The urgency to be an ally has waned. Fatigue is expected, but change is unlikely to happen if we don’t keep going. Are we still listening, learning and speaking up?

So much has been going on on my side. Several things happened which encouraged me to take some time to reflect, and it wasn’t a moment too soon. I started to write down key life moments that have happened since 2019, and when I looked back, it was clear that I was gaslighting myself. A pile-on of experiences was making me operate in fight or flight mode. Throw in some of my own negative thought patterns and behaviours, and you get the perfect storm. Things needed to change. I had to change.

Since June 2020, many companies wanted to prioritise EDI - equality, diversity and inclusion to give marginalised groups the same opportunities in the workplace. Whilst it is brilliant that businesses of all sizes want to do more, many are not prepared for the task ahead or willing to put any money behind their efforts.

There is probably one thing that we have all experienced, whether we work for ourselves or we work for someone else. At some point, we will have all questioned why we do the job that we do. The feeling of dread when it comes to walking the office. Feeling annoyed by having to do any work at all. The ever-increasing feeling that if you don’t leave what you’re doing, you will never feel happiness again. And let’s not forget that feeling about wasting precious time.

Unless you've been under a rock or are ignoring the news (which is understandable) you have probably heard about the incident at Buckingham Palace about one of the royal aides displaying racist actions towards a guest.

Google it and you'll find the alleged transcript of the encounter. Basically, the royal aide was extremely desperate to know what part of Africa a guest was from. When you find the various articles, you'll also find many comments about whether or not the form of questioning displayed was racist.

I tend to go on about bias a lot but that’s because I believe that not speaking about bias causes more harm than good. Navigating life pretending that we treat everyone equally and that our actions are always fair is just simply not true. Even though the majority of people are happy to not think about their biases, there are always the special few that are proud to treat people differently simply based on bias, which for clarification is NOT what we should be doing!

I’ve reached a certain age where I understand the ebb and flow of friendships but I’ve always assumed that the solid, shared values I have between my close friends would get us through. So when a really close friendship didn’t continue after the one and only conversation we’d ever had about racism, I was floored.

January tends to be the time when we review where we're at and our hopes for the year. Many of us will be thinking about making big changes to careers or work but we can get stressed and feel stuck. Have you ever had that feeling where you can't make a decision on how to move forward and then subsequently feel huge amounts of stress and frustration because you know you're not moving forward at all? If I've just described how you feel at the moment, read on.

Has your first thought about someone ever been that they're too young to be in that role or earning that amount of money? Or have you immediately assumed that because someone is smartly dressed, they are the most senior person in the room?

As ever, there will be many brands that choose to get behind Black History Month to show to their customers and clients how 'inclusive' they are. As we know, many companies claim to be inclusive, yet when we dig a little deeper there is limited ethnic diversity at senior levels within the business.

Language has changed over time and will continue to change but to feel that you can’t say ANYTHING is a bit of an exaggeration. The word *throttlebottom used to be a part of the English language, yet we have all managed to get by without using it!

On the 2nd of June 2020, many of us on social media posted black squares in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. It’s been a month since many people openly declared their shock, disbelief and sadness at the stories that black people were telling.

Cast your mind back to that day. What did you want to change? Did you decide to learn more, to educate yourself, to shop differently, to question more, to have those ‘difficult’ but necessary conversations with friends, family, employers or clients? Did you want to take some action?