Recorded in December 2020, the episode reflects the impact of Covid and lockdown on policy shaping.
We speak with Mike Lewis, Senior Policy Officer for the West Midlands Combined Authority, about the decisions and processes that go into making policies.
We look at how policies can help marginalised groups, learn about new policies implemented after Covid, and hear about the path Mike took to get into this position.
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Leading Communities podcast has been put together to help community activists learn from proven leaders, from proven organisations to start caring, keep caring, and care more by exploring topics relevant to our communities.
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Hello and welcome to the leading communities podcast brought to you by Aspire for ucic and produced by that tour media cic I’m kitchen one day and I’ll be your host hello and welcome to uh the next episode of leading communities our leading communities is a podcast series all
About getting people uh to start caring keep caring or care more so we interview different types of people that maybe have access to policy access to a particular skill or a special specialism which is going to help us as Community leaders to be able to move forward a
Little so today I am pleased to welcome Mike Lewis who is senior policy officer for West Midlands combined Authority uh hi Mike uh nice to have you um for you yeah pretty good at a minute busy but good we’re good okay um and so I mean first of all let’s
Maybe start with the basics like what do you do and why should it matter to communities so what I do is I as a title says I work as a policy officer at the West Midlands combined Authority and I work within the the strategy directorate um and the authority and what that means
Is what I try and do is my directorate sorry um tries to kind of bring policy together um across the the combining Authority so we’ve got different portfolio holders different areas of work so we just try and net everything together and make sure it kind of joins together
Um and to kind of achieve our aims the reason why Community should care is I suppose the combined Authority everything we do is driven towards making the lives of people in the West Midlands more prosperous and to deliver inclusive growth so literally everything we do is for communities and communities
Within the West Midlands region um sometimes it you know people might feel like they’re a bit far away from what we do but actually everything we do is kind of driven by by our communities so that’s why I think communities can care about what we do so excellent so uh
You said about inclusive growth that’s a phrase of add a lot more in 2020 so obviously we’re in December we’re potentially looking after the tail end of Corona yeah we’re potentially starting to look and think about um what recovery looks like so what is inclusive growth all about
Well to me inclusive growth is all about just making sure everything everything every policy intervention that we deliver basically benefits um communities in the West Midlands region so whether we’re developing Brownfield and to deliver housing making sure that it kind of delivers for people especially marginalized and vulnerable
People in the region when we’re kind of developing our transport interventions making sure people can access opportunities across the region especially people from kind of deprived communities so literally to me it’s about making sure that everything we do is beneficial to people of this community of this region but especially
People that have marginalized and live in kind of the private communities it’s about kind of addressing issues related to equity inequality and making people more prosperous is is kind of my interpretation of it okay and then you said Brownfield so very quickly uh had would you explain brownfield’s site and
Marginalization words like that like what what do they mean in a 2020 context so Brownfield land is is kind of any you could you could it’s literally what kind of what it is it’s kind of um land that have been that has kind of been repurposed um for for different purposes
You could say so for instance if a business was on a piece of land a plot of land that business is no longer there we might have knocked it down because it’s just not there anymore we’ll kind of use that line redevelop it for for housing um in our um our perspective so
It’s just repurposed and you could say yeah so Greenfield tends to be ones that you can’t touch you need to preserve them for nature Brownfield can be very often out of a Town Center or out of a city but it’s got a little bit of potential for being used for commercial
Purposes or for housing like no one’s laid the stake to say hands off that land exactly yeah okay cool um and then for marginalized Society like what did they what from your perspectives what do marginalized societies sound like look like feel like marginalized Society to me are people
That can’t for for reasons of inequality and Equity that can’t access the things that you know they they have the the rights to to do so whether it’s because of social reasons because they haven’t got the social networks or Social Capital whether it’s like monetary reasons that they don’t literally have
The money to be able to to do or access certain things or whether it’s actually infrastructure or kind of Transport geographical reasons that they just live far away from from things and places that they that they need and services that they need so to me you can be kind of marginalized
Because of kind of those those reasons okay so be marginalized it’s really we’re talking about people that live on the edges and the reason why I always kind of like ask questions about languages it’s really interesting that somebody might have a definition or a phraseology or a label but because
Somebody else doesn’t identify with it it feels like oh they’re not talking about me but when you actually break down and unpick the label you’re like oh wait that that is me so when you talk about marginalized we’re obviously talking about people on the edge but we’re also saying hey you’re probably on
The Edge from a sense of it’s not easy for you to tap into the system yeah it’s not easy for you to be connected like in terms of network so you know it’s not easy for you to move around you start like you can jump on the train and
Go access the job there’s something stopping you doing that um and potentially you haven’t also got a network of people around you that can put you on people that can connect you to the next opportunity so from your guys perspectives plug in that uh Gap matters um what tends to happen to communities
Where those people on the edges if they can be brought in what’s the benefit I think you know there’s kind of loads of benefits firstly I think it’s it’s first it’s the right thing to do like you know kind of the things that the thing that drives me the most is
Literally I think everyone has the right to kind of benefit from the society that we live in and you know whether it be the kind of socio-economic fruits or the social fruits or the economic fruits I think everyone you know has the right to kind of benefit from that but I think
Also it just it makes Society a better and easier place to live so when when we pull those people in those marginalized people in it kind of relaxes pressures on our on our social services potentially on our Criminal Justice Services potentially and it just makes society and makes this place the West
Midlands a more attractive place to live and to invest in but all around I just think it makes Society better when everyone’s kind of pulled up really so in a sense one way of us measuring if inclusion is work in this inclusive growth if we’re to measure how it worked we technically
Should be seeing a lesser demand or a slower reduced Demand on social services potentially yeah potentially yeah yeah you’d hope so I think what I would say to that though it’s a it’s a kind of wider systems approach and I don’t think you know the ca or a local Authority or
One agency has the you know should kind of bear the burden of that I think it’s a whole a whole system because even the police I see the police as like the lead Agency for policing but I think all agencies have a role to play Within policing and the ca’s combined Authority
Yeah sorry the Cs combined Authority so yeah definitely so that that could be one metric um you say like a reduction in the kind of question what are other metrics and again I’m not obviously asking you to give anything that’s confidential away but I think for anyone who’s trying to lead communities and
Think about ways to make social change like how do you measure things that work like yeah how do you guys look at measuring things I mean it’s it’s an age-old kind of kind of questions about uh from on a from a personal level um I think it’s looking at how the con
Those people that are most affected by inequalities I suppose is looking at how their lives are being improved or not being improved so one one area I would look at is the kind of Health um and well-being of people um like recently the combined Authority we kind of commissioned a piece of work
Um called the State of the State of the region Health Report which basically kind of looks at the impact that coronavirus has had on our communities but also just looked at wider health indicators and it kind of shows that there are loads of challenges for this region so I think from a personal
Perspective so health is one area that I would look at to see how um you know we we make our region a more healthy place to me is one way of kind of measuring measuring that so yeah okay um because in in some senses I think the that idea of
Measurement where like you’ve just said especially from the combined Authority’s perspective you’re a union union uh a Unity agency so yeah you’re a United entity and you’re trying to do work that gels the Midlands although the local authorities will do their own things yeah you guys have got some ability
To do region-wide working yeah exactly yeah yeah and I mean I mean there’s other things you can consider so for instance it’s like you know we’ve got um levers over transport so it’s kind of use of um public transport we’ve got levers over adult education so maybe it’s a take-up of adult education
Courses but I think it’s a it’s a mixture of um indicators and all of them won’t be quantitative I think some of it will be kind of kind of qualitative stuff as well and when you talk about levers you’re talking about you guys have got powers against that like you
Can’t leverage something you can make something happen it’s not just sitting pretty yeah yeah so by powers and resources um so yeah okay so at things like I do education Etc um and the reason I’m saying all of that is oh I’m at least I’m checking this
Because when we then looking at you know what do we measure I think very often everyone’s like well you know is it as simple as things have gone up or gone down Etc but actually like you’re saying sometimes it’s what have we lowered what barriers have we removed yeah in order
For something else to occur quicker uh Arrangements of what maybe arrangements or principles have we established in order for everyone to sing from the hanging she so when you’re measuring change it’s really about like you’re allowed to think as lateral as you want but you’ve got to be consistent in in
What you measure like there’s no use of measuring let’s just say like you said you know if the police have their own policing power but if we just measure things on arrests it doesn’t tell us enough about those people that maybe we’re uh planning an offense but
Actually we’ve not dealt with the reason why they were planning an offense and another way to like say with health even if let’s just say there’s lower um Hospital admissions not knowing where and why the Hospital admissions were changing is is also quite damaging because we can’t replicate things that
Work yeah absolutely yeah so that ability to like think laterally and and and really just revert reverse engineer the people you’re working with is probably a big a big uh a big tick but we we probably come on to that a little bit before again because I think that
Measurement is really probably where everyone’s value is but as you said you guys lead other organizations so what’s the is there a secret or a methodology or anything you’ve seen that’s interesting about guiding well-established organizations because a lot of people that are listening are at the low level but maybe they’ve never
Thought wait a minute some of our organizations have bosses themselves so what’s it like to be in charge of the people in charge I mean I I and I’d probably you know I probably should say it up front I wouldn’t say this as kind of being in in charge uh per se
Um I mean I I don’t really see it as a kind of vertical relationship I think I’ll see it more horizontally and we’ve all got kind of different responsibilities for things um it’s kind of how I would see it but I think given given what our remit is
Um I think one of the the kind of powers if you’d like that or abilities that we have is to kind of convince people given the the areas that we we work on so we’re able to kind of bring bring people together to kind of discuss issues and
Come up with kind of collective Solutions I mean one one practical example of that now actually is that is the mayor he’s got um a forum an economic impacts of our coronavirus Forum where he’s bringing together really senior stakeholders from across the region to say on a weekly basis to look at
Um what’s happening in terms of the coronavirus look at the um the kind of impact it’s having on our region and then kind of developing actions from there so whether it’s kind of lobbying government or whether it’s for organizations to kind of work collectively to do things
Um you know coming up with those kind of kind of things um but I suppose the main thing that I would say we do as a combined Authority is we we start from the outcome so we look at what we what a good mic looks like or what we’re trying to address and
Then we work backwards so we so you know bike from starting from where where we think we want to be we’ll then look at the activities that need to take us there and we’ll engage with with other organization and organizations on that basis so that’s a nugget so let’s just
Do a quick Depot that that’s a beautiful nugget like the the power of working backwards it’s underrated and I do think that very often if someone’s looking to get people to start caring like that’s the secret like you know if somebody’s a campaigner around let’s just say ovarian
Cancer all the way to I mean I’ve seen some interesting stuff in uh I think is it the king’s Heath Facebook groups so there’s some kind of Ballard issue that’s going on with it with the road networks in King’s Heath people are not happy like I can guarantee 40 to 160
Message threads as soon as somebody does King’s Thief traffic post right so if someone’s then looking to start anyone caring what’s really interesting when you look at some of these threads it’s you’ve got people that are like but it’s going to help traffic other people are like yeah but it’s going to even
Convenience people I saw one that was like for me I don’t know why it’s stuck in my head but somebody wrote I saw a delivery driver slash a an Amazon driver have to do some weird reversing to kind of so then I’m like okay so this story
Has got lots of implications the locals have a few but also if you’re not a local if you’re that delivery driver and you’re in a particular Arena where a policy changes as as being executed which is what these bullets are um then you’ve actually just got to live
With it you don’t know the why the Falls where it started so weirdly you’ve been affected but if someone’s campaigning they could actually include you in the campaign but they might not know so that ability to say well let’s reverse engine into the problem I think is really
Interesting because you can then ask wait a minute guys what do we want at the end of this like what are we actually complaining about and and what do we want to change so are there any steps and tips for people rather than just saying oh I’ve got this problem
How do we start to yeah how do you break down anything to start to reverse engineering so sorry is that so breaking down any problem so I’m like I said I just use that King’s Heath one because it kind of occurred to me he’s like you guys are
All speaking about this particular issue but no one’s reversed engineered what we want like what so so you know what I mean so yeah how do you start at the end rather than starting about oh my God I’m unhappy yes I think like from a from our
Organizational kind of point of view is you know we might have an idea what the the outcome might be but what we try to do and I’d like to think we do it pretty well is I think we we try and consult um along the way so whenever we’re
Developing a strategy or or kind of a piece of research we will always do like a call for evidence or kind of do a consultation on things and hopefully then people can kind of feed their views into that which kind of feeds into our road program now I think maybe one area
In which you know our organization and other organizations can improve is maybe having that kind of consultation get to a wider group of people because sometimes people might you know for instance my have an opinion about things that are changing but they might have had the opportunity to to kind of input
A view on that but they just don’t know the mediums of doing so I’m not saying the king’s Eve for example is is you know that that wasn’t it was just the random one yeah yeah there were times though where you know like consultations for things will go out things things
Don’t change and people say why why did this change you know um but then you know if you kind of look back at it people sometimes had an opportunity to to kind of at least raise their their opinions on that but maybe you know maybe it’s organizations doing a better
Job of kind of um you know disseminating kind of consultations and like call for evidence calls for evidence maybe so I think I think it’s about how we get views along the way um yeah so so very often if we’re going to reduce engineer the problem we actually need to speak to the
People that are affected by it yeah yeah we need to speak with not just maybe the survivors or the victims or the directly impacted but all the Affiliated bodies you know what I mean yeah and and one of the things that I do in terms of research is triangulation so um I’m a
Massive believer again from working in behavioral units working with young people with Autism so that idea of if I want to do an intervention with said young person it could I have to understand where the parents Dynamics like and then potentially some kind of key worker or educator or other role
Models in their lives um and very often everyone’s just like you know you know little Stevie is doing this this and this but actually it works to make sure that we say okay you know mum of Stevie what’s your views where do you think he needs to get to Stevie
Where do you want to get to teacher of Stevie where do you think he needs to get and then and then now hopefully you’ll start to see maybe a thematic analysis so by asking lots of people you see some themes and then in the themes do you guys maybe score the themes to
Say oh wait a minute this one came up six times 60 times yeah I mean in there might be some kind of waiting and scoring for different um for different things um but to be fair I think every I mean we do kind of take things on board and
Everything’s kind of important but within different strategies and different programs there might be a kind of waiting of of things as well so yeah yeah um and for this is just my own personal tips and and obviously like I say you guys will have your process but from
Hearing some of what you’d say I’d say if I was that person who’s now looking to get a campaign going or like you know I’ve already got people that care about something but I want to step it up more I’d be doing these types of uh thematic analysis where I’ll be asking people
Things to say well you know and I’d be asking sins against me personally time I always feel like time isn’t really interesting measure time people can commit and time that people want to see results I think that’s an underrated part of certain types of uh campaign strategies like how quickly do you all
Want to Resort and then for me I actually take it back to the communities to say guys if you want me to do this in this time what are you willing to give for it to occur and that’s where if you want people to care more in my opinion
That’s one key conversation what are you all willing to give for a result to happen quicker or for a result to impact more people yeah because it’s very easy to have just the expectation which is the complaint but in the solution is the nuances about commitment contribution
And things like that so yeah just as a summary I think listening to people thematic analysis and then starting to wait how much time things might take in order for for a particular program project intervention or invention to to occur I think that’s an underrated approach and then obviously there’s
Resources that people need to think about as well like what’s it going to take to support people with these things so that’s just my like you know two pencils from lived experience um so we talked about how you are you said it diplomatically you say you
Convene around table of the big boys so you’re not their bosses you’re not telling them what’s going on but you’re you’re basically facilitating that like how do small Enterprises get into the room and how can they make the most of your opportunities so small Enterprises I think again I
Don’t think we kind of discriminate on in terms of um size of organizations a lot of the times it might just depend on the issue that we’re kind of discussing and you know for as an example there might be a case that there’s an umbrella organization that kind of represents the
Smaller organizations so thinking of maybe some like um some pencils like churches works like that doesn’t it yeah yeah exactly yeah so so it might be a case of accessing the room via a kind of larger umbrella organization potentially but again though it’s about kind of communicating
The roots to being able to do that but also I mean there is there is the room and there’s actually I mean there’s the kind of wider room of concept so for instance we we do do a lot of research and we do call for evidence a lot of
Times on things so when we do that call for evidence I think that’s a that’s an opportunity to to actually impact what we do so I mean a recent example of that actually is a piece of work that really there now which basically looks at how civil society and how kind of
Enterprises responded to the Corona virus pandemic and specifically we wanted to hear from kind of community organizations to kind of help us shape that work so that’s that’s one way in which kind of smaller Enterprises do can access the that’s why they got a chance
So I mean you may not have it to the top of your head because I understand obviously like when you’re working in a big organization yeah like you know sometimes the the microprocessors aren’t always known to you but so as an example there like where should small
Enterprises be looking so that they can hear these opportunities because really um it’s probably this the other side of this question is what techniques do you guys use to reach the small Enterprises so how do they knowing now that you are you’ve got a room for them
How do you guys go about letting people know that the doors are open or there’s an opportunity yeah I suppose one one way we try to kind of communicate that is through our our media and social social media team so thank you follow follow yeah yeah follow have a look at
Our website have a look at what what we’re doing um to see how essentially you can work with us but I mean there is one way actually and it’s not the most obvious way but it’s potentially a way that that is probably overlooked so a lot of times when we’re working on
Things like if we’re like for instance if we’ve got an Ask of government or if there’s like the budget coming up or if there’s a spending review coming up we might as an as a combined Authority kind of partnership which includes local Enterprise Partnerships um local authorities we might publish
The asks that we have of government on our website or make it public so for instance in July after the coronavirus you know when coronavirus kind of I’m really really hit home we kind of did a package the government an investment case the government to say you know we
We ideally need 3.2 billion pounds over a certain amount of years to kind of deal with the challenges that we’re facing within our region and then again after that there was a spending review we then submitted um again an investment case of a number of programs which said we could do this
Amount of investment to kind of help us overcome these challenges now the reason why I raise that is one of the the kind of submissions that we made in our spending review submission was around business support and how we support um so like ethnic minority owned businesses and female owned businesses
Now if that submission is successful to government and we get that money then as a as a kind of Partnership if we get that money that then links into smaller organized Community organizations because we’re getting that money to kind of support smaller Community organizations if that makes sense yeah
So I suppose if it’s kind of keeping abreast of what we’re doing and then seeing how you know your organization might might be linked into the programs that we’re trying to developing okay so there’s probably two or three things there one is interesting is that sometimes you guys have to fish for
Money as well so it’s not just the small guys I have to kind of keep uh yeah keep asking government to say hey look at us look at us look at us and then obviously you’re saying that the illness is relatively on the organizations to kind
Of just you know uh keep a looking so let’s just so right now I’ll just give the twitters um so on Twitter it’s West mids underscore CA and on Facebook it’s West Midlands CA so those are the social media ways and then the emails and then if somebody does tweet or email I’m
Guessing that they probably get a reply about who to contact by email yeah yeah potentially I think in terms of getting a um response back to um a contact you might be better off kind of going through our website for that because I think there’s like there’s like a dedicated team okay yeah
Yeah perfect so and that’s West Midlands kind of combined authority.org oh yeah yeah so wmca.org.uk so that’s useful for anyone to say look if you do want to be plugged in the honest is there now obviously since covert Etc um I know there are people that are kind
Of you know uh basically because of kovid there are Church groups that come together other types of small businesses Etc so those Bridge organizations that do come in do you guys give so if somebody is invited in the room as a bridge organization like and again you
Know there’s there’s it’s just a general kind of um uh thinking that bridge organization is ideally there to kind of pass it on to to the smaller people do they get any kind of guidance in doing um a a good job in that or yes yeah I I
Would say yeah there is guidance but again I would probably appreciate that it’s more kind of collective guidance so if we’re bringing up a bunch of um you know kind of um face organizations together which the mayor is actually doing at the minute he’s got a Steering group of Faith organizations I think
It’s a kind of collective we’re here together in the room let’s develop let’s think about where we’re trying to get to and let’s think of the solution so it’s kind of and then we you know we’ll collectively kind of suggest some things to to kind of do
Um going forward so in short yes but I would like to think it’s a more kind of joint or process of we’re in the room together we’re coming up with Solutions together and yeah you know the ca will kind of provide any help um along the
Way yes yeah and I think and I think this is now just me speaking as an organization I think this is also where we as as communities um also need to probably Step Up in terms of who we allow to represent us I think that there’s a responsibility even
With us to be saying and asking a little bit more to say well if someone’s got it on their LinkedIn but they’re the uh I don’t know assembly member of this or the other or they’re part of this forum I think it’s also on us to be saying
Okay well when are you gonna come on a Facebook live mate or an Instagram live mate to to tell us what you’ve just learned or what’s been discussed Etc um and and and aspects of that is also the fact that you know uh when we are looking at that you know yeah just
Communication so yeah does the social media do that Etc um and then when we’re now looking at post covert and in terms of policy what do you think people should be aware of that you know any policy changes that we started that are being rethink um though we thought out that the um
That Community should know about so I I think posts kind of covert I think there are a number of things are going to be common for organizations so whether you’re a lab um whether you’re an organization like yourself Community interest group uh company like yourself I think kind of
Jobs and kind of economic recovery is going to be a big thing so obviously like a lot of people have lost and especially with young people actually because it’s estimated that up to a million young people might become unemployed so I think there’ll be a real focus on get like upskinned young people
To get them into work also getting young people back into work who have lost their jobs and also kind of preparing young people for future jobs in you know kind of the green the green economy as it kind of grows and emerges but I think that’s going to be a big thing and
There’s also a link to that there’s about kind of supporting businesses to make sure they’re able to kind of recover and you’ll see a lot of that from this region where kind of Civic leaders kind of lobbying government and trying to work together to kind of support our business base to to
Basically stay afloat so I think I think that will will continue from my perspective actually one thing I would like to see is how we can utilize the energy and kind of willingness of organizations like yourself and other organization who can organize organizations um to kind of deliver
Things and how we can utilize Community groups more in a space of like delivery so for instance can Community organizations take over service some services that local authorities used to provide just to provide some some assistance so that kind of Community Asset transfer um type of stuff so I think that will be
Um that is one thing I would like to to kind of see um another big thing in terms of policy and you know you’ve probably seen it yourself the government is kind of pushing this 20 this 2050 I think it is um zero carbon um aspiration now the ca
Also has its own 2041 aspiration and that is to kind of basically decarbonize the region you know to make us carbon neutral by um 24 41 so I think so if we if we go back to how we were working backwards if we think about for
Us 2041 as the outcome of you know being carbon neutral I think everything we do then do up until then we’ll work towards that so our I think all of our programs that we’re developing will have some kind of sustainability kind of angle to it as well so that’s that’s another big
Thing I think to be aware of and then another um thing that I’ve kind of put together in a group um is to say to address inequity and the kind of inequalities that we’ve seen kind of played out so I think covid-19 is kind of you know
Highlighted some of the the kind of long-standed issues that we we know that some communities face um in terms of you know just inequity inequality um and I’ve you know I think that really needs to be addressed so for instance thinking about young people for instance um who are doing homeschooling um during
Covert but they can’t really do it properly because they haven’t got the the digital equipment that they need to do it so that’s both the kind of infrastructure the actual you know techno um device that they need and maybe the the infrastructure assets beneath that maybe their Broadband isn’t
The best so I think it’s thinking about ways of how we address those kind of challenges because ultimately it will play out in society going forward it’s going to cost us in the long term if we don’t address these issues because those young people potentially could fall
Behind and it you know can as you know probably it could lead to a lot of things that you know then having lower skills and not having access to employment more marginalization more marginalization exactly it’s just a cycle isn’t it so I think we that’s what that’s the you know the main
Thing I would like to see is kind of address is those kind of iniquities that that exists yes so so that’s really useful so like I say you know in the in that kind of context or the vein of starting people or helping people to start caring keep carry care more if you
Start to unpick some of what you were talking about we’re now in the midst of saying wait guys when it comes to jobs we really need to care more it’s not like we need to start caring we already know there’s a job jobs issue um and you
Know we’ve we’ve always had people that have had campaigns around employment but this is now where oh wait a minute this is cataclysmic potentially so that whole idea of care more if there are social Enterprises there that are really like into the entrenchment of employment really entrenched in the world of
Getting people into employment whether it’s nuanced ways whether it’s discrete ways Etc this is their time to step up is that fair to say okay so that’s the whole if you so you that’s a care more starter campaign then we’ve got to understand that businesses are part of communities
So for businesses obviously it’s cyclical because you know businesses employ people um um so for businesses this is also a oh we actually need to kind of care more um because right now it’s not good enough to say oh because the Corona’s business done has gone badly the community needs businesses to innovate
Yeah so absolutely if you can’t step up the consequence of you not stepping up is not actually just about you as an employer or a business there’s a wider ramification um the supply chain also matters because when I don’t know I won’t even say Bakery because food businesses have gone
Quite well but I think events has been a really interesting one so as an events uh venue your security guards your cleaners all of those people can’t do much however if an event venue turns itself into some kind of socially distanced Crest temporarily yeah security guard still
Now has a game is still in play and the cleaners are still in play yes your Venue is no longer you know producing Abba and and and the greatest hits comeback scores but you’re still in that business of helping the community because your asset is space so I think
That that’s a really good point and then when we’re talking about sort of the green world and the green deal from your perspective where are we in that are we going to get people to start caring world or is there a care more or sorry is it a keep caring or care more
Um I think it’s it’s potentially uh maybe do more I would say yeah I think I think people do do care and people like myself you know I do care and funny enough I was talking to my my wife about this this morning I think there’s maybe it’s maybe do more I
Would say and practically do it more really um just knowing the ways that we can kind of play our part in doing things and like it’s yeah it’s funny you raise it actually because me and my wife were kind of talking about that this morning but definitely do more and knowing
Knowing how to do more I would say as well yeah okay yeah so I do think I do think for the most part people do care about it but it’s then taking that practical action isn’t it the next step yeah this is it right yeah yeah
Um and then from your uh sort of perspective um the Journey of you with the organization was like you know 15 years ago 20 20 years ago what were your Ambitions and how did you get to this position of really helping to make a change for for people
I mean so 15 20 years ago so mid-teens um I I don’t know I think you know and I’ll give a lot of it to my my parents really I’ve always kind of been motivated by fairness and you know things being fair and not not just equal but being fair for everyone
Um and I think that’s that was kind of driven by also lived experiences and stuff like so I think I you know I always look at it like I was always okay like my parents you know always provided for me and stuff and you know always did
Okay in school and all that type of stuff but some of my friends who I sort of as having like the same potential as me or even more potential for some reasons they you know they just kind of went different routes and I think you
Know the older I got in my teens that kind of motivated me a lot because I then I would see younger kids who I could see that they were going down the same route as some of my friends and I was you know I was motivated by you know
Not wanting to see that happen and in my teens actually that led to me doing some some kind of mentoring for for water Council where in Warsaw where I grew up to try and wait where did you go to school I went to Alan well comprehens of
School in Warsaw which I think now is called the West Warsaw Academy Academy okay um and is that secondary yeah secondary yeah yes and then for a level for a level same school stay Stayed in the same okay okay yeah and so we’ve stayed in the same school for a levels
Um studied re did English economics and yeah yeah that was it I think um so yeah all kind of motivated by by wanting to kind of learn more about society and I don’t know I don’t know do more at that point I didn’t know what job I wanted to do or anything to
Be honest um again um so did Maya levels Went to went to University again still didn’t quite know what I wanted to do but I don’t know which uni I went to University of Birmingham nice okay yeah so stayed local I went to the University of Birmingham
Yeah to be fair um I probably shouldn’t say it as well Manchester was my first choice but I didn’t get in um so yeah but um my second choice um yes I did yeah went there did a degree in public policy government management because I wanted to see
Practically how kind of politics had an impact on the lives of people is the way I see public policy it’s you know everyone has you know I’m sure people have their political you know interests and Views and stuff but I was more interested in the practical application
Of politics so that’s why I kind of did uh public policy so from there ended up uh working for solihull Council for a while in a research role in the economic development part um Department then moved on from there to the black country Consortium you know the black country
Local Enterprise partnership in a research role again kind of looking at um the region and seeing seeing what the trends were and then kind of making recommendations around how we you know how we could improve the lives of people but I won’t go through all my my roles
But basically I mean like obviously share as much as you wish because what’s really interesting is there’s some amazing parallels between even my experiences and yours but also so I think you’re for me you’re charting what careers potentially look like so I think there’ll be some people that need to see
And hear some of this so share as much as you you’re willing to yeah so kind of did did those kind of research um roles from our kind of first first two two jobs and actually in a step before that actually when I finished University I actually worked for a
Charity for a while um in in again in Warsaw a Community Development charity that was kind of seeking to to engage with young people and improve the lives of young people that were kind of big lottery are they still around no they’re not actually and
They they didn’t last long um when I I kind of came at the end of the project unfortunately and by then it it would it probably it wasn’t the project wasn’t salvageable given some of the stuff that had happened before in terms of us not actually collecting the metrics that we
Needed to improve Yeah well yeah so I was I was there and I was trying to basically back date and do research to kind of prove to the big lottery fund that project was worth carrying on with and then and and part of that actually was probably my experience I mean I was
21 probably didn’t have all the tools I needed to kind of approach to approach it and do it in a better way all the ambition but not enough of the not enough tools yeah so so unfortunately and to this day I do I do regret and I
Wish that project could have kind of kept on because it’s in an area of water that needs that development so yeah so it worked for that charity worked in those kind of researching roles but I’ve always kind of been you know more interested in the policy side of things
I think I you know research is good as well and research informs policy if I wanted to have a more direct impact on policy so I went to the gambling commission actually um which regulates gambling in in the country to get some quality experience work there in their social
Responsibility team which is basically trying to make gambling operators more responsible so I wrote on a number of policy areas there then as we spoke about earlier I went over to the police and crime commissioner’s office in in the West Midlands but my role actually was to work as a regional policy officer
So I worked for four police and crime Commissioners in the West Midlands region and that again was to kind of bring policies together within the region to kind of facilitate and help join joins up working and policing across the region because actually um and a lot of people don’t actually
Know this but police forces within regions have a duty to collaborate so my role essentially was to kind of help the pccs fulfill that function of having their forces collaborate so that that was kind of my role there um and then after that I kind of fancied going back into Economic Development and
Saw the role at The combiner Authority for the the senior policy officer position um applied for that and was lucky enough to kind of get that and that’s that’s kind of where I’m at now and I kind of see myself in in this space for a little while especially
Given where we are with covert and given the um the kind of levers that the combined Authority has I’d like to be in this position to kind of be able to to shape some of the interventions that we we kind of implement going forwards okay and then anything kind of Beyond you any
Kind of international uh thoughts what sorry in terms of what in terms of just like next like you know like uh yeah just uh any other roles or you’re kind of like well let’s all right no I think I think for now I’d see myself
Being being in the UK but I’m I’m more than more than open to kind of yeah like if anyone has got anything going in I don’t know Mauritius okay anyway um yeah I probably need to convince my wife but actually she might need less convincing these days definitely
Definitely up for kind of um experiencing new things and new places excellent well what was really interesting about everything you said is the there’s some incredible parallels between your your your life and my life so interestingly I went to Queen Mary’s grammar school okay just was just for a levels so yeah I’m
Part of my kind of story and backstory was uh went to Camp bunnyland I came here for secondary school and the secondary school that I ended up in um was uh predominantly like white in Sandwell right so okay black males in my year School uh Bristol Hall Bristol no no no
Bristol now yeah this is Sandwell this is so uh two black males um and this is like I said you’ll hear some incredible parallels um uh by year 11 the other blackmail gets kicked out of school the other one he that so me and him so he was a promising kickboxer
Promising footballer who arguably I think he would say you know his family were linked with I think probably Burger Bar but I can’t fully remember but his family will link to that but for whatever reason something happened back in like year 10 and Laser got shown in the teachers eye teacher goes blind
There were four boys that were affiliated with it not blinded but teachers got damage in his eye four boys were Affiliated he was definitely expelled and I believe the others were maybe suspended and somehow it was kind of all blamed on and it went back and
Forth and there was a lot of like you know Injustice and all of that however it then hit me I was like but I know him and I know he’s a good guy but all of these Antics or whatever have now screwed him over his reputation preceded
Him the school back then no doubt they couldn’t wait to get rid of like young people I mean even when I became a teacher I’ve seen how schools could literally fabricate anything um so a long story short I could see the same Injustice as yourself and I could
See that you know for me again this is now one person’s opinion one of my biggest Frights and the biggest things that occurred to me is me getting out of Sandwell and maybe even quote unquote Black Country West Midlands I believe there’s a San Juan mentality and I
Believe that we need to work harder to break it the potential in that region is untapped all the young people have asked aspirations but I’ve seen it get chipped away because there’s not enough of an obsession this is one person’s opinion an obsession that local Authority level
With where we can get the iron people I think there’s a lot of people that sit on panels Etc that are well-meaning but the level of innovation like we’ve just said like I was given a story later when people are close to the bottom meaning like Santa was one of the most deprived
Regions in lots of Statistics the the entropy the level of energy that you need to recover is disproportionate you cannot have average will to get people out of the of a gutter so this is like I say this is my opinion nobody else’s and this is my lived experience so I don’t
See enough of that Obsession uh at that local Authority and until I left to go uni I did not see oh my God this is how other people yeah put their lives together this is how other people use structure to get there um and Etc but anyway like I’ll quickly
Um stick to our kind of the the parallel so I’ll go to grammar school in Warsaw um and the boys were talking on a different level so I’m sitting around with loads of boys obviously just the pure boys school I’ve come from a comprehensive School mixed where the
Girls are trying to like get with me is like the head boy and trying to like even like you know I can’t thank you very much so you’re in grammar school and everyone’s like Gathering and everyone’s like oh like so this has been graduate school there’s something called CTF
Combined Cadets Force so they all you know little soldiers and everyone’s like ah guys you know what one day we should Rob the IMF international monetary fund that’s not let’s go and Rob the corner shop like that’s like in in in in comp school it’s like oh yeah he’s going to
Go and get a twitch yeah Skittles and a child MP champ or a 5p jump people are trying to like you know it’s like I’ve never shopped before the God God is my weakness right but you go grammar school and no one’s even thinking small it’s
Like how do we go and do the biggest rubber in Ultima as like 17 and 18 year olds right yeah and then I go to UNI so interestingly I went to Leeds and obviously in fact um and this is just again I’m I’m a uni connoisseur I’ve been to four
Um I didn’t repeat first year but I have actually been to four payments okay four different times um so I always found that leads for me was a perfect university and I always give this guidance to people like for me I’m not Super Geek but neither am I just
Like a duster so I’ve always needed an experience where I can be with the intellectuals that have lived experience yeah leads was perfect needs was all the kids that couldn’t get into Queen Mary’s say Andrews Durham but they could get into leaves they knew how to party a bit
Yeah and they also knew kind of how to study and they were incredibly ambitious if I told you at least four of my friends worked for Adobe like high up in Adobe like early 2008-9s yeah Facebook um who else um one of my best friends is
A yacht salesman in Monaco so we were like study and party kindness yeah and I think Manchester was very similar like I feel like Manchester is where you went when all the other certain ones well thank you right I feel like you will be that’s a Geeks Universe
I know you know you say that if people that know me will tell you I’ve no I’m not academic I’m no I’m no geek there were times there were times where I need to I needed to to kind of get one to make it through yeah yeah yeah yeah
Yeah yeah well you know what luckily actually I had um a really really good lecturer uh Pauline the Napoleon jazz on my course I remember actually she got me and one of my close friends um and I think it was at the beginning of our second year and she said listen
Boys really like you as people but you know things things need to um buckle up bear with these grades so yeah yeah definitely I think I can kind of relate to um to where you are actually yeah and and then kind of talking to the industry
That really motivated me so at Uni I started being a mentor and I got lucky enough to be a mentor of the year but me and some friends also used to kind of dabble in events and event management so definitely good three or four boys would
Kind of run a night and then they’d bring me as the marketing guy or at least just even advice like I’m a young age I was blessed with thinking just thinking Clarity of thought so people would come to me with complexities and I’d break them down simplifies that I
Don’t know what but like I think I think again for me I was taught to speak more sorry listen more than you speak yeah so that made me very awake where I’m in a situation but I don’t get absorbed by the situation I can actually reflect and
See my surroundings so very often I was then almost like a very early consultant but I used to be so from doing events we ended up doing what we what’s known as uh what you call experiential marketing so we I started to do stuff with Vodafone Xbox Connect all of that but
From becoming mentor of the year at the same time I also went down a teaching route and like you said about Injustice I then start to apply my Injustice to say when I was a mentor I was talking to young people to say hey by the way yes
I’m at Uni but I’m also a dormant and I also kind of run um events with with friends and we do all this other thing in the real world this is what happens you know what I mean so you think it’s about your teacher right now that’s your
Teacher’s gonna get paid are going to move on with their life yep when I go when I go back to UNI all my friends literally say stuff like this so not even my friends but even like I’d be a uni student and a doorman so when I’m a
Dormant people will literally go to your uh I’m I’m studying medicine and I’m going to be a doctor and I’m going to be a solicitor and where are you going to be in 15 years time I don’t think you’re going to be anywhere mate but they don’t
Know I’m also at Uni you know what I mean I’ve been in a queue with some of those people like right yeah yeah so I’m telling the young people by the way like there are people around us that can’t wait to defecate on you more yeah like
They’re not like trying so if you think it teaches the problem like you’ve got it twisted you’ve got to develop whatever your Solutions are to go move forward but don’t try and uh don’t try and make the system exclude you even more so those types of kids is what I
Was having with young people but also I’m like if you want to make money here’s how you’re going to make money yeah people actually pay for here’s how your community could do because I’ve always been entrepreneurial so in that Injustice I wanted to teach in wanted to look into behavioral units and worked
With autism schools worked with their prison schools and that Injustice was always with me and that’s where I then figured out oh no one teaches humans how the brain works so we all expect someone to get an A but we don’t know why they got an A star or a c we don’t
Truly know we don’t know you know what I mean but once they’ve got the grades we make things occur and then also how do people fall into why is it cyclical that domestic violence can happen across Generations why is poverty something that can happen across generations and
Again I’m a big believer that the brains really an impactful part of it so very much it’s really interesting that we both saw the injustice and when you know particularly different ways about solving it but yeah I definitely kind of Concur and I and that’s why for me my thing today is
Let’s help people understand what this machine does because this unit runs everything everything you know and I mean from from what I lived experience what I would say to young people I I mean like I give my parents a lot of credit like I’ll give you know my both
My parents have kind of drive my dad has you know a lot of driving works hard and my mom she’s just really she’s robust like anything could be happening around her it will happen she might look down for a second it’s okay it’s back up how
Are we gonna solve this how are we going to solve this problem so I give them credit so I had that base which was good also had four you know four sisters so having Four Sisters I always tell people is like having five moms because yeah there’s four older sisters
Baby boy but I had a kind of good really really good support system but also I think um like yourself really I was really kind of good at listening and translating kind of actions and behaviors and the older I’ve got I kind of recognize how to kind of maneuven and
Kind of go go to go through places and make it make it through life and I think even even with teachers actually at school I think you know I wasn’t like a naughty or a bad kid at school but you know I kind of messed about a lot um you
Know like 13 14 15 but by the time I got to 16 you know and and I was doing a levels and stuff I kind of realized that there’s a certain maturity that you needed to approach teachers with once I once I kind of recognized that and did
That some of the teachers who I thought didn’t like me actually I became my favorite student and I was like stay behind after class and having conversations and that kind of helped develop my my thinking and the way I maneuvered through life I mean at that
Time of life as well 16 17 18 my I had came Rose in my hair I don’t know if you remember I was wearing do you remember Phoebe oh yeah it’s always I was I was figured out I was like we’re in a lot of Phoebe and like maybe
Um and given you know the neighborhoods and friends that I had at the time that might have contributed to me being stopped by the police like kind of times but again like given given the advice and stuff I got from my family and my
Mom and my my dad and all that like I was able to know how to kind of speak to police officers how to kind of maneuver those conversations and you know not you know and potentially de-escalate situations to the point where I was having you know reasonable conversations
With police officers at like 16 17 like you know article asking them why why I’m being started and kind of explaining to them why it might be between us profiling and all that type of stuff you know I at that time I didn’t know that
That’s what I was doing but it’s I think the the experiences and the support I had from my family kind of helped me to maneuver through life because like I said you know a lot I’ve had a lot of friends that I grew up with that could
Be sitting in this this position as well that not and you know maybe and you know there’s various reasons for it but yeah you know well very quickly and I know because like obviously we would probably come into the end so I’m really interested in this bit this is now just
Pure lived experience experience right so um you’ve really really articulated about three or four things which is our makers yeah our parents have a massive role in modeling and role modeling and the conversations that I had with us when no one is looking you’re making a
Difference yeah yeah now I like I’m just brought up by my mom alone right but but the level to which my mum was paranoid about my conduct was probably one of the saving Graces because we’ve got the same one right so my mum was always like as
Soon as you leave this store remember your surname and remember that wherever your surname goes your brand goes wherever your behavior goes right so you got this constant paranoia it was like I can’t let the family down like you know what I mean but then you then like
You’ve you’ve kind of also then alluded to is that when you’ve then got that power of your mouth to be able to speak explain articulate that underrated and weirdly you don’t need to be an amazing Lyricist but just your parents helping you to practice standing up for yourself
In a non-reude way in an unconfrontational way in in the ability to manage Injustice yeah and and understand that maybe you don’t have to have that Justice right now that sometimes some people are going to get a few wins over you yeah but as long as
You don’t die you can recorrect like so all of those inner talks I think is some of the things where there’s got to be a smarter way to harness it yeah and and especially for maybe people of like of minorities that maybe don’t fit in but I
Think this applies to anyone that how your parents guide you talk to you reflect with you matters it just really matters like a lack of conversation is is not um a lack of conversation is not a good uh it’s not a good practice really like even if you think your kids have heard
It all before tell them again tell them again yeah because your TV channel is giving them like I I one summer I remember one of these Summers because you know um one of my first jobs was um uh kind of working for a uh cufflink manufacturer a Sophos Lamborn and they
Used to support um a brand and and I’m just a weirdo I like to just count and measure one day a when Nelly Nelly and Kelly dilemma was number one yeah okay excellent that summer I was working in a factory and I just decided to count how many times that song comes
On in a day right across all the channels that we changed to so I think back then I had my own Walkman and I could hear the the factory floor um radio as it were and I heard that song uh 18 times that day wow and
Occurred to me that if somebody else is pushing their propaganda their work their music their advert whatever at me 18 times a day yeah a parent needs to be doing 67 times yeah yeah yeah because someone’s gonna get into my head whether I like it or not yeah why isn’t it my
Own family’s voice right so that’s where I kind of think it’s underrated the the power of of families having consistent conversations to the point where it becomes culture and then it’s like nagging it’s nagging when you’ve never said anything sin and then you start saying something and then the kid’s like
Wait a minute you’re inconsistent right yeah um and then like and then um kind of um to the tail end of um some of that because that’s just my kind of thoughts but you never said that you’re very good at articulating you said that you now understand that power
Of when you’re around people of power or police and influence that you can reason with yeah where do you think our role and responsibility lies as other black males that have also lived there and know things and like you mentioned FUBU FUBU is for us by us and it’s a black
Owned brand by a guy called Damon John he’s now a millionaire he wrote a book called The Power of broke what I’ve never read it but the logic when he describes it I always say to people when you’ve got nothing enjoy it it feels like everything’s against you but we’re
I’ve been in positions where I’ve got nothing until and my braveness yeah sometimes I wanna I can’t wait to go back to nothing again I’m not gonna lie because the the lack of all that the audacity in the the lack of Shame and and the lack of overthinking that I have
Allows me to actually move forward I perform better when I’ve got nothing to lose yeah it’s a very hard psychology that he’s trying to get across to say that when you are broke you are more likely to be resourceful when you are broke you’re more likely to overthink
And care less about what people think caring about what people think holds a lot of people back overthink it holds a lot of people so there is a power in being broke yes you don’t want to stay broke but for the 5-10 minutes or five years that you’re down do the right
Things in the right order to recover anyway so that’s just about Phoebe yeah back to what you’re saying what do you think our role in position is in um potentially helping to I wouldn’t say maybe even Rectify but how do we pull others up and what ages do you think we
Should be looking at should we be looking at those that are 30 something our age that can actually because we’ve got a like for like race haven’t we if someone’s getting something now we know exactly what happened every year up until now so should we be trying to pull
Them up or should we be focusing on the 13 40 15 16 year olds or the 18 year olds yeah you know and at some point it’s probably everyone but I think if you mentioned Bridge organizations earlier you know you talk about treasures and stuff I would almost see
People like me and you guys kind of bridges between probably younger people and bridges between the organizations that have an impact on those young people’s lives so it’s just that have we’ve had those kind of lived experiences you know like I worked in policing you know I should be able to
Speak on behalf of you know not as a kind of community leader or anything but just using my own lived experiences to human to kind of communicate to the kind of Criminal Justice System but also looking back at youngsters to maybe be able to kind of explain what the journey
That might be going on that they don’t know that they’re at start off as well so there is that um and not not saying that I’m an old man now but I don’t know how uh 12 13 year old might react to me so maybe our
Role as 30 something is kind of some things it’s kind of motivating those younger ones that are 20 somethings the kind of Mentor the younger ones it starts from an early age I think it’s starting earlier with kids now where they know the world and they’ve got
Access to to technology and the internet so you’re looking at kids 9 10 11 now is kind of like a 15 year old from maybe our generation in terms of the knowledge and stuff that they have so I think the younger you can get kids and get into
Their brains is the better I would say yeah a quadrillion percent getting into someone’s mind I mean I always feel a bit weird kind of saying it but literally humans are susceptible to mind control I think there’s an element of us owning it and appreciating it and and
Just wrapping it with ethics but the whole point of the human brain is it’s meant to be written over it’s a hard drive so if I grew up in Greece I’d have a hard drive written into me that allows me to assimilate into a Greek culture
There’s only so much that we can say we need to leave people to be who they want to be I actually think you have to do a little bit of Hardware writing into them in order for them to also go and live their best life like and things like that
Um yeah but one thing that you’re saying um when it comes to that kind of guidance or let up the 20-somethings in order for them to help the teams and we can help teams as well but I’m just you know they may not respond right they
Might or might not um like you know like I’m not saying we’re old but people might look good yeah we’re old man we’re ancient you imagine you’re trying to you from your bouncer days imagine you’re trying to explain to a 12 year old what garage music is you know what I mean
I was like guys man like and it was like yeah when this dynamite was running things right but so but very kind of like quickly with that I think in that pulling them up pulling people up this is now just me I I see a weird frustration though for those of our age
That maybe they have been pen and they’ve been through things when I try and give guidance I feel that there are still some males with lived experience that still want to do it their way even though I can sit before them and so one of the things I say to young people
Is I was like especially young people that are thinking about going down that that the road lifestyle and all that I’m like boys I can sit down for two hours and write a bid and bring in 10 grand you you show me your road man and you show
Me the man that’s shot in and all of that that can do the same in two hours and sleep at night so I’m like bro he’s like if you don’t even want to like you know like I don’t if you don’t want to follow me I hear you but who do you know
That can bring in big figures six figures I told you I raised a hundred like and I’m saying this I’d have knocked out to brag but just as a lived experience mixed with like what more do I have to do to tell you that there is a
Route here where I’m saying I bought in 150 000 pounds to help 100 people get therapy like that is one person that’s doing stuff I’m more than willing to teach you just come and sit in my office I’ll order you all the food that you you
Need let’s chat let me show you this system and let you bring you in right young people they’re cool with that some of the grown-ups seem to get either intimidated by that or they’ve got their own story and their own narrative and then I look you know a year on and I
Always say to people my best measure is watch me every year and if I’m in the same place I’ve screwed up and I don’t even always mean growth or you know size it could be depth of understanding new knowledge all of that but there is no two years
That any human has ever met me where you can say kit is still there you might not know the full story or you know I’ve not told you what you need to know but so but I I I’ve seen people that I’ve met in 04 let’s just stay in this social
Enterprise world I joined it in 2013 really yeah and then I took over Us by a few 27 2016 is when the paperwork was signed but 2017 is when I got to work so we went from -10k like literally with the accountant and everything was like here’s all the like you know hidden
Debts that you didn’t know about here’s all the there’s obviously no contracts or whatever and now we’re going to be Crossing you know a few hundred thousand yeah right so that’s pure lived experience that’s and you know no one knows me I know you don’t know me nope
Like I’m not in anyone’s Chamber of Commerce right I’m not in anyone’s Church Association I’m not in any Institute of this or that I get invited to small small stuff but literally up until this year is when more people have started to be like oh who is this weird
Guy like that that’s doing stuff without permission right yeah like no no permission in the room getting around and owning minds and basically say look like here’s another alternative but also look what I’ve built I didn’t wait to be told what to do I went and built it and
I’m showing you my homework so I’m trying to say when it comes to appears that won’t listen or that still feel or they’re not truly let go of the road what can we do oh you’re in the room with government I’m in the room where the money’s at and I’m
Saying hey guys humble ourselves chill out a little bit you know take a step back in like I always say in order to jump you have to crouch no humans ever been able to jump without having to correct yeah and this this motion seems to stop people moving forward they just
Feel like they can’t go like this they can’t go backwards you’re not really going backwards you’re positioning anyway I’ll be quiet over to you no I mean it’s a tough one not saying I’ve got the solution but I mean part of it might be in in kind of getting those
People to to kind of see themselves as shaping the path because maybe and I’m not saying you do this while I do this but given the way we speak about things and the advice that we might be giving to people they might see it as you know this guy’s kind of preaching or
Preaching to me I mean you’re telling me what the solution is rather than like asking me for my opinion or like oh yeah true I’ve kind of like developing a solution together so I think that could be one one um one one kind of issue sometimes it’s just um like not an ego
Thing maybe the the fear of like failing you know people have they’ve lived their lives a certain way for a certain period of time it’s kind of like go another route might be you know be seen as I you know he used to do that easy appreciative my younger brother or
Whatever it might be so there’s that kind of fear of like being seen as a failure in in your world or that’s potentially um an issue and part of it is probably just down to Ego you know like and probably linked to the last point I just made really it’s kind of hard
You know to once you get to a certain period in life that’s why I think the younger you can get people the easier it becomes because you know people might think that their way is going to work until it doesn’t so until you’re like locked away in prison for for for life
Or or even if you you know until you die or something like people might think like still got a chance so let’s go to chats yeah I’ve still got a chance I’ve been doing this for 20 years in the same yeah yeah it’s like this is my year
This is the year so yeah I think a bunch of those things really but in terms of how we go about doing it I think having those conversations is definitely a starting point but kind of making people feel like they’re part of the solution and part of developing the solutions yeah and what
What role do you think females have in this because obviously a lot of what I’m saying is probably directed it like you know probably black and Asian males mostly because that’s just who tends to kind of come around me Etc but one thing I’ve definitely I mean my all my organizations are all
Literally about 80 female um and that’s just because I’m a big believer I just need a break like I actually don’t care who you are where you come from I just need your brain and I find that for whatever reason like what how I do stuff works better with
Female do you think that there’s a role there where maybe females can coach and teach males better absolutely definitely like I you know I mentioned before you probably see the theme I mentioned my mom I mentioned my four sisters sisters um and I’m the teachers that I was
Referring to about at school like there was a lot of them are female um definitely I think in you know speaking as a black man and as a I was a young black boy definitely females have definitely had more of an impact all my
Life you know I love my dad and all that and you know respect everything he doesn’t says but um I would definitely say females play a really really strong and have a role in our communities because when especially when things go wrong it’s the females a lot of times
That pick up the pieces so definitely they have or should have more of a role in kind of you know helping to shape Our Lives definitely I can you know in thinking about my even in my career today I can the roles I’m thinking back
To I can think of the females that have helped me to get to where I’m at so when I worked at solihull Council I wasn’t a very good research analyst but a woman called Katie judge kind of showed some faith in me and her manager Rachel Westwood showed some faith for me
Um and they kind of helped me to progress to my next role at the black magic Authority and why again where I was managed by another female delman Dwight who again kind of you know helped shape me to become who I am went to the police and crime commissioner’s office
That I mentioned earlier and you know at least you’re following again trying to saw some things that needed I needed to address and that led to me actually getting a mentor she was the one that recommended getting a mentor to kind of unlock certain things within me and
Again that kind of propelled me more and you know and today even in my organization now I can think of um you know the chief executive um I’ll give her a shout Deborah Cadman again like I have conversations with her and those you know I don’t know if she knows it
But those little nuggets that I get from her kind of helped to propel me so definitely like you for some reason definitely females have a big impact on my on my life so yeah yeah so yeah we need more women at the round table than all women in the guidance and
Instructing roles even if it’s to diffuse maybe the male energy or maybe the misinterpretation of whatever male energy brings but this has got to be a everyone yeah I mean it’s like it’s like my son I’ve got I told you earlier I’ve got a 16 year old a 16 month old son and
You know he loves both of us but if you give him a choice he’s going to run to his mom like it’s just that kind of internal extent that you know moms have for the for their young young boys I don’t know why but yeah he will always
Go to his mom if he kind of give him a choice really so yeah it’s really interesting yeah cool all right so yeah I’d want to say a huge thank you for your points your Reflections you’ve really made us think and I think in in
Summary there’s a lot to be said for if we’re thinking about this new world uh organizations need to do their best to kind of tap into what things the what combined authorities offer organizations are also to look into measuring whatever their impacts that they’re trying to do
Um includes and we gave some tips on how to measure like do things like thematic analysis look at waiting look at time and resource allocation against any missions that organizations have um and then we obviously then explored you know the journey like the career journey and the impact and of just small
Steps you know what I mean you know follow the right stages ideally access the right mentorship in a role and then ideally or hopefully you know people move on to to to develop things that they need to develop and in all of that we can’t forget each other like any
People left behind we need to have men and women in roles probably more women in roles to to diffuse you know maybe arguably toxic masculinity Etc um but yeah I’ll let you say it so yeah perfect thank you very very much for for joining us um anybody wants to know more um about
Westminton’s combined Authority uh I think we said it on Twitter West mids underscore CA and that’s Charlie Alpha and on Facebook it’s West Midlands come by I’m sorry West Midlands CA Charlie Aqua um um all on on Facebook um for yourself if anyone wants to find you to LinkedIn it’s LinkedIn yeah I’m
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