So today's session is about from optics to outcomes, how inclusive cultures drive technical delivery. People disengage long before they resign.I think we know this, but it is one of these things that just needs to keep being said. I think it gets forgotten multiple times. And when resignations appear on managers' desks, they're surprised. And like we say, by the time the organizations notice the resignation, the innovation, the trust, the challenge, psychological safety, they were gone months earlier. How do I know this? I've had firsthand experience. I've worked for twenty years in the energy sector. By background, I'm actually an engineer. Engineer turned project manager. I've worked offshore, onshore, on-site in multiple countries around the world on major projects, handling scopes in the millions and billions.

But it wasn't always, you know, fun and traveling and lots of projects and being trusted. Yes. That did happen at some one point. But years before that, I spoke up about discrimination I was feeling. I was told by the person I was working for that women belong in the home and in the kitchen. I, of course, disagreed with that. I spoke up about the discrimination, the behaviors I was experiencing, and they terminated my contract. I was actually escorted out of the building, stuffing all my belongings in a box. And I'd only been working for, you know, three years from graduation, so I didn't really know what I wanted to do at that point. Did I quit?

Should I change engine should I just quit engineering? Should I just restart? I don't know. I decided to give engineering another go, this time in sub c. Started over from scratch, took a graduate role. And in in retrospect, it was a good move for my career, rather than staying in the previous industry I was in. But even so, I spent years trying to fit in environments that weren't designed for those who are different. And I say anybody who's not the majority. What I realized is it's not just a people issue. It also impacts teams. It impacts performance. The tension so many workplaces feel, they organizations will say, we want innovation. We wanna be cutting edge. We want to do you know, we wanna be competitive. But the culture in the room that the individuals day to day are facing are often told don't challenge the room. And we know that these two things can't coexist.

If you don't challenge the room, if you don't challenge the this is how we've always done it, you're never gonna innovate. Again, we know this, yet it doesn't seem to be happening in practice. We get fear driven silence, conformity, hierarchy, and we learn how to be disengaged. I'd love to know how many people have asked a question in a meeting only to be met with silence, And then, eventually, someone will come in and say, let's just park that. We'll we'll get to it. And, funnily enough, they never do. I know I've experienced that. But let's look about what does it look like at work. It's when a person is often referred to and said, oh, can you take the notes? Or being told you take the diversity box. That happened to me, and it wasn't that long ago either. Also, you're not technical. Well, actually, excuse me. Someone said that to me.

Again, it was probably about a decade ago. And I'm sitting there and I'm thinking, I got a master's in electronic electrical engineering, and I'm a chartered engineer. And you're telling me I'm not technical? It but these words get weaponized against you. And and the exact words that he said to me is you're not technical. I'm removing you from this email chain, which then excluded me from the WorkScope discussion. I would say silence after sharing an idea. Being included visibly but excluded operationally. What do I mean by that? It's when there's a DE and I event, and then you bring out a person who ticks the box. Or if there's a discussion on softer skills, you bring out someone who's maybe more known for softer skills. But, actually, when there's a project opportunity or a technical opportunity, an opportunity to really show what they can do, they're not even their name isn't even mentioned.

And that's what I mean by being excluded operationally. These moments can seem small individually, but accumulated over the years, they shape confidence, visibility, and, of course, progression. And if people are, like end up having lower confidence because they're not being included, they're invisible at work, so no one sees them in the first place, at least not in the way they want to be seen, they're not gonna progress them. And that's sad because, again, what if that person has the answer to the innovation question? How do we do this differently? I'm a firm believer that culture is not a side initiative. It's not like saying, oh, it's it's a DE and I thing, or it's an HR thing, or, oh, it's a people thing. It's you know, let's get a champion in there. Culture is core to every single person in the workplace. It shapes the visibility of risks.

You know, how comfortable does someone feel saying, actually, I saw something that wasn't right. Imagine if they didn't speak up and someone got hurt. That that is what we're talking about here. Culture also shapes innovation as we talked about retention. If you're constantly being ignored, how long are you gonna put up with that for? It shapes collaboration. It shapes the quality of your delivery. If your culture is bad, your delivery is gonna be bad. Culture is delivery infrastructure. The strongest technical organizations understand this. The culture is not separate from performance. It determines your performance. The way I think about this is it starts with leaders. How are leaders engaged? How are leaders coming to the table on this topic? They need to build trust, clarity, and accountability. Teams need to be enabled.

They need to need we need to reduce the friction between team members across different teams and create ownership so that when they get out of bed, they actually want to deliver. They want to get after these things. We want to energize the culture, embed the behaviors, the hold even under pressure on the hard days because it's not always going to be easy days. But how do how does the team work when they're under pressure? And then, of course, when you've got leaders engaged, the teams enabled, and the culture energized, the results are gonna be elevated. Inclusion, in that sense, is turned into measurable outcomes. That's faster delivery, greater profits, and who doesn't want that? Performance through people is a system.

To thrive in STEM, it shouldn't require self erasure. It doesn't mean hide yourself. I'm also a little bit around when people say bring your whole self to work. Sometimes parts of yourself doesn't belong in the workplace, and I'm not saying personality wise or something like that. If you like to wear slippers at home, probably best not to wear slippers in the office. Like I say, I don't think it's your whole self, but it's definitely your work self. And it's not saying that you need to hide a part of yourself, like I say. There there's also that culture in the office about, you know, dressing for the job, working with the culture you've got.

If you have a more casual office, dress more casual. If it's more if it's more professional, then, yeah, you probably need to do that. But it's all each in their own and finding your way of being your way of aligning to the culture. I think that's the way I'm gonna say it. You don't need to match it. You don't need to be who you're not, but find but there will be a way. And if anyone's not sure, come and have a chat because I've navigated this multiple times. There's a way to find how you can be yourself and still work within the cultures and the boundaries that you're given. But the reason I mentioned this is also too many people succeed professionally while disconnecting from themselves personally.

I mean, I remember years ago, I was told cut your hair really short, in order to progress as a woman in the energy sector. And that's just not true. I mean, I don't know how a short haircut improves my capability or competency. And for me, that's not thriving when people are just picking at aesthetics. We started talking about psychological safety here. How comfortable are people in sharing their views? One, sharing things about themselves, but also, again, having ideas. So you see a risk. You raise it. There's an assumption being made and in, let's call it maybe it's a junior person in the room, one of the first times they come to this, and they ask the question, why are we doing it that way? How how are they received by answering those asking those questions? Enabling expertise to be heard, plus what psychological safety is all about, And reducing the fear driven silence.

Safe teams always outperform the fearful ones because they're not worried looking at their you know, watching their backs all the time. They're focused on the job knowing that, okay. Yep. Oh, I said the wrong thing. Okay. Let's move on. We'll we'll fix that. We'll move on to the next one. And everybody's working together. It's really cohesive. It is really cool when that happens. I want you to ask yourself, and it doesn't matter what level you are in an organization. Who speaks the most in your meetings? Who gets interrupted? Who quietly disengaged many months ago? And then what delivery risks are hidden inside your culture? Because if people aren't speaking up or being enabled to get their whole point across, there's going to be risks there. Leaders need to shift from optics to outcomes, from awareness to accountability, from measuring diversity metrics to creating inclusive behaviors right through the organization from the top of the house right down to the shop floor.

And don't focus on individual resilience. Look at and take systemic responsibility because it's a whole system. The organizations retaining the best talent in the future will not be the ones with the best slogans. They'll be the ones creating the safest environment for contribution. And we can do better than survival. It impacts so many people. It's not just women. Like I say, it's anyone who is not the majority. The culture you tolerate becomes the performance you experience. Too many women in STEM, like I say, anyone who is not the majority, are taught to survive environments that were never designed for them to thrive in. And I like I say, I think we can do better. I see a lot of people tell me that they're not just questioning their workplaces. They're questioning themselves.

So I think you've noticed the QR code that I've been including on here. This is on the left hand side. This is a free strategic visibility toolkit. If you scan the code, you can download this, exec this conversation starter kit for connecting with an executive in your organization. Download it for free. Let me know how it works out for you. Really excited about that. I used it myself multiple times and got a conversation every single time with an executive, and these are c suite levels. So wanted to offer that to those joining today and also, a career clarity toolkit because in order to communicate what you want, you need absolute clarity yourself. And I'm very pleased to offer this with a discount code, women tech 26. So please screenshot the page and, again, have a look at that.

Let me know how you get on. And, of course, I'd love to connect with you all online.