Podcast: Leaders in EDI – Management Futures’ Shona Crooks & Sarah Cartwright and Commonwealth Games’ Darnelle Morgan-Johnson

Leaders in Equality, Diversity & Inclusion (EDI) is a monthly series covering news, views, comments and debates happening across the equality, diversity and inclusion space. It also shines a spotlight on the progress being made and the challenges being faced in EDI across sport.

This episode features an unmissable conversation led by Shona Crooks, who works as Management Futures Head of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion. Shona has worked in EDI for over a decade and has travelled globally with her work, facilitating conversations around EDI, what it means to be truly inclusive and your authentic self, and how this impacts behaviours and high performance. She is joined by Sarah Cartwright – coach, trainer, speaker with a focus on speaking with impact, and Associate of Management Futures. She has collaborated with Shona in her global mission to organisations  to understand the importance of inclusive leadership and environments. Sarah and Shona are both also joined by Darnelle Morgan-Johnson, a sports and events professional currently working as the Events Services Operations Manager at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games 2022.

Within the discussion, the trio offered their valuable insight and practical advice that they have taken away from C-Suite and Future Leader programmes that were delivered by Management Futures as part of the Leaders Meet: Diversity Series. There is a brief overview of what the sessions covered, but the primary focus of the conversation was on inclusive leadership, standing firm and influencing up. Among the topics of exploration were setting boundaries and how this may be affected be race and gender stereotypes, psychological safety and how to offer feedback, and the uncomfortableness but cruciality of establishing non-negiotables with leaders.

The Leaders in EDI podcast is part of the Leaders Meet: Diversity Series, delivered in partnership with Meta, which provides a platform for executives within sport to come together to drive diversity across the industry, accelerate the pace of change and inspire the next generation of executives, through thought-leadership events and digital forums. Please click here to find out more about the Leaders Meet: Diversity series.

Listen to the podcast below, and subscribe today on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify or your chosen podcast platform.