, in particular, these unique constructs in our environment. They're given vast amounts of latitude. You know they exist in perpetuity and and people who are either their C suite, you know, or their directors, are custodians of of that organization for a short time. And so I think I bring that to it as well, that kind of understanding around an organization and the fact that they have these, these privileges. And with those privileges comes some responsibilities. And you know, our job in an organization is to create an environment where everybody can do and be their best, and for me, inclusion in particular is all encompassing. You know, we do our work for different segments of the community and we need to do it in a way that is all encompassing for everybody, so that we are creating an environment where everybody and I mean everybody can and do their best work the majority of the time, and that's a really hard skill. That's really hard. People really underestimate the sophistication of that skill, particularly when you're leading a group of diverse people.
Speaker 2:So I think I've gone off track a little bit, but that's my drivers. And when you have an environment where people are thriving, where they are doing their best, where they're being their best, then business is better. You know, business is easier, You'll get less customer complaints, you'll have better revenue, you have less risk or you can manage your risk differently. There's a whole host of really positive, you know spin-offs for what a business is there to do and it's good for the individual. So that's also how I come to it. And again, it's quite different to my peers and my counterparts in this space who often come with a very strong advocacy. And it's not that I'm not an advocate, but there is a lived experience type of advocacy around. This may have happened, or I've witnessed this, or I've experienced this, and we have to change that and I think that's really valuable input. I think it's insight and input that you need to balance with the context of the business doing whatever the business needs to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, such wise words, I think. What One of the things that I think can be frustrating with this work is often you don't see instant progress, or you might see something move forward, but then you actually might see it take a step back again. But what are some of the things you're really proud of that you feel like have made a difference in the work you've done?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so some of the things are pivoting people's thinking. So I can remember when I arrived, there were these In some other organisations. There were these allies campaigns and you know we're supporting women and we're supporting the LGBTQ plus community and we're supporting ethnicity and race and we're supporting people of different ages. And this is what it means to be an ally and that's important. And then I had kind of this Well, for me it was an aha moment. It's no longer an aha moment, but I had my own little light bulb and I kind of went if we could encourage people to be more inclusive, it doesn't matter what the diversity is.
Speaker 2:So you know, really pivoting and focusing around, actually what we're going to do is talk about how you're a more inclusive leader or how you're a more inclusive person. What are those behaviours? What are the three things you could walk out of this session and do differently and have a positive impact? And some of them are really simple, basic things. How do you think about impact? You know your leadership shadow and what you want to be known for and really talk about being inclusive. Because it's like that's a rising tide that will lift all boats and there are absolutely a need for interventions for different populations of the community? Absolutely, and there's this bigger piece around.
Speaker 2:Let's just teach people to be more inclusive more generally and give people a better overall experience, and to have a conversation about how do you engage with someone who is different from you, whatever that difference is. Is it their way of thinking? Is it their education? Is it because they're a different gender? Is it because they're a different skin colour to you? Whatever that difference is, is it cultural? You know, of course, you speak different languages. Literally, how do you engage with someone who is different from you and how do you have an effective working relationship and support that person who is different from you? So, yeah, did that answer your question?
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely, and I love what you said about that. Of course, there are groups in any organisation that need specific attention and support and help, but focusing on the overall inclusion. So you know, it doesn't matter how you're different, you can still be part and feel like you belong. And I think that solves the problem in organisations to an extent where and I've seen this where you might be doing a disability initiative and you might be doing a Pride initiative and another group comes along and says well, what about us? What about you? Know, whatever it is and the thing in organisations, there's finite resources. So if you're doing a disability initiative and you're doing a Pride initiative, you might not have the funds, the capacity, you know, or the people to take on more, and so then you're saying to some groups well, you're more important at the moment than other groups, which is not building inclusion, whereas if you kind of, you need to be able to do some of those things. But if you're focusing on building inclusive leaders, I think you go further.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you do have to prioritise. That's you know we are. Every organisation has limited resources, limited time, limited capital, limited energy. So you do have to prioritise and I think having a really clear strategy is helpful because it allows people to. Where is this? On the strategy? This is what our people have told us, this is what we've identified, this is what we think will have the greatest impact. So this is where we're focusing being clear around that communication, because the other thing around inclusion and diversity, which I'm sure you're aware of, is what I call the random acts of kindness.
Speaker 2:So not a day goes past that someone doesn't say I've had such a great idea or I'd really like to do blah, and it's, and people are very well-meaning and it comes from a good place, and it's a complete distraction most of the time, and often not on strategy. So how you manage those random acts of kindness, how you can prioritise based on your strategic goals, and how you can gracefully either ignore or say no or defer some of those other random acts of kindness, but you're right. And then there is often the backlash. You know. So how, why are these people? And we're seeing it play out in America at the moment. Yeah, rit Large, you know why these people getting an advantage that I don't have. That's not fair in inverted commas, with no consideration to individuals' pathways to where they currently are or how fair or otherwise those pathways may have been. But I think that's why, if you can have a more holistic conversation, if you can frame things in that we are creating an environment where everybody can do and be their best the majority of the time, then that talks to everybody and it is about everybody. Right, it's, it has to be. And the other conversation that I find really one that I wish people were having.
Speaker 2:Morals is in my mind if you actually want to have impact and change, you need the majority to change their behaviour. So when you focus on the minority or when you focus on the underrepresented and you're not bringing the majority along in that conversation, or you're not talking or engaging with the majority, you're almost on a hiding to nothing. You can, you'll wear yourself out, because you, to actually create a better environment for everybody, you need the majority to change. We don't need the underrepresented groups to change Like. That's not our job. We invest a lot in supporting them and sometimes I think we do that at the expense of really focusing on how we need the majority to change and what small changes or big changes you could get the majority to adopt. That would make life so much better for the groups you know that we serve.
Speaker 1:You've talked about a couple of things that are important in diversity and inclusion work. So one being strategy, one being able to talk the language of business and you know I'm paraphrasing, but it's almost meeting people where they are not leading with heart but, you know, leading with head kind of work. What are some of the other things that you think it's important to have as skills in this work?
Speaker 2:Resilience and patience and a good support network. You know you will see the best and the worst of humanity in your workplace and outside of your workplace, right, you literally see the highs and the lows. The average staff doesn't come to you, it really doesn't. Other people are doing that. So you see the highs and the lows. So being aware I can remember my first nine months or so was so confronting because it was just do we really do that? Did someone really have that experience? Oh, I draw dropping in terms of what was being presented and what I was being asked to deal with, and also going I'm not a psychologist, what would I know? I'm completely under-equipped to provide any guidance or help. How will I do this? So absolutely resilience around that. Have a good support network, be able to debrief and then, as you've been in the space for longer, patience. So you will have the same conversations many, many times with different people. Every time there's a new executive sponsor, you'll be briefing them. Every time there's a change of talent leader, you'll be briefing them. Every time there's a change of executive leader, you'll be briefing them. Sometimes you need to brief those people more than once on the same thing because it takes a while and sometimes that can be really wearing.
Speaker 2:And sometimes I find in those business roles where they've been appointed a champion or they're passionate about this, or they're your exec sponsor, those roles tend to rotate more than our roles do.
Speaker 2:So you can go through this kind of two-year cycle.
Speaker 2:You brief somebody, you get them up to stage, you've got them engaged in the strategy, you've got a good working relationship with them, you've got them doing things that you need them to do at the meetings that you're not at, and then they say I'm off to another job or I'm really busy now, and so on.
Speaker 2:So we're going to give this opportunity to so and so and you're laughing, you've been here to I'm so busy, you're right back at scratch at square one, and so it's going to take a couple of months to get that person up to stage and that can be a bit frustrating. So just knowing that that is the reality of our role is really important, I think, knowing that you'll have the same conversation with a bunch of people and then I go choose your battles. So in my experience, people are either calling on IND one because they have appetite and they want to be better leaders, or they want to be known for something and that's a really positive and engaging conversation, or because it's remedial. The employee survey has come in. There's been a harassment claim, the clients complained, something's happened and you're being sent in to help.
Speaker 1:So whatever gets them to you, I always think, but yeah, but that's kind of do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2:You get the highest amount of noise and you get the people with appetite or the people you're being sent to. So I think, as much as you can be part of the talent conversation and as much as you can be part of the business conversation and look forward and be ahead. Like how is the market moving? Co-pilot, co-pilot's a great example. What does chat, gpt and co-pilot mean? Who's gonna get co-pilot in your organization? How are you going to make that determination? Do you need to account for that in your talent and review processes or promotion processes? Do you give co-pilot to people who are struggling?
Speaker 2:More Typically, it goes to execs. Are they the ones who really need it? What does that mean in terms of the skills you know like, do we have to think three to five years and do we have to start pivoting our people and the skills? What does that mean for the people who are impacted? How can we manage that gracefully? How can we provide opportunities for those people to pivot and be at the forefront of new technologies and new ways of working? And I think for me, if you can be part of those conversations and be contributing forward thinking, it's better than the reactive stuff where you're cleaning up mess. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, completely, completely. What advice do you have for people who would like to move their career into inclusion and diversity?
Speaker 2:Yeah, look, it is really interesting. I think give yourself time to get up to speed. Live experience is incredibly valuable, and you need other business skills. You need to be able to influence. You need to be able to understand the business. You need to be able to talk to leaders about things that are important to the leaders. You need to have really good relationships with other parts of the business. That is how you will get your work done. You are often going to be a very small team, either a relatively senior person as a team of one, or you might have a small team who are in different locations, depending on your role, but you will get the bulk of your work done through others. So the relationships with your HR directors, your relationships with the talent process and the other people in HR, the relationships with the people who the COOs, the people who control the business agendas how do you get on those agendas to raise a topic or to you know how they are really important? So think about all of that. There is a wealth of information out there. It is open source, it is free. There is a good 40 years worth of history there. This is not new work. Take some time. Go through that Don't accept all of that at face value.
Speaker 2:Challenge that, bring a different perspective. You know I was very unpopular very early in my career. I kind of said you know? So it is pretty clear to me that unconscious bias training doesn't work right. We are going back 10 or 15 years and there was just this shocked intake of breath. What do you mean? Well, there is 30 years worth of history and several billions of dollars invested in this space and no progress. You know like what other industry would do that, what other industry would perpetuate? You know that type of investment and when you have that conversation with people in our practice who have built a livelihood on that, who are deeply passionate about the work, who really feel that this is a way to create change, that is very confronting. See, I am not a pop, I am not. I am very controversial. I am the DDS candidate, I am the tricky one, but you kind of go there is 30, 40 years worth of evidence that it doesn't work. We might need to try something different or something new. What do you reckon Could you give that a whirl?
Speaker 1:Anyway, Do you know, the only time I have had success with unconscious bias? Training is usually in a one-on-one and it is not training, it is a one-on-one conversation about what is going on with them. And it has been often with women who are struggling, who have been approached about a role, the next step in their career, and they are saying I am not ready, despite all the evidence to the contrary. And we start talking about are you scared? Do you think you will fail? And yes, yes.
Speaker 1:And then, if I can take the conversation to all our brains, we hear about unconscious bias all the time, but our brains are trying to keep us safe. And that was great when we were out on the savannah and lions and tigers were trying to eat us. But we are not in that world anymore, but we still have our brains doing that. So you might be scared, but let's talk that through, about some of the things that could happen and how we could mitigate those. And, by the way, what else is your brain doing? What other things is it telling you? That might not be true, and so it is usually when I do that kind of one-on-one stuff that you can get people to go oh, what else am I doing?
Speaker 2:How is my?
Speaker 1:leadership, then impacting other people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's really interesting. It's really interesting.
Speaker 1:So what are you looking forward to next Katrina? What are you optimistic about in this work?
Speaker 2:I'm really optimistic because I think there's a bit of a sea change. So I think I look at some.
Speaker 2:I look at Lilah Zing and some you know global commentators and I think there is yeah, I think there is a real mood of change in terms of embracing the new and embracing a different way of doing this work. I think for folks who might be in IND within the Americas, it's a really difficult place at the moment and I think that's a different conversation, yeah, but I think what I am excited about in terms of IND broadly is that we as a profession seem to be open to a different way of doing things. We seem to be moving away from someone called the cupcakes and performance or you know flags and you know.
Speaker 1:Cupcakes and flowers. Oh yeah, no, it is cupcakes and flags, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, flags and something else.
Speaker 2:So and into the well, what are we going to do? That's different, that's going to change and make impact. So I'm really excited for that conversation and, at the same time, I'm mindful that for colleagues and folks who are doing this work in the US at the moment, it's a really difficult time, and how we can support them is important.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you so much, katrina. I have so enjoyed speaking with you and I would say you're one of the wisest and smartest people in diversity and inclusion at the moment. Well, that's a very generous.
Speaker 2:Thank you very much. I'm not sure I'm not sure my shot that that's an accurate mental, but thank you for this intimate that's lovely.
Speaker 1:No, thank you so much Thank you Lisa.