Alex: 0:37

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Working it Out podcast. I'm here today with Leon Mann, the founder of a number of organizations, including Refresh Sports Consultancy and Productions, BCOMS, and the co founder of the Football Blacklist. Welcome to the Working it Out community, Leon.

Leon: 0:53

Hey, Alex. How you doing? It's good to be on here.

Alex: 0:56

Yeah, I'm doing all right. Thank you. And then hopefully I covered the majority of the organizations that you found, but I'm sure if not, we'll cover them throughout.

Leon: 1:03

Yeah no, absolutely. I've been involved in lots of different campaigns and creating organizations. I feel very fortunate to have had some super support in the sport and media industries to, to push things forward and yeah, it's gonna be nice to have a chat about them with you.

Alex: 1:20

Awesome. Yeah, really looking forward to this one. So the first thing we do with all of our guests is we ask people to induct one item into our working it out locker. So could you induct one item for me, please, to do with your relationship with physical activity?

Leon: 1:33

Yeah. No. Do you know what? I've had a good think about items that I use, have used, et cetera, and I've gone through the maybe some of the more traditional answers that I could offer in terms of boxing gloves, because I've enjoyed doing some boxing in my life down at Fitzroy Lodge boxing club. Boots, so I still play football now on a Wednesday night down in Brixton which I take far too seriously for someone of my age playing in a very amateur league, but I love the competitiveness and that helps me with my physical fitness. It's talking about age. Massage gun was another consideration because I've got it behind me actually. It just lives behind me with my roller and kind of things I need to help my body. But the massage gun has been, like, huge for me, just in terms of I'm in my 40s now, so I really do need it at times. But the item I want to put in there is my phone. And I know that's a controversial one, because we're meant to be getting away from our phones, and I'm constantly telling my eldest daughter off for being on her phone too much. And it won't be too long before my youngest daughter is doing the same because of the world we're in. But actually, I've found my phone really helpful with my fitness journey. And it's not because of any apps because I'm rubbish with technology, so I'm really not good with the apps generally, and I want to get better with them, because I've seen people have a lot of success in using them and measuring their progress, etc. but actually, I've found that using my phone to record myself been really helpful in terms of keeping myself accountable by using social media. So I got into a habit and still do this of going for a run, not a long run 3-5k. And I will stop at one point of that run. And I will download some of the thoughts I've had from the week my week at work normally or it might be things that are going on in my life outside of work, but I will share the fact that i'm out running i'll share the facts that you know I've been thinking about this on my run because someone asked me a brilliant question one time I said, what do you think about when you run and I just thought god, that's a great question. I've never thought about that. But I began sharing on my instagram stories just some thoughts And response I got was fantastic in terms of the engagement of, Oh, it's really interesting. You're talking about this and it's great to see that you're out running, et cetera, et cetera. And then I had a period of missing my running and then people would be, where are you? You haven't been running. And I was quite looking forward to Sunday morning, listening to you talk about how to deal with stress or how you've not dealt with stress very well. And so it kept me accountable. So it kept me accountable in terms of my running because I was sharing it with the community and that community had a mixed reaction to the things I was doing and saying some of it was how fast are you running? How far are you running which I found annoying quite frankly and I could have worked with athletes so some athletes were jumping in terms of you should be doing this and the other. Trying to be helpful, that was their aim, but actually I was like, look, just leave me alone. I don't want to tell you how far I've ran or how fast I've ran. My relationship with running is I just get out the house and just go and sometimes it might be impressive, but largely it's probably not. But I've gone out and done it and I don't want the judgment from the outside world, but I do want the encouragement and engagement from the outside world because I feel that helps me. So doing that, also I get my personal trainer to film me when I'm on the bags in the gym and I feel that by posting those things, I keep myself accountable. And that's the thing that I've always struggled with when I've been doing sport alone, I'm much more of a team person than go away and work out by myself. I'm chucking the phone in there as controversial as that might be, but hopefully my explanation is like. Helped people understand why I'm going for a phone in the locker. Yeah.

Alex: 5:50

like that to track my runs to help me more, to slow me down. Cause if I normally sign up for long distance events and I try to go too fast, I'm not a fast runner.

Leon: 5:59

Yeah.

Alex: 5:59

injure myself by trying to get out there too fast, so I'm like I need to track my splits, but on the average day, yeah, I completely, completely agree. There was a period about two or three years ago now, where I actually created a side account where just my said, my, my friends and family on the Instagram, I said, I'm going to post every day. just to be, hold myself accountable. So completely resonate with that one to say, it's going to be boring posts. And it's more of a diary for me but I just wanted a couple of friends and family on there just to be like, just to talk and to share the experience with. So that really worked for me. I exercised every day for a year because of that, which was great.

Leon: 6:38

It's really helped me and continues to do and interestingly the feedback I've had is it's helped others because it might be a rainy Sunday morning and I'm out running. And someone says, do you know what? I was going to sack it off this morning, but I've seen you're out there. So do you know what? I'm going to jump out as well. And I've never gone for a run. I've never done exercise and come back feeling worse off. So I share that as part of the journey, if you like. And I'm not going to say it helps everybody, of course not, but it certainly helped a number of people who've been engaged with my stories. So yeah the phone, I've got lots of worries and concerns about phones, but this is certainly a good place where it sits in my life.

Alex: 7:23

So you've, we've used some words and I'm not, I've got to say, I'll potentially, would this be your, the one emotion, but without leading you down any road. I'm, predicting what ones could be but if there was if I was going to say to you, let's do some physical activity, let's do some sport, let's go out for a run. What's the one emotion feeling that first comes to you?

Leon: 7:44

Anxiety, probably, if you're talking about a run specifically. Only because, look, I'm not young anymore and in terms of my relationship with sport and exercise, I have always been the person who's been in the front group. I have always been the person who's been performing quite well. I've loved sport and physical activity, and now I am not as fit and strong as I used to be. Obviously the elastic band, as I call it, is sagging a bit. In terms of the things that I have previously done and now it takes a lot more thought and a lot more preparation. So the thought of running with other people, I sometimes think, oh my gosh, this is going to be, am I going to keep up? I hate the idea of dropping back and people thinking I'm not taking it seriously. But equally then when I do go with groups I'm okay. I'm not at the front anymore and I'm fine with that. And I have plenty of people who I might perceive to be people who should be behind me. But actually that's a really good thing for me to experience. The thing that, you know up for physical activity is not about the person who looks like they might be the best runner, whatever best is. But it's actually just being there and being present with yourself and pushing yourself. That's the important thing. So anxiety for running. If you were to say, let's go and have a kick around I'd quite like that. It would be joy. 100%. I think it's just because you mentioned running interesting relationship with running where it's a love, hate relationship and I have been very good at it, but I have to be completely honest with myself and say, I struggle a bit. Now I'm a little bit older.

Alex: 9:29

Yeah, I get that. I think there's there's times where another person who works at Portsmouth University, there's a connection between myself and Leon with Portsmouth University, which we could, which we may cover, but There's a guy who works there, I even hate that I'm giving him a plug, a guy called Lee. He's two years younger than me, but

Leon: 9:46

Right.

Alex: 9:59

30 now. And when I was when I was 30 and he was 28, I was where he was. I always just go to him. Yeah, mate, it catches up fast. As soon as you go over like the 27 mark. So I do with him specifically. I normally think, ah, I would join an event with him because I always used to, but now I just, I know I'll be holding him back and that's an anxiety feeling I have with running with him.

Leon: 10:19

It's a different relationship, isn't it, each of us. And I think it still sits within me, that kind of competitiveness, to be where I used to be, maybe, fitness wise. And actually, breaking it down, I think that's the wrong place to be, because who cares really if I run faster or don't run faster for me right now in my life, right now, and it might be that as I get older, I get much fitter because I prioritize it much more but right now where I am right now, my relationship is about getting out there, being out there, enjoying it. and being consistent. And also that I found really interesting is I will be on my Instagram stories saying, guys, I'm so glad I've been out running today because I've had a really hard week at work. And I would really suggest that the harder it gets for you in your work life, personal life, whatever it might be, exercise more. And then I find myself doing the complete opposite, where I've got so much work on and I had a personal trainer messaged me this morning saying, how are you getting on? And I said, Oh mate, it's been a nightmare at work this week. I've just had so much on, so I've not exercised at all. And I'm like writing it thinking, hang on, I'm the one who's telling people they should be out there with, so I'm not living the values that I'm projecting, but it's good to feel that sense of accountability and also remind yourself, why are you doing this? And it might be important to someone that they're setting new goals and publicly doing that. And that's their motivation point. My motivation is actually just getting out there and doing it and feeling the benefits of it and coming home and, speaking to my family and not telling them how fast I ran. It doesn't matter but just telling them and letting them experience a more positive version of me because that's what exercise does for me.

Alex: 12:12

Completely agree. A word which I thought would come up because you highlighted it a bit when you were speaking around your item was competitive with football. So the two words that you've used for with football, like joy and competitiveness, how do those two emotions compete or fight against each other or work with each other?

Leon: 12:31

be deadly honest here. I'm playing football in a Great team of people who used to go to university with and then friends of friends, etc And we're all around the kind of window of 38 to one guy I was massively surprised he's 48, right? And we are playing teams that are generally age range 21 to about 31. And we're winning the league. We're doing really well and not always but we're doing really well. We're competing with these younger guys who, are really taking it seriously in the way that we are. And funny enough, when we win, they say, Oh, you're taking it too seriously. When they win, then they're like not interested in talking about how seriously we're all taking it But that's like part of the relationship an interesting bit and dynamic. But you know being well 44 right now, and I know many people say oh god, you're still young but you don't feel young when you're chasing a 21 year old who's just skinned you. But

Alex: 13:33

I feel that now.

Leon: 13:34

right, okay

Alex: 13:35

Yeah,

Leon: 13:36

so

Alex: 13:36

I do. And we've got 18 year old. So I'm just like, God, I need to, I just need to do some more fitness.

Leon: 13:42

it's great. It's just the way that they can just chop so it's like they can go left and right You Because of where they are with their fitness and health journey it's it's a natural thing that you're gonna lose that sharpness. But anyway fiercely want to win when I start playing in that game despite it being Incredibly amateur. No one cares. No one, and it's a league where you play let's say 15. No, sorry 16 games or so and then next week you start the next season. So it's not like a a season that's in line with the football season where you get preseason and all that kind of stuff. So it's an ongoing thing. But I really liked that and I really like the competitive nature. I really like. Because it's almost impossible to replicate that elsewhere in, in your life. Certainly for me right now. So I enjoy it. It pushes me much further than I could ever be pushed on a one to one basis. Even with a personal trainer, it's really hard for me to get to that level of pushing myself. Because I'm there for the team. I'm letting someone down. There's a space I should have covered. There still is that competitive edge within me. I think I need to do a better job of maybe controlling it sometimes. I work with referees and love referees but sometimes I do question my referees in my league a little bit too much and end up apologizing at the end of the game because I felt I maybe shouldn't have questioned them and they actually got it right and I was just, being a little bit silly by getting it wrong but no competitive, big thing for me in that space. And I worry about where I find that in the same way when I eventually have to say, I play to this standard anymore. But but I love it for the minute. I really love it.

Alex: 15:27

I'm just resonating completely with that. Same on a Monday night is I have exactly the same thing with my mates and yeah, I speak about it a lot. How my mental health changes when I don't do team sports, specifically. Some people love running, but for me, running is a fitness source to do things like football. It's. That's it. That's the only if there's a long term event is because I want to improve. I would sign up to that because I know by the end of that event, I'll start the American football season because I played that for a while. So there's always an aim. I completely agree. We've spoken around football quite a bit. The next bit is around your earliest memory of being physically active. Is there something that stands out to you?

Leon: 16:07

It's how started playing football. Both my parents would go to work pretty early in the morning. Both were teachers, and so they would drop me off in the school playgrounds before anyone would be there. And I remember finding a tennis ball in the gutter. Just random balls and playgrounds, just find things. And so I picked up this tennis ball and just started kicking it against a brick wall and then challenging myself in terms of can I hit the fifth brick up on the right hand side? Can I do that with my left foot? Can I, and I just started becoming like obsessive about it and it was something I'd enjoy getting to school early for where at first it was like it's no fun to get to school as a kid by yourself in a playground. But that was where it all began. And from there it developed into the thing many people are sure will resonate with where it used to be like me versus 12 young kids and because I'd been practicing every morning in a way that they maybe hadn't been, I was so much better than them. So I felt a sense of, A sense of achievement, a sense of self worth through doing that. And also I adopted this feeling of I'm very good at this. Maybe I can help others as well. So began doing the challenges with others and talking them through I want you to try and hit this brick because I'm going to try and hit that brick. And it's, that was the beginning. That was the beginning of everything for me. And it does really Stand out in my memory and mind, because often I do reflect on working in sport now, like, where did this all start, my dad is a big sports fan he'd have the cricket on, the rugby on, the football on, athletics on anything. Grandstand back in the day is what I grew up on, so you'd be watching badminton, table tennis. You'd have everything, and I would love it, I would lap up every single moment of it. But the actual doing is the thing that I remember really well. And I'm so pleased I found that tennis tennis ball. It was one of those really decrepit ones where all the kind of green had fallen off it. And it was just a bit manky, but it I wish I had it and could frame it somewhere, my reminder of like the purity of the relationship that we have. Or can have with sport when it gets a little complex and when you're working within it.

Alex: 18:24

And throughout all of this a few times I've been making notes for those who are listening and I've got, so we've got the item, your phone and around accountability, you wanted to post thoughts on socials and you said around helping others. And then we speak around our memory. And then you talk around the school playground, this tennis ball, and then the thoughts about helping others. I think this next part is around the work you do. But before that, it seems a common theme throughout your personal relationship with physical activity, is around the want and desire to help others. Is that correct?

Leon: 19:00

Yeah, I was the footballer in the playground who had passed the kids that no one wanted to pass to because people thought they weren't very good. For me, I didn't like that. There was something within me that was like no, we're all playing this, right? So we're not going to not pass that person because we don't believe they're not good. They're in the best position to receive the ball. And if they're not great, then I'm going to get closer to them so they can get the ball back to me. Because I can then see the pitch turn and play, but they're in the right place. So I'm giving it to them. And to this day, it drives me crazy. When people don't do that, when people make decisions of, I don't think you're that great. So I'm not going to give you the ball, even though the person's in the best possible place to receive it. I think that's wrong. And I think that kind of reflects some of the wider problems we have in society in terms of where we see values in others and I don't know maybe I got my sense of injustice about the world from the playground and playing football and seeing how people are very quick to place value on people based on their perception of them. And also having seen as a kid, the joy of passing the ball to the person who didn't get the ball normally, then giving it back to you, you giving it back to them and then having a shot and scoring and surprising everyone. That did something for me that beating seven players, school kids football, you can beat seven players and put it in the corner because it's kids football, right? I did that. That's not the thing I remember from being a kid. But seeing the joy you had together with someone by doing things together, that gave me so much more. And I just had the sense of injustice about the world because I, some reason, spotted things that I felt were unfair and wanted to do something innately about addressing that.

Alex: 20:57

That's where my thought process was going to, and I'm glad you brought it up because that was gonna be my next question. And I love the line of self injustice has come from the playground. And because that just makes, it makes complete sense. I think one thing which I do, I'm quite proud of with this podcast is that there is normally a clear link between someone's personal relationship with physical activity. And obviously that's why they work in the sector, but also the roles that they're in and the influence they want to have. And you can clearly see with that's the same with yourself, which is really nice around inclusion. So for those who are new to you, haven't heard of your work before. Could you give people a overview of, I say your organization, but I'm going to use a broader sense of your work or and the types of organizations you work for or have founded and it's linked to physical activity.

Leon: 21:44

No, absolutely. I am the co founder of something called the football blacklist that I came up together with Rodney Hinds, who is the sports editor of The Voice newspaper, which is the, I guess you could term it the black newspaper for the with news around the black community in the UK. So it's a newspaper that is, I don't know, 40, 50 years old and very well established and very well respected. And a good read for those who want to know more about a black community perspective or what's happening within the black community. So I'd gone to Rodney and said, look, I think I'm we have so many brilliant black people working in football but they're behind the scenes and not seen. So we know the footballers on the field of play and we have a huge representation. So now 43 percent of footballers in the Premier League are black. So that's 43%. That's a huge contribution in the EFL. 34 percent are black and this is research that's been done by the Black Footballers Partnership. So in the men's game, big representation of the black community. Women's game, different. There's still challenges there in terms of increasing the numbers of black players there. But we have this huge contribution there. But then we've only got one black chief executive, yeah, one black chief executive. Across all 92 professional clubs. And that's someone who's of mixed heritage, Flo Robinson, who's a Bernard Albian football club. And then we have one black director across all the Premier League clubs. A non-executive director called Deji Davis, who funny enough, I used to play football with. We used to play in a very amateur team but had a lot of fun playing football together. And he is on the board of Brentford Football Club. So we just wanted to to spotlight and celebrate these brilliant black people working in the industry with the ambition of showing our community, the black community, look, there's doctors, there's like people working in leadership positions, there's people working in the community. So if you, as a young black person or as a black person generally, Like love football, then there are places where you can work within football. So it's not just about becoming a player. There's so many different things you can do. And look at all these people who've come from similar backgrounds, similar walks of life, similar parts of the UK, the news. So want to offer you that encouragement. And also through the blacklist, we're also saying to football, look, there's a huge under representation here. Here's a pool of brilliant people, but what are we doing collaboratively with black communities in the game to try and address this very uncomfortable under representation which football is completely holding hands up to and saying, yeah, we need to do better, we need to do more. And that applies to sport as well. So now there's a rugby blacklist, there's a tennis blacklist, and look out for other sports, because I'm sure where the context exists, a good opportunity to do something around black celebration or celebrating black achievement while having a positive entry point to some sensitive discussions that are solution based and that's really important to me. I want to talk about solutions. So that's the football blacklist. My football industry journey started with a campaign called kick it out. I'm sure many of those listening will be familiar with kick it out. The slogan back then was kick racism out football because that was my kind of my focus in terms of my life experience. And now it works across all areas of under representation, which is great to see. But I went from there to work for the BBC, and I went into the sports media, and I saw a huge lack of diversity in terms of the people who were responsible for telling the stories of sport. And I thought, this is crazy, look at all the black athletes, this can't be right, it can't be right that there's me and a handful of other people. And it wasn't a BBC problem, it was an industry wide problem. So I called a meeting, got people together, and eventually we set up an organisation called the Black Collective of Media in Sport. Known as BCOMS now, so we rarely spell it out, but it's called BCOMS. And we've been working to diversify the sports media. So we have an academy that gets brilliant young people from all backgrounds. Not just the black community, but Asian communities, LGBT Q plus community. Those who are disabled. You name it. We bring all communities together. Those from white working class backgrounds, Jewish backgrounds, et cetera, et cetera and we basically use our links within the industry to connect people with opportunities and create a pathway because if you want to work in sport, it's, I found it like almost impossible. How the, how do I get to work in sport? Like, where do you start? You can go and do a sports degree or sports related degree at university, but then what? so actually we started providing pathways in, found that the industry that knew it needed to diversify and found brilliant people who supported us. Athletes and legends such as David Beckham, such as Dina Ashes Smith, such as Yaya Toure, so many people got behind what we were trying to achieve in terms of offering their support, Lewis Hamilton's another one, Anthony Joshua's another one. But now we work with pretty much all the media in this country to diversify it. So those are the kind of the two main campaigns that I am the founder of and have been running for, gosh, 14, 15 years now and I'm really proud of what I've achieved through that. I have a commercial business, so I work as a consultant. And I have brilliant people who work with me at Refresh Sports. We problem solve, we have ways of working with sports leagues, bodies, individuals, to answer questions, be it can we run your social media channels can we create content, because we're a production company as well. Can we come in and do media training for people? We do everything. And it's all anchored in EDI and communications because that's my background and my expertise. Yeah, feel very privileged and honored to be in this position and got talent business as well within it. So we get to work with some fantastically talented broadcasters and athletes, former athletes. So yeah I think we call it a portfolio career is the posh term for it. And that, that's certainly the sweet spot that I'm enjoying at the moment.

Alex: 27:48

That's fantastic. I think like I said, we've got the helping others and it's clear throughout all of those pieces how you've been aiming to do that. And you've used words throughout when you're talking around the blacklist and that piece of work around wanting to be solution based

Leon: 28:03

Yeah. Yeah.

Alex: 28:04

and then talking about your consultancy and BCOMS around problem solving. So there is that real strong theme there. This part now is around, I'm trying to create a map for tackling inactivity. And I'm using sector leaders, personal opinions of what we as a nation should focus on and then narrow down to what you are passionate about. So to start that broad image of if we were gonna tackle inactivity, get more people active, and you were going to start the process of mapping this out, where does your, where did your head go to? What would you focus on? How would you do that?

Leon: 28:42

Yeah, for me, I think it's about, breaking down that this is a really complex problem. This is not a, this is the solution and this will work for everybody. And getting the expertise, understanding and a diverse lens on this problem. So I will have a perspective as a active male of mixed heritage who's got a very tight relationship with sport and playing football and going to football games, etc. So that is not the lens of somebody else. Who has different barriers of entry into physical activity might have cultural differences in terms of how and where and when they are playing sport. And so my perspective while it might be useful is not the perspective. And that's why we need a diverse lens of people with different backgrounds, experiences and relationships with sport. To really tackle the issue. And I guess that's where been making interventions in terms of, understandably, given the demographics of this country, the way that we have approached this has been from a white lens. And it's been white and male lens predominantly, and no one as part of that journey has done anything wrong in terms of approaching it from that lens because that's their lens. However, when we have, diversified and we've said, Oh gosh, we've got the majority of the country, 51 percent is women, so we better get them involved. Then what we've done is we've gone let's get white women involved. Or not intentionally said white women, but that's what's turned up. So therefore the intersectionality of black women, Asian women women with who are disabled, that's completely been missed out as part of the journey. And me saying this now is also speaking from experience. So I'm not being critical here going, God, this is terrible that these people have done this because with the football blacklist, guess what? Our first meeting was 10 men. Guess what? With BCOMS our first meeting was 10 black men. So we made the very same mistakes in terms of not being intersectional in our approach. So I understand how these things happen, but if we're truly trying to address these issues, then we need to have an intersectional approach to it all and an understanding of all these different perspectives. The person who seemingly doesn't like a sport or like physical activity must be involved in this because they will contribute with a different lens to myself, for example, who's obsessed with sport and is really into it. So me saying, They should do this and they should do that. It just doesn't work. So for me, this is about really leaning into the different expertise and lens that we have And truly listening, truly engaging and truly ripping up what sport and physical activity means traditionally. Because I think you know for me I've talked about running, boxing, football, so in many ways very mainstream ways of physical activity and health. and I've had this conversation with my wife lots because she has a different experience of sport and she's written a book, Eat Sweat Play on physical activity and the relationship of women with physical activity. And hearing her talk about this has educated me massively. and made me realise how traditional in many ways my lens is towards sport because I've been a nice comfortable fit in many ways to the structures that have been set up to engage with sport. So I have had no problems getting changed and being naked around other men in my life through sport. It's just what I've done since a very young age, it's just what it is. I've never even thought that could be a barrier to other people, other groups, et cetera. It's all of these kinds of things that now seem quite obvious to me but I've had to go on a bit of a journey in terms of being open and listening to that. So I think from the outset or from where we are now, what we can't do is we can't sit around the table as a group of men or a group of, All black people, or all white people, or all British Asian people, we can't do that because that's not going to get us to where we need to get to and it might seem like a pretty basic thing to say, but I still see those mistakes all the time, or maybe I am the black person sat around the table and people think that's job done. Whereas actually, it is, it really isn't. Yeah.

Alex: 33:26

in sport to talk around tackling an activity. And I was interviewing. The first few episodes, white men. I was like, I need to exactly the same story. I was, I need to be more diverse with this. I need to, I want a diverse voice on this podcast to build this map in a better way. And then I was able to get white women involved. And I was like, how do I more exactly what you're saying? I was like I'm wanting these people. So now this is actually the last episode of this series because I'm thinking I need to go to the drawing board a bit now to review my map to say, if I want to get this diverse thought, who is the audience of people that I need to speak to and what roles are they in and how can I engage with those people. So it's been really, it's really interesting that you're saying that because that's what I'm even feeling doing this podcast.

Leon: 34:14

no and look I think it's really good of you to be open in that way, because that's what we need. Like you, others, me, we haven't gone out with the intention of shutting anyone outside the room. However, we've gone with where our lens takes us. And, there's a number of kind of different studies that, we define best in the image of ourselves. So it's no surprise that in many times in my world, I've ended up having good relationships and good conversations with people who have mixed heritage from North London, male, play sport that's, essentially looking at myself, right? And that's where I'm defining best in many ways. And why wouldn't I go and speak to these people who I know, who I get on with, et cetera, et cetera. But actually, it's about shaking that up, being more disruptive and understanding actually it probably makes more sense for me to speak to a white working class woman from Scotland because that's a completely different perspective to my own and that will challenge my thinking. And the thing with diversity is I think it's a problem that people have seen it as like a tick box exercise in some cases oh my god I'm terrible I'm not speaking to different people, or they've seen it as it's a good thing to be seen to be doing. Or it's been like, Oh, I'm trying to save the world. So I'm going to go and speak to other people. It's the business, it's the business side of this. I'm really interested in because you want to have a thoroughness in terms of investigating any problem. You're probably best off finding someone with a very different view to your own. Because then, regardless of the problem, by the way, if you're saying how do we change how we grow grass in this country? Well, actually, I could speak to a million people who are doing it in sports stadiums, but, for football, but I probably wouldn't speak to another sport, or another area, or another part of the world, to get a different perspective that actually helps and enhances what I don't already know or think I know. And that thoroughness of investigation into problems like the inactivity issue that we're trying to solve, I need to hear a different perspective because I don't need anything reinforced in whatever I think already necessarily, I actually probably need the opposite view for me to either dig down into my own thought in terms of what the solution is because it challenges that, or to be receptive to a different way, which maybe helps us find the best way, which might be bang in the middle, Or it might be that we find out actually what you're doing there needs to be done here or what I'm doing here is the right thing to do here because I've examined where you're coming at it from and so it's that push and pull. And I think people miss that as part of the diversity discussion. I really do think they miss it. And that's part of my mission, is to help people understand, the power of diversity as cheesy as that sounds but I genuinely do believe in it and that diversity can be, someone from Scotland and someone from, South London it shows up in lots of different ways.

Alex: 37:21

Exactly, exactly that. funny you mention Scotland and women because the episode I've just released although there'll be a few after this one now, but it's from an amazing person called Virginia Anderson. She's the CEO of Disability Snow Sport UK and had an amazing conversation there because that is a completely different conversation as to what we're having now and what I'm hoping to do as part of this map. So when I post this episode with every episode, I also post a link to the map so you can see it's a causal mapping exercise. So here's the reasons why the sector leaders feel how we can tackle an activity. And then the question I'd then do is, okay, so what about that? And then why to really find these real tangible potential actions that we could take as a sector. And I gained these through the more of a social media lens rather than a media lens through podcasting rather than going through formal insight avenues. So for yourself, I know you said your focus on is trying to to have that thorough lens of investigating activity and the power of diversity. If you had the unlimited resources. What one thing, what would you go, I'd put all of my efforts into this basket and it's really unfair to narrow people down, but it makes it for an interesting conversation.

Leon: 38:40

Look, I think it's no secret that sport is struggling in the area of diversity, and diverse thinking and thought. And I think, many things that many clever people have come up with are working, but many, many things are not working not working for everybody. And when you look at the one consistent thing across pretty much every single sport, what is missing is that kind of diverse lens. It is diversity. So actually what I would do is give everyone a budget a significant budget, to do a couple of things. I would give them a budget to be able to look at how they become more diverse at every level. And that involves bringing in experts who can help them to understand this challenge in the same way that they would. Potentially look at facilities, you would bring in experts who really understand facilities. You wouldn't just find someone in the office who, once upon a time used some facilities and said, Oh, yeah, I'll give that a go. And with great respect, sometimes organizations have done that with black and Asian people or someone who is disabled within their organization and gone you are from an underrepresented group, you can help this, you can, you need to solve this really complex issue because obviously you're one of them, and people feel under pressure to come in and work on something where they have a lived experience but beyond that, and that's really valuable by the way but beyond that, why should it be on this one person who who should be tasked with trying to solve this deeply complex issue that they've had no, no part of creating. So I think we need to look at creating cells of expertise that come in and truly come in. So what organizations tend to do, they'll come in and get someone to deliver a talk. So I might come in and talk about the football blacklist. And I think that has value, but I think what has more value beyond that is somebody to come in and work within an organization for a year. And when I say work within an organization, they're embedded in the leadership team. And they are given permission, and the mission to identify how you make that workplace truly inclusive, and how you genuinely identify the skills and experiences needed for boards, leadership teams to work around these problems. Not a consultant comes in for a week and gives you a PowerPoint presentation. Everyone goes that's amazing. And then the next Monday, they're dealing with some crisis. And then that PowerPoint kind of gets passed down to somebody else. And they've given no resource to get it delivered. So I think I think that's the kind of level of I guess commitment that's needed to change this. And the second thing I would have, is I would create a position in every single organization called Chief Impact Officer. Their role is really, when that person, after a year of coming in and doing all the complex work with experts behind them, leaves, it's their role to drive this reporting into the CEO. often, EDI officers, directors, report into HR. That's just how it's traditionally set up. I'm not saying it doesn't work all the time, but I would say CEO, this is a real vital function for your business to be inclusive, to get the best from everybody. You need to have this chief impact officer to be able to report into you to make sure that you are accountable and that you're working with someone with expertise who's been backed up with research and a plan, et cetera, et cetera, to be able to make real change. Not just an aspiration, but give it a real kind of like chance of happening within a timeline. That, that makes business sense, which is as soon as possible.

Alex: 42:37

I love that. I had a whole ramble on, but I'm not going to, because I think I want to listen to more from yourself, but from a the only little bit is from I was trying to think. Okay, so how, what does this mean and feel like from, for my day job and I work for Sport England and I look after what we refer to as our strategic partners. As part of that process, they have to meet the governance code.

Leon: 42:58

Yep.

Alex: 42:59

As part of the governance code, they have to submit a DIAP, which is a diversity inclusion action plan. And for me and a lot of colleagues, we want to work with, cause it's a compliance piece. What we wanted to do is try and make that feel like it's more than a compliance piece, because an organization can submit a plan and just go, okay, yeah, we'll put that down, we'll submit that, and then we'll look at that again in six months time. For where I previously worked in the workforce team, and people leadership team, our team needs to work with this and understand everyone's people's plans to know one where the gaps are, but to also how can we make and make as a strong word influence organizations that this is a long term aspirational document, which should be living and breathing and there should be people accountable to it.

Leon: 43:48

100%. And I've been working in sport for 20 years. I've seen a million plans. And they've been very good at the time. Most of them because people have really cared about that piece of work right then, but then. They're often put in the hands of someone who has no real agency to be able to hold people to account within the business to make sure that things are being done. and I think, we're not an industry short of people with brilliant ideas, the sports industry. I genuinely think there's so many people with brilliant ideas, but what's been missing is the agency of leaders to get stuff done and to be accountable for it. So we need to make leaders accountable for it in the same way that their profit and loss sheet at the end of the year is reviewed. It needs to be reviewed. We're like what's the progress we've made here and where are we failing and what do we need to do differently? And it's that level of engagement. And, I know CEOs who are completely committed in that way and see this as an area where they can create real legacy. So in the way that maybe other leaders have made digital, their legacy. Or different areas of the business, they are committed in this area. However, they do hold their hands up and do the right thing and saying, but I don't know how to do this. I have thoughts and ideas, but I don't know how to do it. And that's the question that needs to be answered. How do we empower organizations to get the right expertise and to get the right buy in and to make sure that when we're talking about diversity inclusion, we're talking about it, In a way that the shop floor understands this is a non negotiable. This is our organization. This is culture. This is for everybody. This is not for your black or Asian colleague. This is for you. And this will make us all perform better. That's ultimately what a business wants to do. How do we perform better? And I think now we're having those kinds of discussions with that kind of language, and I know there are lots of EDI professionals of lots of different takes on this but my take is business performance, is the bottom line for these leaders and for the people we serve, what turns up for them, what shows up for them. So we need to talk and we need to be invested in that way and it's measurable and we move left and right, but we're committed on that journey.

Alex: 46:06

I think that's a perfect place to leave it for today. Thank you so much for so many insightful thoughts. And I think, and we've gone from a really broad aspect, like you said, like we said, and we've narrowed down to quite a tangible specific thing, which if I had a pot of money, I would definitely invest in, but

Leon: 46:25

Yeah.

Alex: 46:26

yeah, thank you again for today.

Leon: 46:27

No, it's been a pleasure. Thank you for your questions and thank you for listening.