Latest / Event Industry News Podcast / Making Networking Work for Everyone: The Neuro‑Inclusive Guide
Transcript
- 0:00The Event Industry News Podcast is sponsored by Present Communications.
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- 0:29Hello everybody and welcome along to the Event Industry News Podcast
- 0:34with me, James Dixon, wishing you all a very good morning, afternoon, or evening,
- 0:37whenever or wherever you tune into today's podcast
- 0:41from. As always, recording on a Monday morning from home, the Monday
- 0:44after Spain have won the World Cup. So for context,
- 0:48you know, if you're listening to this on a future date, you know exactly when
- 0:53I'm recording this. And yeah, for any of our Spanish followers
- 0:57for the podcast, and of course if you work in the events industry and you
- 1:00are from Spain, congratulations. Congratulations to you all. The end of a
- 1:04huge global event. And that's
- 1:08exactly why we're here on the podcast every week, is to talk about events,
- 1:11to talk about things that are happening. And I'm delighted to say that on today's
- 1:14podcast, not one but two guests to give me an
- 1:17insight into something that they've been collaborating on. And we'll find out more
- 1:21about that as we get into the episode. My guests today are Anita McDonald,
- 1:25marketing manager at Meet Cambridge, and Andy Williamson, the founder
- 1:28at Welcome Brain Consulting, and we're going to be talking about the new Neuro-Inclusive
- 1:33Networking Guide that launched just a few weeks ago at The Meeting Show.
- 1:36So let's welcome our guests, Anita and Andy.
- 1:40A very warm welcome to the podcast, you both. Morning. Thank you.
- 1:43Hello. Nice. Let's start by getting to know a little
- 1:47bit about you both before we get into what I introduced there at the start
- 1:51of the podcast, this new Neuro-Inclusive Networking Guide.
- 1:55Anita, let's come to you first of all. Welcome along to the podcast, a first-time
- 1:58guest. Well, to both of you, of course, as first-time guests, but tell us a
- 2:02little bit about yourself, Anita, and exactly what your role is at Meet Cambridge and
- 2:05what Meet Cambridge is. Okay, thanks, James,
- 2:09and just wanted to echo congratulations Spain, viva España,
- 2:13and all of that. Well done, everybody. So yeah,
- 2:16my name's Anita MacDonald, I'm the marketing manager at Meet
- 2:20Cambridge. So we are predominantly a venue finding
- 2:23agency for anybody who's looking to host any
- 2:27type of event in Cambridge, and we
- 2:30have links with the Cambridge colleges and university buildings as
- 2:34well as strategic relationships with venues in and around the city.
- 2:38So my job predominantly is marketing
- 2:42Cambridge to event professionals and how it can work
- 2:46for them. I was going to say, if that background's anything to go by,
- 2:49it shouldn't take much marketing. It shouldn't take much marketing.
- 2:53Yeah, that's my next-door neighbour.
- 2:57Fabulous, thanks Anita. And Andy, same to you, tell us a little bit about yourself
- 3:02and what Welcome Brain is as an organization. So yeah, so Welcome Brain
- 3:06is a neurodiversity consultancy, so we work—
- 3:09anything to do with neurodiversity is our jam really, and that's quite a broad range
- 3:12of things. So we provide workshops and trainings and consultancy,
- 3:16policy help, things like that, but we do a lot of work in the events
- 3:19industry through what we're going to talk about today. But through the
- 3:22ABCO working group that we joined, we've done a lot of work on networking
- 3:26in events— sorry, neuroinclusion in events. We put together about
- 3:30a year ago the Neurodiversity in Events Checklist,
- 3:34which is a guide on how to make your events neuroinclusive, a free guide
- 3:38I might add, on how to make your events neuroinclusive. We also have a
- 3:41neuroinclusive venue accreditation, so venues can get accredited, show off
- 3:45their credentials, and then we just recently launched the networking
- 3:49guide on how you can make networking neuroinclusive. So everything we do is driven by
- 3:53the idea of making things actionable, practical, easy to access, and so
- 3:57that people actually do it. And, and yeah, please,
- 4:00Anita, jump in. Thank you. I just wanted to
- 4:05say that whilst the focus is around neurodiversity,
- 4:08with the task force that Andy and I belong to
- 4:11under the APCO umbrella, something that we've found,
- 4:15and this is something that Andy champions, is that
- 4:18when you start looking after your neurodiverse community
- 4:23and attendees, it actually benefits everybody.
- 4:26So whilst we're using this umbrella of neurodiversity,
- 4:31actually the changes that you bring into your events will
- 4:35benefit everybody. So it's kind of like, I don't want it
- 4:39to kind of like be pigeonholed that it's all about neurodiversity. Whilst that's what
- 4:43our focus is today and on this podcast, it's As I said,
- 4:47it does, it benefits everybody. Absolutely. And I'm sure, I'm sure
- 4:51we'll, we'll touch more on that and, and sort of talk in a little bit
- 4:55more detail on that. But let's, let's take it back to the actual guide itself
- 4:59first of all and get into some sort of the, the obvious questions that people
- 5:03may be sort of shouting now down towards their devices as they listen to us
- 5:06today. What prompted it first of all, Anita? What was the sort of the driving
- 5:10factor behind it? What was the, you know, the, the genesis of this, uh,
- 5:13guide being, uh, researched and then produced?
- 5:17So I think as Andy alluded to a moment ago is that we created
- 5:22a new neurodiversity events checklist about
- 5:26a year ago, and it went down really,
- 5:29really well, and we kind of wanted to keep the momentum going,
- 5:33so we came together as a group and thought, right, what can we look
- 5:37at next? And we, I think we put a poll out as well
- 5:41to event professionals within AbCo and within our own networks about asking
- 5:45people what do you want us to look at next? And networking
- 5:49came up high. And, you know,
- 5:52I'm not neurodiverse, I see myself as neurotypical,
- 5:57but even I struggle with networking, going into a room when I don't
- 6:01know anybody, the noise levels as
- 6:05well. And when you see people talking in little cliques,
- 6:09I find it overwhelming. And I'm just thinking, if I find myself as
- 6:13neurotypical, what is it like for somebody who identifies
- 6:17or who even perhaps has neurodiverse characteristics
- 6:22and hasn't even realized they're in that,
- 6:25that sphere? How on earth does it feel for them? So that's kind
- 6:29of how it came about. Um, and what
- 6:33we did is that we put a survey together and we put it out to
- 6:37anybody who's ever attended an event. Doesn't matter whether it's
- 6:41a conference, a meeting, a dinner, a networking a family gathering,
- 6:45and it didn't matter whether they were an ABCO member or not, or an event
- 6:49professional. We opened it up to everybody, um, within our networks,
- 6:53asking them questions about how, how they feel when
- 6:57they attend an event. How does— and, and around networking, how does it
- 7:01make them feel, and what changes would they like to see?
- 7:05And I think the overwhelming result was, um,
- 7:09nobody likes it. Traditional format of all being shoved
- 7:13in the same room with catering, glasses clinking, lots of
- 7:16noise, music going on, quite bright lights— nobody
- 7:21likes it. So it kind of begs the question, if nobody
- 7:25likes it, why are we sticking to this traditional format?
- 7:30Something needs to give, something needs to change, and that's
- 7:34kind of how we started to evolve it. Andy, is there
- 7:38anything you wanted to add to that? Because obviously you collated the results. I mean,
- 7:40no, I mean I get we all start from the same position, is anecdotally,
- 7:44I think we're all uncomfortable with networking as is, and we all sort of swapped
- 7:47horror stories. But I mean, from a neuroinclusion perspective, the 2
- 7:52most common things that neurodivergent people can traditionally struggle with are crowds and
- 7:56sensory overload. And those 2 things are what networking
- 8:00is really. So as sort of a first principles perspective,
- 8:04it seemed like it was ripe for reexamination. So that was where we started.
- 8:08That was the problem we identified. And then it turned out from
- 8:12doing the survey that most people did agree with us. Neurotypical and neurodivergent people agreed
- 8:16with us. Was there a stereotypical networking scene
- 8:20that was created almost like as a, you know, right,
- 8:23that there's sort of 90% of scenarios
- 8:27that we are referencing here? Because when I think of networking and
- 8:30Anita, forgive me if I've misunderstood this, but the way that you
- 8:34were describing it, I'm thinking, you know, classic hotel conference room,
- 8:37150 people walking in there, teas, coffees and everything. But,
- 8:40you know, networking goes on at huge trade shows, you know,
- 8:44places like Excel and the NEC. Networking goes on
- 8:47awards dinners. You know, Andy, was there a sort
- 8:52of a benchmark? Was there a stereotypical layout and scenario
- 8:56that was painted in order to sort of create this list? Yeah.
- 9:00And that was borne out by the results of the survey, actually, is what we
- 9:03had sort of in our mind's eye was this idea of unstructured mingling, like you
- 9:06said. So there's a— we're at a conference, there's an hour set aside in the
- 9:10conference hall where we can get tea and coffees or a glass of wine or
- 9:13something and do our unstructured mingling there. That sort of formal networking.
- 9:17The networking that happens organically at, you know, at a dinner
- 9:21or something like that is a slightly different issue, but we were focused mostly
- 9:25on this unstructured mingling, which is still the default for most networking,
- 9:29where we sort of just dropkick everybody in a room together and say, have at
- 9:32it. That's what we had, and that's what we wanted to change.
- 9:36And it was very clear from the results, that's what most people didn't like.
- 9:39You know, the awkwardness of having to hold your saucer with your tea on it
- 9:43and manage the handshake, or people are standing in triangles, how can I
- 9:47break in? That sort of deal was what we were looking to change.
- 9:51Yeah, I'm fascinated to hear some of the practical tips because I'm
- 9:55already thinking in my head of, you know, operationally,
- 9:58stuff that I see day to day and whether or not
- 10:02that's manifested what I see sometimes and think, why have they
- 10:06not done that? I'm really curious to see if it's manifested itself in the report.
- 10:09So I'll give you a real-life example. I was running
- 10:13a conference for the biosciences industry
- 10:17last week in a very what I'd call
- 10:21stereotypical conference setup, a conference room laid out theater style and
- 10:26an adjacent room with some sponsors and exhibitors with tabletops, and in
- 10:30the center, big coffee station and where the lunch buffet served.
- 10:33No tables and nowhere for people to sit down, which meant
- 10:37that everybody was stood balancing tea and coffee and balancing their lunch buffet
- 10:41plates, kind of with elbows tucked in because it was quite a
- 10:44tight room. And I just thought, what a silly— you know, why not just put
- 10:47a space aside where people can actually sit and eat their lunch comfortably?
- 10:52That's not necessarily a neurodivergent thing. That's just a basic wellbeing and a
- 10:56basic operational practicality. Is stuff— is it stuff
- 11:00that's as simple as that that's addressed in the guide, Anita?
- 11:04Yeah, absolutely. It's, I think, one of my sort
- 11:08of favourite things that there was 2 that came out that I really liked.
- 11:13And these were ideas that came from respondents to the
- 11:17survey and within the group itself. So One
- 11:21was having a networking buddy, and it could be somebody
- 11:25within your committee, somebody within your organizing
- 11:30group that would make introductions.
- 11:33So if you're new to a conference, new to an event,
- 11:37they would actually help you make introductions and introduce you to a
- 11:40group. And it just having somebody do that and breaking
- 11:44that barrier down, I know certainly for myself would be really nice because that's standing
- 11:48on the periphery and thinking, Oh crikey, who do I talk
- 11:51to? Um, it's really, really hard. And then another
- 11:55one that came out was, um, when people
- 11:59register, so as well as putting their name and
- 12:02their organization, maybe having just 3 words of
- 12:05things that they're happy to talk about. And then it
- 12:09could be something really random, or it could be something to
- 12:12do with the event or the field of, um, field of
- 12:16science that they're looking at. And we tested this out at
- 12:20AbCo back in April,
- 12:24and I know that seemed to go down really well because it kind of gave
- 12:28an introduction. So whilst you might be looking at somebody's chest,
- 12:32at their name badge, you could actually see things that they were happy to talk
- 12:36about. So for me, you know, dogs, I love dogs, and if somebody,
- 12:40if I find a fellow dog lover, you know, we've already got
- 12:43a connection. We haven't got to break those barriers down.
- 12:48Um, and I think that's what we were looking at, is just how can
- 12:52we make it literally
- 12:55more accessible to everybody that's attending.
- 12:59And because that— and I think this is a key thing that anybody who's
- 13:02attended an event, they sort of said, you know, what, what's your biggest take-home?
- 13:06It's the connections that they make. They remember the people that they
- 13:10met really potentially more than the speakers,
- 13:14more than the program. It's who they met, who did they get chatting to,
- 13:18who do they want to continue that conversation with.
- 13:21And if your networking is not enabling that,
- 13:25then what is your event about? Yeah, absolutely. And that's— Andy,
- 13:30I'll bring you in on this just to ask. I was smiling
- 13:34then because I love the idea of having 3 words on a name badge.
- 13:37That allows you to kick off a conversation with somebody rather than the usual
- 13:41walking up, oh, hello, what do you do? Which company are you from?
- 13:44You know, it's boring as well, isn't it? You know,
- 13:48if you can get talking and find common ground with somebody unrelated
- 13:52to your work or the reason that you're there at that event, you can
- 13:55actually then open up a more meaningful conversation when you do get around
- 13:59to talking about the business side of things. Well, yeah, exactly. It's about making those
- 14:03connections seem less transactional, I think, is actually what makes them much more effective.
- 14:07And Sort of following on from what Anita was saying
- 14:10is none of this has to be really difficult or really involved or hard work.
- 14:15The way that the networking guide is structured, it's a silver, gold, and platinum
- 14:19level depending on your appetite for work and the size of your event and all
- 14:22the things like that. So silver, you know, if you
- 14:26want to just do the basics, turn the background music off so
- 14:29that people can actually hear one another when they're networking. I mean, that has no
- 14:33cost to it whatsoever. It actually results in less work because you don't have to
- 14:36choose choose a playlist or get the speakers out or anything like that.
- 14:39That's the sort of the level of silver level. And then, you know, like you
- 14:43said, you know, introducing a bit of structure can be something as simple
- 14:47as laying out some question cards on the tables or the area around with
- 14:51icebreaker-style questions. And they don't have to be cheesy. They could be something like,
- 14:55what's the worst film you've ever seen? What's one of the funniest
- 14:58things that's ever happened to you at work? Or something like that. Just anything that
- 15:01is just going to break that ice. And then you start having those organic conversations
- 15:04that then might lead to a sort of a transactional relationship down the road.
- 15:08But you've bypassed that sort of awkward standoff at the start,
- 15:12and everybody— it's a very level playing field. But when we talk about structured networking,
- 15:15that's what we're talking about. It's just those little sort of elements that
- 15:19facilitate the introduction. That's all it has to be. And then obviously,
- 15:23you know, as Anita was saying, having sort of a host or a facilitator who
- 15:27can make those introductions is really, really nice as well.
- 15:30The upside for that in terms of the host or facilitator
- 15:34The upside for that is, is good sort of PR for the organization,
- 15:38for the organizer as well, you know, that, that, that's a level of customer service
- 15:42that would be welcomed by any delegate or attendee at an event
- 15:45regardless of their, whether they're, you know, neurotypical or neurodivergent.
- 15:50If somebody came up to me at an event, if I was an attendee and
- 15:53said, look, can I help you make any introductions? I'm from the organizers, you know,
- 15:55is there anybody you'd like to meet? I think that'd just be a great level
- 15:58of service before we get into labeling it anything. Yeah,
- 16:02I think that's true. Sorry, Anita. No, I was just like,
- 16:06you know, we're, we're in the hospitality business. Is hospitality
- 16:10not about making people feel comfortable and being hospitable
- 16:15to one another? Exactly. You know, so yeah, exactly right.
- 16:18When it comes to— I think we forget that sometimes, don't we?
- 16:21You know, hospitality says it with hotels and restaurants, and in the events industry,
- 16:25I think we don't often consider ourselves to be working in hospitality,
- 16:29but we are. That's what we're doing. Yeah. And I was going to pick
- 16:33up on the other side of that is the hospitality business. It is a business.
- 16:35So ultimately what you're selling often with events is you're selling the
- 16:39networking and the people who are going to attend. So if you're not doing that
- 16:43effectively, you're selling a defective product and improving it and making
- 16:47it better. And this neuroinclusive networking, as we've said repeatedly,
- 16:50makes your networking more effective for everybody. So neurotypical
- 16:54people as well. So If you're selling networking but it's not really working,
- 16:58if it is just unstructured mingling, then you're not paying the same attention to it
- 17:02as you are to every other element of the events that you're running. And so
- 17:05if you just invest a little bit of effort into it, it will improve it,
- 17:09and then you will have a better product. So there's a commercial imperative to that
- 17:12as well. Yeah, go on,
- 17:15Anita. Sorry, I was sorry, I didn't mean to keep talking over you. I was
- 17:19gonna say, yeah, I agree and concur with, with what Andy said,
- 17:23you know. And with the actual guide, we're not saying that you've got to do
- 17:26every single single point. It's even just making one
- 17:30or two changes could make a massive difference. Yeah.
- 17:34So, you know, it's, it's not being afraid to
- 17:37make the change. And the changes that we've put in the guide, as Andy
- 17:41has said, you know, some of them are of no cost.
- 17:45But if you have got a bit of money, you know, this is where you
- 17:48go up to the, the gold and platinum levels of— and it's using
- 17:52technology because as technology is evolving, it's making life
- 17:57easier, certainly, I think, around networking and with hosting events. But it's,
- 18:01you know, you don't have to do— we're not suggesting that you've got to do
- 18:04everything in this list. Even if you can just bring one
- 18:08or two changes, we truly believe you'll see
- 18:12a difference with that, and you'll get good feedback. The technology,
- 18:16um, subject is an interesting one to bring in here because
- 18:21You mentioned budgets and working at different levels depending on,
- 18:25you know, at the top end, if somebody's got the budget to use something like
- 18:28an app, an event app that has matchmaking built into it where all
- 18:32the attendee details and pre-registrations are loaded in there, everyone's profile
- 18:36is created, there are some great matchmaking tools built
- 18:40into event apps now that use sophisticated algorithms and match stuff up. Great if
- 18:45you've got the budget, but at the opposite end of the spectrum The example that
- 18:48you gave earlier, Anita, where people might just give you 3 words that they're
- 18:52happy for, things that they're happy to talk about. If you had that on something
- 18:55as simple as a spreadsheet and you put that spreadsheet into everybody's
- 19:00accessible AI like Copilot or Gemini, one of those easily
- 19:04accessible platforms could also spit out matchmaking and look at that data
- 19:08and think, right, that person might want to talk to that person. So the
- 19:12tech now, because of how accessible AI is, even the most simple
- 19:16registration data can be interpreted and maybe used in
- 19:20a better way, even if you don't have access to these sophisticated platforms.
- 19:24That— I just wanted to make that, that point, that it doesn't have to be
- 19:27expensive to be able to utilize really good tech nowadays.
- 19:32Yeah, and I, I'd agree with that, you know. And isn't it— I know
- 19:35myself, when I've been on a conference app, if I could see somebody
- 19:38who's perhaps got common likes or dislikes to myself,
- 19:42I'm naturally going to gravitate towards them and I think, oh,
- 19:46I'd quite like to speak to them. Or if I see them,
- 19:50I know already before I've— even before I've attended, you know, got to the
- 19:54event, there's somebody who, who has a similar
- 19:58likes to me. And I know in this world of equity,
- 20:01diversity, and inclusion, you know, there is talk about, you know,
- 20:05don't always gravitate to people who think and look like
- 20:09you. Do go to people who will challenge your views and opinions.
- 20:12But I think when it comes to networking, and there's a lot of noise
- 20:16around finding your tribe, finding your community, if you
- 20:20at least, if you just have that icebreaker conversation, or you can
- 20:24get yourself through that door, um,
- 20:28and get yourself over the threshold and just start that conversation,
- 20:32it will give you the confidence to then approach other people,
- 20:36so who will perhaps challenge your views and opinions and make
- 20:40you a better person. And I think just going back a
- 20:44little bit, so as I said, we put together
- 20:47the neurodiversity at events checklist, and Andy,
- 20:51correct me if I'm wrong, but 1 in 5 people
- 20:57who identify as neurodiverse won't attend events Full
- 21:01stop. It's too overwhelming, it's too much.
- 21:04It's 20% of the population, so— and
- 21:09that's for those who identify as neurodiverse. For those who don't identify
- 21:13as neurodiverse, you know, that stat could be even higher.
- 21:17So if we can make just simple little changes, just think
- 21:21how many more people would be interested in your event and
- 21:24attending your event because they feel welcome, they're not feeling
- 21:28excluded, and Andy, sorry I keep coming back to you, but I just remember our
- 21:33early conversations a year ago. It was a brilliant
- 21:37phrase, and he said, instead of calling people out, let's call them in,
- 21:40let's welcome them in. And I keep using that mantra with everything
- 21:44that I do that's around EDI, not just neurodiversity,
- 21:47but anything to do with EDI. Let's welcome people
- 21:51in. Andy, could I ask, how, how important
- 21:55is it that organizers publicize any changes or developments,
- 21:59you know, however big or small or however subtle they may be,
- 22:03how important is it that organizers actually publicize that to their delegates?
- 22:07Well, I think it's very important for the reason Anita was just saying, is that
- 22:10a lot of neurodivergent people can choose to stay away from events
- 22:14if they think that they're not neuroinclusive. And also, you know,
- 22:18they might leave midway through because they don't like the idea of this networking that's
- 22:21coming up in the afternoon, or, you know, Participation doesn't just mean being
- 22:26there in the first place, it means staying there, actually asking questions, things like that.
- 22:29So I think it's really important. We always recommend when people do the Neurodiversity in
- 22:32Events Checklist and have their event accredited that they publicize it as much as possible
- 22:36to let people know this is neuroinclusive. And with the Neuroinclusive Networking Guide,
- 22:41we decided to make it a self-assessment scheme.
- 22:44So event planners, if they're planning a neuroinclusive networking, they use the guide,
- 22:48they work through it, they can themselves certify their
- 22:52networking as being neuroinclusive. And really, you should publicize it. Absolutely sing
- 22:56it from the rooftops, evangelize about it for the reasons that
- 22:59you're going to encourage more people to go. People are going to feel like it's
- 23:02a psychologically safer space, but also put pressure on everyone else
- 23:05who's not running a neuroinclusive networking. So because we want this eventually
- 23:10to become the default so that all, you know, these changes aren't hard to do.
- 23:14People can do them. So we increasingly want it to be the case that if
- 23:17someone's not running a neuroinclusive networking event, people say, well, why? Why aren't you doing
- 23:21that? It's easy enough to do. I've been to 5 already this month. Why aren't
- 23:24you doing it? So we always find with the events
- 23:29checklist, once people have done it once, it's really easy for them to repeat it
- 23:33and do it again. And people don't go back to doing them the non-neuroinclusive way.
- 23:36So we want that to be the case here. So yeah, sing it from the
- 23:39rooftops if you do run a neuroinclusive networking event. Networking. It's really important.
- 23:43I'm curious to ask, I would usually ask when we've got somebody on
- 23:47the podcast talking about, you know, a guide or some documentation that's been released,
- 23:50you know, how long was the consultation process? How long was the process to bring
- 23:53it to publication? I'm more curious to ask today about what
- 23:57the approvals process was like and how many people
- 24:01looked at this when you were kind of ready to publish it and
- 24:04how many people actually said, yes, this is great, or yes, this is
- 24:08almost great, but I think you need to tweak this. I'm curious, how many people
- 24:12were involved in the actual approval side of it to say, I'm neurodiverse, and actually,
- 24:16if all these things are implemented, that would be great?
- 24:21So we have some people within our group who identify—
- 24:26so within the APCO task force— who identify as neurodivergent.
- 24:30So we ran it past them. As I said, I work
- 24:34in Cambridge and I'm a member of the
- 24:38University of Cambridge staff, so I talked with a lot
- 24:42of my colleagues here at Cambridge and ran the guide through
- 24:46them and sort of said this is tentative. But I think again with
- 24:49the— I think this is something we kind of want to say about the guide—
- 24:52it is a living document. So for people
- 24:56out there in the audience land, if you're using it, if there are things
- 25:00that work or even don't work, or you've got ideas on how we can improve
- 25:04it, we'd love to know, we'd love to hear, because we want this to evolve
- 25:07as events evolve, as time goes on, so it remains a useful
- 25:12document. And that was one of the reasons why we came up with
- 25:16the guide. So when we put out the neurodiversity events checklist,
- 25:20we said we don't want this to be a static document, we want
- 25:23this to evolve, we want to keep the momentum going, we still want—
- 25:27we want to be useful, and helpful to event professionals
- 25:31and to venues as well, so that we're all coming
- 25:34together. And I think we'd kind of noticed as well over
- 25:38the year that people were working in silos, or, you know,
- 25:41people were bringing in different things. There was no place
- 25:45where everything was all coming together, and that was the whole purpose that we came
- 25:49together. And we have just built this, um, hopefully this
- 25:52power chain that will keep the things moving and make things better
- 25:56for everybody who's attending events. What's the process,
- 26:00Andy, of sort of future revisions to this now?
- 26:03You know, now that it is out there as a document for people to utilise
- 26:07and use within their own event operations, you know, how easy is it for
- 26:11people to get in touch in order to offer any suggestions? And is
- 26:15there a sort of— is there a plan in place and a timeline in place
- 26:18for when you will revise and look to produce further revisions of
- 26:22the document? Yeah. So what we did with
- 26:26the events checklist, Neurodiversity in Events checklist, is we were getting feedback consistently.
- 26:30And when it was its year anniversary, we launched 2.0.
- 26:34So what we did that based on the feedback we had, we sort of re-met
- 26:37as a group, spoke to a bunch of different people and made, to be honest,
- 26:41quite small tweaks, but I think quite important tweaks. And as Anita said,
- 26:45this really, you know, this isn't an abstract document. It only works if people actually
- 26:49try it and say, well, this This is what it's like on the ground.
- 26:53And that's what we did with the neurodiversity events checklist. We made changes based on
- 26:56people said, well, this thing's in the guide, but that's not practical. That's not really
- 26:59how events work. So we tweaked it to make it more practical. So I think
- 27:03the networking guide's only been out for about a month. It's only
- 27:07a month old. So when we get up to the year anniversary, we'll look at
- 27:11making an updated version. But yeah, again, it's really important that it is organic for
- 27:15all the reasons Anita mentioned. Technology changes, people change, our understanding of neurodiversity changes.
- 27:19Best practice changes, law changes. So there's a million different factors
- 27:23that, that mean this has to be organic. It has to be a living document.
- 27:28And it brings me, I guess, to the most obvious question of all, but a
- 27:32neat way to start rounding off today's episode is how do people get
- 27:36it? Where do they need to go?
- 27:39Andy, over to you. It's on the Welcome Brain website. So I think
- 27:43the link is floating below my head. There we go. Yes.
- 27:47On the screen now, for those of you watching today,
- 27:56welcomebrain.com/neuroinclusive-networking-guide. I'll do that one more
- 28:00welcomebrain.com/neuroinclusive-networking-guide.
- 28:05That's on the screen now for people watching. We'll also put a link to that
- 28:08in the description of today's podcast. I'll keep it on the screen for
- 28:11a few more seconds so that people can note it down. It is actually relatively
- 28:15simple. But a few characters in there. So hopefully people have got it.
- 28:18But yes, it will be in the description for today's podcast. So if you're listening
- 28:22to this, if you're watching this, just check out the description that's either below or
- 28:26on the screen where you get your audio podcasts from and you'll see a link
- 28:30to that. I have got my copy just before
- 28:34we literally hit record on today's episode.
- 28:37My copy pinged through, so I'll be having a good read through that.
- 28:41And I said it's stuff that I've encountered in my day-to-day you know,
- 28:45working life, working as a freelancer in events, at conferences,
- 28:49at what I guess you would call a lot of very sort of stereotypical business
- 28:53conferences around the country. I've seen examples of this on
- 28:56many, many occasions where I've thought, hold on, it's not just about
- 29:00people of a neurodivergent background and making
- 29:03them accessible. A lot of these things, and I think we said that at the
- 29:06very start, Anita, a lot of the changes that you can make that on
- 29:10the face of it are including or being more inclusive to people
- 29:13with neurodivergent aspects actually
- 29:16will have an impact, a positive impact on your entire
- 29:20delegate or your attendee list because of those
- 29:24subtle changes. And it'd be interesting. Yeah,
- 29:26I'm looking forward to having a good read through it and seeing what
- 29:30I can implement. And guys, please do stay in touch about this, you know,
- 29:33further revisions. We'd love to see how this is being accepted
- 29:37and how the rollout is going across the industry. You know, as the time comes
- 29:41when there is feedback, when there is you know, some reporting, some stats and data,
- 29:45anything like that that you want to feed back to the industry, it'd be great
- 29:49to have you on, on a future episode. Thank you. That'd be great. James,
- 29:52let us know your thoughts as well when you've been through it. If you run
- 29:55it at any of your events, tell us how it worked, what you've put in
- 29:59place and how it worked for you, because obviously your feedback, we can bring
- 30:02that back into the guide again. Absolutely, we'd be delighted to. I'm really
- 30:06pleased today that my guests have been Anita McDonald Marketing Manager at Meet Cambridge,
- 30:09and Andy Williamson, Founder at Welcome Brain Consulting,
- 30:13talking today about the new Neuro-Inclusive Networking Guide
- 30:17that launched at the Meetings Show just a few weeks ago.
- 30:20As we've said, available now to anybody that works
- 30:24in the events industry. And just one more time, really important before we round off
- 30:28today, welcomebrain.com/neuro-inclusive-networking-guide.
- 30:34-guide is the link that you need to go to in order to download your
- 30:38free copy of this guide. Thanks very much to both my guests today.
- 30:41And just a couple of bits for Event Industry News before we wrap up today's
- 30:45episode. If you're watching today's episode on the website, thank you very much for doing
- 30:48so. Please do make sure that you're checking out the latest news features, special supplements
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- 31:31Thanks very much again to my guests today, and we will see everybody on the
- 31:34next edition of the Event Industry News Podcast.