The Inclusive Networker
The Inclusive Networker is a podcast dedicated to helping small business owners, solopreneurs, and network marketers develop inclusive marketing and sales processes that help them authentically reach diverse audiences and subsequently grow large, diverse networks of customers, business partners, or team members.
The Inclusive Networker
Disability Inclusion in Online Business with Toby Mildon
Are you ready for an empowering conversation that will challenge your perception concerning disability inclusion within network marketing? Our guest today is Toby Milden, a seasoned diversity and inclusion architect, who will guide us through this journey. We’ll unravel practical steps that can transform your business outlook, making your systems more accessible and fostering a team culture that celebrates diversity.
In this episode, Toby shares his insights on disability inclusion and recruitment. He offers powerful techniques to generate meaningful interactions with individuals with disabilities and discusses how these learnings can be effectively put into action. Toby also emphasizes the necessity of disability inclusion in recruitment and retention and the importance of reevaluating our assumptions to create an accessible and inclusive environment.
In this episode, you'll learn the following...
1. The importance of recognizing the diversity within the realm of disabilities.
2. How to start implementing inclusive recruitment practices.
3. Understanding and addressing specific barriers individuals with disabilities may face.
Toby's book: Inclusive Growth https://www.amazon.com/Inclusive-Growth-Future-proof-business-workplace/dp/178133448X
You can find Toby on…
Website https://www.mildon.co.uk/
LinkedIn https://uk.linkedin.com/in/tobymildon
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Thank you for listening!
~Dr. Raymona
Hey, hey, hey, welcome, welcome.
Speaker 1:Welcome to this week's episode of the Inclusive Networker podcast, where we help network marketers, small business owners and solopreneurs become aware of gaps in knowledge or awareness that could be keeping their networks and businesses small. Tune in as we give tips and simple practical tools to make your business more inclusive and we teach you how to build inclusive communities that support diverse customers, team members and business partners. So if you want to authentically build relationships with diverse communities of customers or business partners, you are in the right place. But be warned you will be challenged. But here's the thing you won't be judged. I'm your host, dr Ramona. I'm a speaker, coach, consultant, public health professor, wife, mom and a fierce challenger of broken systems that keep people from reaching their highest potential. I'm so excited to be with you on your journey to becoming an inclusive networker, so let's jump right in. Hey, hey, hey, welcome, welcome.
Speaker 1:Welcome to this week's episode of the Inclusive Networker podcast. This is your host, dr Ramona, and who am I calling into conversation today? Well, it is Toby Milden. I am so excited to have him as part of the podcast and let me tell you a little bit about him. Toby Milden is a diversity and inclusion architect and founder of Milden, a consultancy and advisory business. Toby works with businesses to re-engineer processes and systems to minimize the impact of bias and build a culture of inclusion. Prior to setting up his business, toby worked as an in-house diversity and inclusion manager at the BBC in Deloitte. So Toby, welcome, welcome, welcome to the Inclusive Networker.
Speaker 2:Thanks for my notes. Lovely to be here. Thank you.
Speaker 1:Yes, and so I'll open it up, like I open up with everybody, and just tell me about your lens. What is your lens? How did you get to where you are today?
Speaker 2:Well, you might tell from my accent that I'm British, I'm a white man, I have a physical disability that I was born with and I'm also a gay man. And one of the things I quite like to talk about with people is the intersectionality of our different identities and characteristics and how they give us a unique lens on the world through that lived experience.
Speaker 1:Awesome. So you know, I think that this is so important and it's such a great conversation for network marketers, specifically, particularly with the disability piece, because we don't get a lot of training with that. We're not told, you know. We think, oh, this business is online, there's nothing that I have to think about, we're going to be inclusive of people that have disabilities and really we're not. There's so many different things that we need to think about, and so I'd love to just open up the conversation there and really start to think about what are the things, when we're talking about online business specifically, that we need to start to think about when we're trying to be inclusive of people with disability.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the first thing that lots of people do is they fall into the trap of thinking that disability is really limited to people like me, as in people in wheelchairs. But the world of disability is so diverse, there are so many disabilities and impairments out there. So I think, first of all, marketers need to think broadly. One of the first things I think they really need to think about is how disability is defined, and there's kind of two lenses really. There's the medical model of the disability, which basically says that there's something wrong with you, you need fixing. Somehow there's some underlying condition that needs addressing, whereas the social model of disability, which is what we prefer to talk about, really says that people are disabled by barriers that are created in society, and these can be physical barriers, they could be procedural barriers or they can be attitude barriers, and if we want to be inclusive, then we need to identify and dismantle these barriers.
Speaker 1:Okay, so that is an amazing point to start with is how do we even define disability? And so give us some examples of? I think people more so think about the medical disability right, and so give us some examples of medical disability, but also the social disability that you're talking about.
Speaker 2:Yes. So if we take me, for example, I was born with a rare genetic neuromuscular disability which is called spinal muscular atrophy, and the medical model of looking at it would be to say that, you know, I have this underlying genetic disability, I'm a wheelchair user and I need medical interventions to cure me somehow. And whilst there's an element of truth to that, whilst I have benefited from healthcare and there is a healthcare need if I want to go out to the restaurant with my partner, for example, and I can't get into the restaurant because there's steps and there's no ramp or elevator it's not the fact that I've got this underlying disability, it's the fact that there's no ramp or elevator provided in order to get into the restaurant that's actually disabling me.
Speaker 2:That's creating that barrier. So if we think about it in terms of like the world of marketing an e-commerce company, for example, they might be creating barriers by making by their checkout process not being accessible, okay For somebody who say can't see or they're blind, because maybe their website doesn't work with assistive technology. So that means that somebody who's blind or can't see is not able to complete the checkout process and buy a product online. So that's an example of how a digital barrier could be created.
Speaker 1:Okay, and so when we're thinking about building our teams and we're building the systems, specifically in network marketing, we have companies that we work with, we have online sales and what you just gave us an example of is the checkout process is something that the overall company can be aware of, but how do we then move into the team culture to make because we, you know kind of yield to the company with the checkout process and those types of things? But when we're thinking about when we're building the team, when we're doing presentations for people, when we're building the team and building the culture around inclusion within the team, what are some tips and things that we can be thinking about and things that we can address within inclusion or disability?
Speaker 2:Yes, a really good question, because I think the place to start is for the team to probably invest in its own learning and awareness and just become a lot more mindful about how difference and diversity and some of the challenges that people might have when engaging with your product or service, maybe even some of the stereotypes that we're perpetuating, and really give the team confidence to be able to call out inequity when they spot it. So if you imagine you've got a team, maybe they're brainstorming a new marketing campaign, there might be somebody on the team that goes hang on a minute, you know what? We've got a lack of visual diversity in this campaign. For example, there's nobody who's visibly disabled as part of the campaign. So how do you then equip that person with the confidence to be able to speak up and call that out to their colleagues and really become aware of their blind spots?
Speaker 1:So, when we're investing in that learning, what are some things that you suggest that we do? Are there specific resources Because we think about? There are so many different things to learn about race and ethnicity. There's so many different things to learn about these different diversity categories. But when you think about disability specifically, where are some places that we can go and what do we need to start?
Speaker 2:Yes. So one thing I teach my clients is lean back, lean forwards and jump in mentoring. So lean back mentoring is where you listen or watch something in the comfort of your home. So you could watch a YouTube video, you could listen to a podcast, you could read a blog post or online article or something. It's something very passive that you could do in the comfort of your own home on the sofa. So that's the lean back experience.
Speaker 2:The lean forward experience is where you actively connect with and engage with people that you wouldn't normally connect with. We all have this similarity bias being human beings, we find comfort in just hanging out with people that are like ourselves. But what that ends up leading to is we create in-groups and out-groups. Unintentionally. We over-appreciate the skills and abilities of people in our in-group. Then we might undermine or overlook the skills and abilities of people in our out-group.
Speaker 2:So the lean forwards experience is really about connecting with people that you wouldn't ordinarily connect with and that could be actively seeking out networking opportunities. Or, for example, if your company has an employee resource group, go along to events that they organise that you might not normally attend. Then the jump forward or the jump in experience is where you proactively build a relationship with somebody, mentor them and sponsor them. So it might be that you identify or you work with somebody who has a disability and you act as a mentor or a sponsor or do reverse mentoring. That would be my main recommendation so you can mentor them, they can mentor you about what it's like to live with a disability.
Speaker 1:And then, how do we translate the things that we've learned? Because I think when I talk about diversity, equity and inclusion, I often say you're getting these ideas from people. Now you've done this learning, you've done the interaction with these other people, and then a lot of times it just falls there. And so what is the best thing for us to do to actually put it in action, the things that we've learned, especially that last piece, the jump in when we've talked to somebody and we've done this bi-directional mentoring with a person that has a disability, how do we actually put it in play and make sure that we do something about it?
Speaker 2:This really is about taking personal responsibility and accountability and setting yourself a commitment that you will write down the actions that you want to take and then actually do them. And it's even handy if you can. If you can get yourself an accountability buddy, and if you, if you do go into the jumping the jumping experience and you get yourself a reverse mentor, then you can hold each other accounts both yes, okay, so, as we're, I have this framework that I use.
Speaker 1:It's called war, and when we talk about war, one of the reasons I use it is because I want people to war and speak up for diversity, equity and inclusion, but it also stands for recruitment, on boarding, the activity that you have within your business and retention. I want to talk about some things within that, and so when we're thinking of recruitment and we're thinking about you already said some things about marketing the materials that will we show people with disability, but are there other things that you can think of that would be tips when we're thinking about recruitment specifically for people with disabilities?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, there's so many things that you can do and.
Speaker 2:I'll just give you a flavor of some of the things I mean. One of the things that we, that we do me and my team is that we will go in and we will assess and we will audit how accessible and inclusive a recruitment process is for clients and disabled talent, and the good news is that there are some pretty consistent themes and actions that organizations can take. So if, if the person listening to us right now is UK based, a good place to start is actually the disability confident scheme that was created by the department for work and pensions over here in the UK. It was developed and designed by disabled people and industry as a way of attracting and recruiting, retaining and developing disabled talent. Now, I haven't tested this. I don't know if it's accessible for anybody who's outside of the UK, but I'm sure if somebody Googles it, they could. They can probably download the guidance, which is really handy and it's free, which is a bonus.
Speaker 2:Yes, when it comes to attracting and retaining, I think, first of all, making sure that you you visibly show and talk about disability in your, in your careers, marketing collateral. So if you're using images, show images that have got visibly disabled people in them. As a note of caution. Just avoid that kind of stock photography that you can download from some websites, because it's not completely authentic. So just just be careful with that.
Speaker 2:In the, in the copy that you're creating, talk about disability and inclusion as well. Make it very clear to people that they can talk to you about requesting workplace adjustments and kind of demonstrate to people the art of the possible as well, giving case studies of maybe workplace adjustments that you've made for existing staff, so people feel a bit more confident about asking what they they need and what adjustments they need. And then I think there's almost like doing a bit of a technical audit of your recruitment process as well, just to make sure that your systems work with assistive technology. So I've already mentioned Jaws, for example, which is what people who are blind or visually impaired use online. Now, if your careers website does not work with this kind of assistive technology, then people might have difficulty applying to work for you.
Speaker 1:So it's worth just doing a technical audit of those systems and so with network marketing, people don't normally apply, and so let's think about so. If a person is just usually it's word of mouth or they're seeing someone on social media and they're coming in and there, so we can have the different assistive technologies that are especially we let's talk about onboarding, because that's where people really start to get online and they're having to come into the team, they're having to learn the processes, and so we can add those assistive technologies especially into our onboarding as well yeah, it cuts across any, any system that's being used absolutely so, as we're thinking about onboarding, then because I always use this phrase we recruit for diversity, but we onboard for conformity right
Speaker 1:so we're always thinking about the fact that we onboard for this one type of person that looks like us, that acts like us, and it's very difficult for other people who are not, that don't fit the mold and I'm using quotation marks here to be able to be successful with some of our onboarding processes. So what are one or two tips that you, as we're thinking about on boarding person into an online business that we can think about with disability inclusion?
Speaker 2:yeah, it goes back to this social model and medical model.
Speaker 2:I think first of all you need to understand what barriers somebody might be facing. And a great question that you could ask somebody is what are the speed humps of, what are the roadblocks slowing you down or stopping you performing in this, in this role? And then and then so identify what they are and then and then be proactive about trying to eliminate those, those barriers. So somebody might say to you well, actually, I'm finding it really difficult to use this system or this software, and then you could identify how you could put in some assistive technology or help modify the software to make it more usable okay, and so is that.
Speaker 1:So the same type of thing, I guess, with presentations right, because we will think about network bargaining. We think about when you have to present the products. You have to talk to people about the, the products. It may be just a one-on-one that a person is doing, so how do we help people to really up their game in that activity? Yeah is when we're including doing disability inclusion yes, the same question really, because, if you, think about presentations.
Speaker 2:Somebody might not be able to look at slides in the normal way and so maybe they need to access the slides differently or earlier. So a lot of my clients for example, I've been working with a client they run lots of training and conferences and things like that, and they've created a guide to running accessible and inclusive events and training, and one of the things that they've got their trainers to think about is should presentation materials be provided before the event so that somebody has got time to read them, digest them, look at them using their own assistive technologies before they actually show up to the main event itself?
Speaker 1:so you could think about that providing things in different materials, okay, so yeah, there's those, those kind of adjustments that can be made mm-hmm, and then, as we move into the retention piece, what are some things that we really need to to think about when we want to retain people, especially with disabilities?
Speaker 2:yeah, I think that's a really good question, because I think the first thing to do is is again just keep checking in with people regardless of whether they're disabled or not, actually right.
Speaker 2:What is what is preventing them from progressing mm-hmm? And again, eliminate those, those, those obstacles or those barriers. And there could be a whole number of reasons. Somebody might not have the tools to do their job fully, somebody might be struggling to access the training or the skills development they need to move to the next level. So I think it's really about identifying what those obstacles are and as a manager, doing your best to remove those barriers.
Speaker 1:Awesome. So that's recruitment, onboarding, activity and retention. Now I want to think about just our mindset and the thought process. So what are some things that people need to unlearn? So what do we need to unlearn about people, either people that have disabilities or disability inclusion in general? What are some things that you think that we should unlearn?
Speaker 2:I think one of the things that we really need to challenge ourselves on are what assumptions we're making about somebody. So I've had this in the past with some managers I've worked with, where they see me in a wheelchair and they make assumptions about what I can or can't do, which and some of those assumptions turn out to be false. So I think we need to challenge our assumptions first of all. So be quite introspective and just say to myself what am I assuming about this person? What do I think they? What am I assuming that they can or cannot do because of their disability? And is that actually true? And are my assumptions being shaped by my biases, which are mostly unconscious? And what are some of the stereotypes that I'm falling foul of Because of, maybe how disabled people have been depicted in the media and TV and films in the past?
Speaker 1:So any other things that you think we should unlearn? I think that's probably enough to but that's probably going to keep you occupied for quite some time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right.
Speaker 1:So this has been an absolutely amazing conversation. So much, I mean, if you all have not learned anything, you just didn't want to learn anything today, because this has been so good to me, because I think that this is again something that we are not talking about and we really need to bring this conversation to the forefront. So, toby, thank you so very much for being on the Inclusive Networker podcast today. Tell me about the next big project you have coming up. How do we stay in touch with you? How do we plug in? I know everybody is going to want to make sure that they connect with you after this.
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm about to write my second book.
Speaker 2:So, my first book, which is called Inclusive Growth, basically sets out kind of seven best practices for really embedding diversity and inclusion into your organization in a sustainable way, and the book went down really well and everyone was like, yeah, it's really great that you've got these seven best practices, but how do we actually implement it in our business? So over the last four years, I've been working with clients and we've created a methodology for developing diversity and inclusion strategies. So my second book is really based around this methodology and how you can actually maximize your impact when it comes to creating a plan for your business. So that's what I'm working on next. But in terms of how people can just get in touch, I mean, linkedin is probably the best place to start. Just connect with me on LinkedIn and drop me a message.
Speaker 1:So when is the second book coming out? Do we have a date yet? Are we getting a preview of when it's going to release?
Speaker 2:So I'm hoping it's going to come out in the first quarter of 2024.
Speaker 1:OK, ok, we will be looking out for that and then tell us the name of the first one again.
Speaker 2:So the first book is called Inclusive Growth and you can get it on Amazon.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Well, everybody. Thank you for listening to us today on this episode of the Inclusive Networker Podcast. Again, thank you to my guest, Toby Milden. This was absolutely fabulous and we can. You'll get his information in the show notes and we will see you on the next episode of the Inclusive Networker Podcast. Bye, and that wraps up another episode of the Inclusive Networker Podcast. I want to express my sincere gratitude to you, our listeners, for joining us on this journey of learning and growth. Your support and engagement are truly, truly appreciated. Creating a more inclusive network and beyond starts with us individually and collectively. Let's continue these conversations beyond the Inclusive Networker Podcast. Engage with others, challenge your own assumptions, take action to make a difference in your own spheres of influence and share, share, share this podcast with a friend. So here's what you can do next Go to drremenahalartscom and keep up with me. Stay in touch. That's D-R-R-A-Y-M-O-N-A-H-L-A-W-R-E-N-C-Ecom. Don't forget my Y in Dr Ramona, and don't you dare forget your Y, and I'll see you on the next episode of the Inclusive Networker.