EDI Chronicles at Brain Sciences- EP 5: “We had great plans for EDI, but who was going to lead it?"

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Beverley Isibor 

Hello and welcome to the EDI Chronicles at Brain Sciences podcast. I'm your host, Beverly Isibor. The equality, diversity and inclusion coordinator at the Faculty of Brain Sciences. In this podcast, we sit down with an expert to learn about all the wonderful and impactful things happening in brain sciences, as well as higher education more widely in the equality, diversity and inclusion space. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Or you can say, as EDI Space. So whether it's learning, working or researching. This podcast is dedicated for academics, professional staff, researchers, and any curious people willing to learn about embedding EDI in their practice. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Today, we're diving into EDI leadership and exploring how to navigate it. I'm joined today with a very, very special guest, Professor Anna Cox, who served as vice dean for EDI from 2019 to 2024. And Anna is also a professor of human computer interaction in the Division of Psychology and Language Sciences at UCL. So with Anna's extensive experience driving change in EDI, I'm very excited for some tips and tricks from Anna. 

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Beverley Isibor 

So welcome Anna. 

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Anna Cox 

Thank you very much. I'm looking forward to talking to you today. 

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Beverley Isibor 

I'm looking forward to talking to you too. This is a new thing we've added to the podcast. It is seen as an icebreaker for the podcast, right? I'm going to ask you a few questions. And these questions I just want you to answer yes or no. If you really have to, you can answer it in a way that you can just give us one sentence, okay. 

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Beverley Isibor 

So are you ready? 

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Anna Cox 

Yep. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Okay. Was leadership buy in the biggest challenge in advancing EDI within the faculty? 

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Anna Cox 

No. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Okay. Was the success of EDI and Brain Sciences over the last five years, largely driven by the EDI structures that you created? 

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Anna Cox 

No. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Oh, I was thinking that was going to be a yes. At least she‚ is honest. As Vice Dean, did you observe a shift in attitude towards EDI? 

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Anna Cox 

Yes. Yeah, yeah. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Okay. Oh, we finally got a yes. All right, so, we're going to talk about two things. First of all, we're going to speak about you as a leader, your personal journey into leadership. Because I think that needs to come from some form of value or passion as to why you want to, you know, lead. So where did it start? 

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Beverley Isibor 

Why were you passionate about EDI and getting into EDI leadership? 

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Anna Cox 

Well, I first joined the Athena Swan team in the Division of Psychology and Language Sciences, and I'm not sure what year it was. It was quite a long time ago, and I think we had had a couple of meetings when everything kind of went quiet. And I think, like if I go back a little bit, there had already been someone who had chaired that self-assessment team really successfully. 

00:03:28:19 - 00:03:43:06 

Anna Cox 

The division had had, I think, already a silver award, a bronze and a silver award, but I hadn't been involved at that time, but I'd kind of heard about it a little bit, so I sort of knew it was happening, but I didn't know much about it. 

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Beverley Isibor 

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Anna Cox 

And then someone else took over and, and I think when they took over, they asked for new people, and that's how I got involved. Yeah. And we'd had a couple of meetings, and then it all kind of went quiet. I think there is something about a quality that just really matters to me, and I can't really explain where it comes from. 

00:04:08:05 - 00:04:34:14 

Anna Cox 

But from that couple of meetings that we'd had, I knew that the award was coming up for renewal. And really we had as a group, we had a big task ahead of us, and we didn't have a huge amount of time to do it. Yeah. So as the weeks went past with, you know, radio silence, I started thinking, oh, I'm getting a bit worried about this. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

00:04:35:05 - 00:04:58:18 

Anna Cox 

And so I thought, well, I'll just check in to make sure everything is okay. And I contacted our head of division and just said, is everything alright with this? Because I haven't heard anything. And they said, well, actually, you know, there's a reason why why there's been radio silence and we're going to need somebody else to take over. 

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Anna Cox 

Yeah. And so I sort of ended up going from just being, you know, a very new member of this team to being the person leading it quite quickly. 

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Beverley Isibor 

So allocated. 

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Anna Cox 

And I don't really know how it happened other than like there was a need for someone to step up. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

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Anna Cox 

I'd ask the question if everything was okay and it wasn't. And so there was clearly a gap I could step into and help with. And so I did it because help was needed, not necessarily from a some kind of inner drive to lead the team. 

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Beverley Isibor 

So I was actually going to ask you that whether there's a particular value that you have that, you know, pushed yourself into leadership, but it was basically an opportunity that you took. You saw a gap. And then obviously there's still some form of drive, as you said, within yourself that you cannot explain. However, there was an opportunity that kind of, you know, drove you into that position. 

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Anna Cox 

Yeah. So I think that I think the thing that's really inside me is like a real commitment to fairness. And really wanting to make workplaces fair. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

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Anna Cox 

And that comes from just recognising that life can often be really difficult. 

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Beverley Isibor 

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Anna Cox 

And if you're experiencing some, you know a difficulty in life, the last thing you need is for work to be extra hard. Yeah. And but so I really want workplaces to be fair and, and to work well for people. And in terms of leading it. I would have been quite happy really if someone else had stepped up to lead it, but there wasn't anyone rushing to do it. 

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Anna Cox 

And so yeah. 

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Beverley Isibor 

I like that. So it's kind of more of, take an opportunity where you saw it and not necessarily thinking whether I can do it or not. Just putting yourself then kind of going with the flow. Would you consider it like that? 

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Anna Cox 

Yeah. I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Like, I really didn't know enough at that point. But I, I'm someone who likes novelty. So I really like learning new things. And, you know, it was a great opportunity for me to learn a lot more about the process and what was really possible. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Okay. So from that point, then how did we then land into vice Dean for EDI? 

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Anna Cox 

Okay. So the first thing I had to do on that SAT (Self-Assessment Team) was to get us an extension because we really had run out of time. So that then, then we submitted, for silver renewal, which we, were successful. And then I continued to lead the team for our next submission, where we obtained silver renewal again. And then from that role, I became, faculty Athena Swan lead. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Okay. 

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Anna Cox 

So at the time, I think that was the only faculty role. 

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Beverley Isibor 

To do with EDI. 

00:08:07:14 - 00:08:31:04 

Anna Cox 

Yeah. Yeah, the only faculty edible. And it was really at that point about trying to connect up different parts of the faculty and providing an opportunity for the teams who are trying to put together a submission, to have someone else read it and give some feedback, and for teams to find opportunities to work together. So. 

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Beverley Isibor 

A mini community of practice? 

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Anna Cox 

Yeah, I guess, and obviously as chair of the Self assessment team in empowers, I'd been part of that group. Yeah. So I took that on. I did that I think for a couple of years. And in that role, that meant that I sat on the faculty EDI committee. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Okay. 

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Anna Cox 

Which at the time it was a reasonably large group, I guess, and we met every time. A lot of the people on that were either people who had volunteered because they had some commitment to EDI. But they might not necessarily be leading on that in their part of the faculty. But we also had, you know, some members of the faculty office team. 

00:09:26:06 - 00:09:59:12 

Anna Cox 

So the person who was doing comms, for example, and a few other people like that one day, Alan Thompson, who was the dean and who'd been chairing that committee, commented that once we got together every time and we had these really good discussions, that it was very difficult to see how we were moving forward. So a group of us formed a small working group to kind of rethink how this was working and come up with a plan. 

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Beverley Isibor 

You know. 

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Anna Cox 

And this sort of coincided, I think, with hearing from other faculties how in the Bartlett they had just appointed the very first vice dean editor in UCL. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Okay. So it was pretty is a pretty new. 

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Anna Cox 

New role. Yeah. Yeah. Like no one else had one. And this was the first time that there'd been this kind of senior leadership position in that area. 

00:10:28:12 - 00:10:29:06 

Beverley Isibor 

Okay. 

00:10:29:08 - 00:10:57:15 

Anna Cox 

And I guess there's a bit of serendipity there in terms of hearing about a model that's being trialled somewhere else and thinking, well, okay, if we're trying to rethink how we do design the faculty houses are really going to work. Yeah. And I think what we as a working group saw was we could come up with great plans of how this could run, but who was going to lead it? 

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Beverley Isibor 

The chosen one! 

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Anna Cox 

And at that point, it was something that I kind of floated to Alan, that maybe having a vice dean, for EDI would be useful, because then we would have someone who was tasked with leading on this and who could then work with really kind to refresh that committee, thinking about what kind of structures might work within the faculty and really to try to to push back. 

00:11:28:06 - 00:11:41:16 

Anna Cox 

And and so it was his decision to create that role. And I applied for it. And and so I became the first vice dean in brain sciences. It was charged with doing EDI. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Amazing. So funny enough, I was going to speak about the role of Alan in this episode because, he's also a leader. In his own respect. And I'm just going to bring him in right now because I believe that, when we speak, we hear these statements a lot of the time in EDI, like "we need to persuade so many leaders." 

00:12:05:16 - 00:12:23:08 

Beverley Isibor 

"We know we need to get everybody on board." But it seemed that it was very, natural in this sense where Alan actually saw it as a problem. And I guess people like yourself took it on board to try and find a solution. 

00:12:23:10 - 00:12:52:07 

Anna Cox 

Yeah. I suppose that's why when you asked me that quickfire question. Yeah, I feel like I paused for a really long time before I answered. And and that's because I can't say it was difficult to get by in when Alan has been such a champion for this. But of course there. Oh, sometimes there were challenges in getting other people on board with what we wanted to do. 

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Anna Cox 

Yeah. But that was always as easy as it could be, in that I always knew that Alan was incredibly supportive of it. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

00:13:03:05 - 00:13:25:03 

Anna Cox 

And, you know, I don't think I think it would be really difficult to find someone else who could be who going to be more supportive. I mean, I think the successes that we have had in brain sciences in terms of really pushing EDI up the agenda, you know, a lot of that is owed to him and the support that he's really given to us. 

00:13:25:04 - 00:13:42:07 

Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. So talking about success, I want you to boast a bit. Well, what are the few successes that you feel like? You know, during my five years, I'm really happy that I've left it in this condition. Because I can name a few. But I'm going to allow you to take the mic on this one. 

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Anna Cox 

Well, I think so. Well, don't be humble. I'm not going to be able. 

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Beverley Isibor 

To not be humble. 

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Anna Cox 

It's not that. It's that that I think the things that I see as successes, not necessarily the things that other people would see. Right. Yeah. But one of the things that I think has enabled us to succeed in, in so many different ways is that we have really clear structures in terms of the governance of how this is going to work. 

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Anna Cox 

Yeah. 

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Beverley Isibor 

That was my number one, if I was going to say it. So you beat me to it. 

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Anna Cox 

And I think that, well, in many, many parts of, of the work that we've done, we've had to navigate a field where there's a lot of people already engaged that are already doing things and things are already working well, but because things are so organic and bottom up, you find a situation where one part of the faculty is working in one way, and another part of the faculty is working in another. 

00:14:52:17 - 00:15:20:21 

Anna Cox 

And whilst they might both be working well to some extent, it becomes quite difficult to make all of this coherent and to get everybody moving in the same direction if there isn't a bit of organisation there. And so I think what we did as a team was find how could we work with what was already going, but at the same time impose a bit of structure. 

00:15:20:23 - 00:15:57:01 

Anna Cox 

And that meant that areas of the faculty who weren't perhaps as far on the journey as others were able to say, oh, okay, there's a way that we can, you know, take a few steps forward. If we put in place a team that looks like this. Yeah. And doing that meant that because we had roles that were spelled out that had sort of like clear descriptions across each different part of the faculty, we were able to bring those people together, and then we knew we had the right people in the room. 

00:15:57:16 - 00:16:21:04 

Anna Cox 

And that makes it much easier to have conversations, to share information, to work together. Yeah. And also because I think sometimes when you're doing EDI, it's really important that it's not, as I said, sometimes not something always, always you don't want it to be this extra thing that you add on. 

00:16:21:06 - 00:16:21:17 

Beverley Isibor 

We say. 

00:16:21:17 - 00:16:27:09 

Anna Cox 

Embedding. Exactly. We really want to embed it in the way that we're working all the time. 

00:16:27:15 - 00:16:28:02 

Beverley Isibor 

On it and. 

00:16:28:05 - 00:16:55:08 

Anna Cox 

Sharing information across different parts of the faculty about how we have embedded EDI into our normal ways of working is something that has had far reaching effects, because I think all the time it's this separate thing done by this separate team that becomes more and more difficult to really feel like we're changing the culture that we're pushing things forward and that we can measure any change. 

00:16:55:10 - 00:17:12:17 

Anna Cox 

Yeah. So I think all of that kind of like structural governance, that was it. That's been really successful. We've seen the impact of that in terms of having real success with our Athina Swan Awards. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

00:17:14:13 - 00:17:19:07 

Anna Cox 

And having all parts of the faculty, holding an award. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. Six awards, to be precise. 

00:17:22:17 - 00:17:33:13 

Anna Cox 

And seeing the journey, I think of parts of the faculty moving from, you know, getting their first bronze to getting their silver and now having aspirations to get gold. 

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Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

00:17:34:19 - 00:18:04:05 

Anna Cox 

So I think all of that has been really great. And then the other thing that I really enjoyed and that I think has been really important, was actually something that you led on, which was putting together the faculty awards. And I think that that had a really impact for ten place in our work in terms of recognising what everybody had achieved. 

00:18:04:06 - 00:18:18:20 

Anna Cox 

Yeah. Recognising individuals. And the thing that I was so surprised by was how it served as an opportunity for us to discover even more things that were happening in the faculty that we didn't know about. 

00:18:18:20 - 00:18:45:06 

Beverley Isibor 

I know, especially when it came to the FBS. So for me, in the Faculty of Brain Sciences, EDI awards were also the inclusion awards at UCL. I was like, I don't know you from anywhere. And that's really bad because, you know, I'm the EDI coordinator, but wow, you're doing amazing things. And it just shows like even out of our own, you know, understanding or awareness that so much more is happening within the faculty. 

00:18:45:07 - 00:18:54:06 

Anna Cox 

Yeah. But I think it shows the importance of having ways to try to find out about this. Like we have all of these wonderful grassroots stuff. 

00:18:54:08 - 00:18:55:03 

Beverley Isibor 

00:18:55:05 - 00:19:17:21 

Anna Cox 

But even when you're engaged in EDI, it's hard to know about it all. So so finding ways to surface it I think is really important and ensuring that we recognise people's achievements and impact, not just so that they have a nice day and they feel like we're saying thank you, but also because we can learn so much from what they're doing. 

00:19:17:23 - 00:19:23:00 

Anna Cox 

So yeah, I guess that those are the things that kind of stick out to me as being the real successes. 

00:19:23:06 - 00:19:46:03 

Beverley Isibor 

And what would you say to any faculty across, UCL that is like, oh, we really like to structure. Is there a way on bringing it to our faculty? Because I've seen a few requests on, you know, how it works in, brain sciences, people always asking like your governance structures are just like is its own organisation, and that's just for EDI. 

00:19:46:16 - 00:19:50:14 

Beverley Isibor 

So what would you say to someone that is inquiring about that? 

00:19:50:20 - 00:20:19:07 

Anna Cox 

Well, I think we've always been very open to how we've shared, how we've set this up, with other parts of the university, and we've tried hard to work out how it integrates both with, like, the UCL structures as well as that's been changing over time. But I think one of the challenges in taking it to other parts of the university and for other people to implement it is that the faculties are all really different. 

00:20:19:08 - 00:20:19:20 

Beverley Isibor 

Very. 

00:20:20:01 - 00:20:53:20 

Anna Cox 

And so you can't have a one size fits all model. It just doesn't make sense. But I think that there are definitely things that other people could could learn from what we've done in terms of just sort of understanding what we've been trying to achieve and where we think having that structure is really helped. And I think part of that work has been having this annual report that we've done for a few years now, and that has been another way for us to surface. 

00:20:53:20 - 00:21:01:18 

Anna Cox 

And, the things that people have been doing and also keep track of everything that happens. 

00:21:02:10 - 00:21:05:05 

Beverley Isibor 

I know monitoring is the best task ever. 

00:21:05:07 - 00:21:26:11 

Anna Cox 

I think every time we've put it together, there's been more and more things that we've been able to put into it. I hope that other parts of the university could take a look at what we've done, and then kind of adapt it to their own context. But other than necessary, just taking it as it is and then saying, well, we must have someone who does this role or we must have somebody who does that one. 

00:21:26:13 - 00:21:46:23 

Beverley Isibor 

Especially as I like to mention that LTI report, I think is an opportunity to reflect on the year, because I think sometimes people were on to their strategic actions that they have for EPI, when they probably do a report, but actually doing a year by year report on everything they've done across the year probably just puts things more into perspective. 

00:21:47:00 - 00:22:10:08 

Anna Cox 

You know, it's not that dissimilar from doing your annual appraisal, right? Yeah. It's an opportunity to pull together lots of information and to and as you say, to reflect on what's going well, what hasn't, which things are just no longer relevant. You know a year ago they seemed like a really good idea. But now you look at them in a different way I think. 

00:22:10:08 - 00:22:21:10 

Anna Cox 

Yeah. Maybe that's not where we should be putting our effort. Yeah. But also just as a way to track progress, to have that line that you can draw and say, okay, where are we now? 

00:22:21:12 - 00:22:51:17 

Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. And I think another good thing, which I see as a success is having our faculty staff survey. Correct me if I'm wrong because I joined in 2022. So I know there was a survey just as I joined. I don't know if that was the second one or so, but what I love about that survey is that it brings everyone together at this point, all departments together to, you know, ask questions and, you know, really mobilise data, which is very important. 

00:22:51:19 - 00:23:15:07 

Beverley Isibor 

And I think without that structure that you mentioned in the beginning of, you know, getting people to, you know, feed into EDI work, such initiatives like the faculty staff survey will be a bit more difficult with just one person handling in the faculty, but actually is a group of people, you know, mobilising into, you know, push EDI work forward. 

00:23:15:09 - 00:23:39:18 

Anna Cox 

Anyone who's involved in a self-assessment team for Athena Swan will, if at some point realise that they need to do some kind of survey or they need some survey data, and what we always done in the past was rely on the university staff survey. Yeah, but there was a period of time where the frequency of those, wasn't quite working for us. 

00:23:40:05 - 00:24:04:04 

Anna Cox 

And so we felt we needed to fill the gaps so that if a team was putting together their Athena Swan application. But the last lot of data they had was two years ago, they needed to do something and it just made it obvious that actually this was something that could help us if we had it on a really regular cycle. 

00:24:05:01 - 00:24:11:07 

Anna Cox 

And we thought carefully about how to avoid overloading our staff by what. 

00:24:11:10 - 00:24:12:24 

Beverley Isibor 

They could do. Yeah. 

00:24:13:05 - 00:24:24:23 

Anna Cox 

And by working around the UCL staff surveys and also trying to make sure that it was aligned with the UCL survey so that we could make use of that data also you. 

00:24:24:23 - 00:24:25:09 

Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

00:24:25:11 - 00:24:49:17 

Anna Cox 

But also that it provided an opportunity for those parts of the faculty who had less resources because they're smaller, gave them an opportunity to get the data without having to put in as much work if they were running it by themselves. But we also set it up in such a way that whilst the main bulk of it is common. 

00:24:49:17 - 00:24:50:06 

Beverley Isibor 

For. 

00:24:50:07 - 00:25:08:15 

Anna Cox 

All parts of the faculty, that each of the divisions and institutes can also have a bit that's tailored just to their content, you know, and I think that gives us a really nice balance. It means that everybody feels ownership of the survey, because they're not being asked questions that have nothing to do with them. 

00:25:08:16 - 00:25:09:03 

Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

00:25:09:03 - 00:25:29:14 

Anna Cox 

And really, it's a good way for, an institute or division to ask questions, perhaps about something that they've tried to implement and they want feedback on or, you know, to find out what are the challenges that their, their staff are facing. So, you know, I think it's worked in a number of ways. 

00:25:29:16 - 00:25:49:19 

Beverley Isibor 

I want to speak about resourcing. I know we spoke briefly about, you know, buy in from Allen. And, you know, it being kind of easy. Was the resourcing also very easy to get as well because people say, oh, there's not enough budget or we don't. We have to get budget from here. We have to get a budget from there. 

00:25:49:21 - 00:25:54:19 

Beverley Isibor 

Was it easy to streamline budget for, you know, EDI? 

00:25:54:21 - 00:26:31:06 

Anna Cox 

Well, it was perhaps as complex as you might imagine, right? So in terms of the the resourcing, I think one of the first things was when, I was quite new into the role and at this point we were experiencing difficulties in renewing Athena Swan Awards across different parts of the faculty. And we were working quite closely with the central EDI team, and they were understand to be very sensibly saying, well, you need to think about the resourcing like, who's actually going to do this work? 

00:26:31:08 - 00:26:58:03 

Anna Cox 

And so we argued that for each division or institute, they really needed to have some time from a dedicated member of staff in order to support the work that was going on there. And that's where for parts of the faculty that are smaller, they're less likely to be able to earmark parts of their budget that might be able to work for them. 

00:26:58:15 - 00:27:31:06 

Anna Cox 

You know, it was really hard, I think, for them to see how it was going to be possible for them to implement. Tam. But this is one of the areas where, you know, you can really see Alan's influence because he was able to propose ways in which, you know, if we looked at this at their faculty level, then we would be able to resource permanent members of staff at the faculty level who could then support, individual parts of that faculty. 

00:27:31:08 - 00:27:59:23 

Anna Cox 

And so, you know, that resulted in us having, two full time members of staff, yourself included. And I think that's just made such a difference because not only has it meant that for the vice Dean, there's, you know, some dedicated people who are working in this area and you can really see how, you might be able to put those people to use to work on things that might work across the whole faculty. 

00:27:59:24 - 00:28:45:06 

Anna Cox 

Yeah. But also because we're able to say this part of the faculty doesn't have dedicated resources. So how might someone who's working at faculty level be able to dedicate a certain amount of their time to really helping them move forward with some things? So it's given us flexibility. Now, there were other parts of the faculty where it was much easier for them to earmark someone who, perhaps as part of their professional services team, who could take on board some of the EDI work, the kind of fact that implementation work or the data gathering work and build that into part of their role. 

00:28:45:08 - 00:29:11:06 

Anna Cox 

So, for example, you could see how if there was a part of the faculty that has a big teaching remit, you know, they've already got people who are gathering data about students. And so some of that work that might be necessary for, something like an Athena Swan application can be delegated to that team because they're gathering that data anyway. 

00:29:11:08 - 00:29:13:10 

Anna Cox 

We just need them to look at it in a different way. 

00:29:13:11 - 00:29:14:02 

Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

00:29:14:04 - 00:29:24:08 

Anna Cox 

Even within the faculty, we've had to look at those differences and adapt the way we're working so that we're supporting everybody. 

00:29:24:10 - 00:29:40:21 

Beverley Isibor 

So talking about support and everybody, I, I was very personal myself. So I would like to ask you to give an example of an idea initiative that has potentially had a very good human impact on the people within brain sciences. 

00:29:40:23 - 00:30:21:24 

Anna Cox 

We go back to when we were all in Covid lockdowns. There were a number of things that we did then to try to respond to the difficulties people were experiencing. And there were two things there that that stick out to me. One was that we set up these virtual coffee charts. And these were, two like 15 minute slots where you would be randomly allocated to someone for a 15 minute chat as though you had met them by the coffee machine, and you were just having a little chat with them. 

00:30:22:01 - 00:30:41:08 

Anna Cox 

And we had quite a good response in terms of people who wanted to take part in this. And so once a month we would pair them up with someone and we tell them who they were paired with, and they would organise a little catch up and just get a little bit of like human contact, which I think at that time was something that was really important to people. 

00:30:41:10 - 00:31:07:22 

Anna Cox 

The second thing is the carers fund that we set up, which well, all started during Covid kind of inspired by two other things that we'd seen in the university, one which was a carers fund that had been set up in the faculty. Really to help support people who had additional expenses, when they were attending conferences. 

00:31:07:22 - 00:31:37:19 

Anna Cox 

So perhaps they needed more childcare, for example, whilst they were away. And the other area of inspiration came from a fund that was set up by the central LDI team during the lockdowns, which was, which provided small pots of money for people either who needed to try to entertain their kids at home whilst also getting their job done, or who might need some additional assistance. 

00:31:37:19 - 00:32:11:22 

Anna Cox 

So perhaps because they were having to change how they talk to being online, or they had difficulties with conducting their research because they were in lockdown, so the money could be used for those things as well. So we set up our own fund with quite a broad remit, much like the centrally Di teams fund. And so we know that the people who chose to apply to the fund, that it made a big difference to them in terms of the things they were able to do. 

00:32:12:09 - 00:32:34:14 

Anna Cox 

But we've continued that since then and, and now it's, you know, almost exclusively, I think, supporting people who have got additional expenses from travelling. So whether that is going off to a conference somewhere or attending some kind of out-of-hours meeting, so it's somewhere that we can kind of help to cover some of those expenses. 

00:32:34:16 - 00:33:09:11 

Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. Through these two initiatives, what we can see is that, you know, it came out of, I guess, situations and, you know, a need to address certain things. And I would say that as a leader, I would think that, you know, certain situations that you can support to help individuals themselves. It's something that sometimes doesn't get spoken enough about in Eddie, which we often think about the big things of representation, the, you know, diversity, having certain people in the room, but actually it's the little things. 

00:33:10:03 - 00:33:13:14 

Beverley Isibor 

Well, it's not little, but, you know, it's very meaningful. 

00:33:13:18 - 00:33:45:14 

Anna Cox 

I think you're right that there are these kind of different ways of viewing what we're doing right. And and sometimes I do think it's important to look at our data, look at our processes, because if we change things for the better, there's an opportunity to have an impact on many people. Yes, but doing the little things and those are the things that that I think can really change the general culture because they're much more personal and bespoke. 

00:33:45:16 - 00:34:15:03 

Anna Cox 

Right? Not everybody needs one kind of support, but it's a way of really looking people as individuals and saying, well, what is there something that would just make a really big difference to you? And it just creates a bit of a different atmosphere. If you're working somewhere where you feel that the organisation, your line manager, your peers will go out of their way to do something just for you. 

00:34:15:04 - 00:34:15:16 

Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

00:34:16:06 - 00:34:37:04 

Anna Cox 

And I think when we're thinking about how we really change the culture of the place that we're working in, if we want to make it feel caring and equitable. Yeah. And fair. It's not about giving everybody the same thing. It's about really looking at the individuals and what's going to help them. 

00:34:37:04 - 00:35:02:08 

Beverley Isibor 

Yeah I agree. So on that no I'm going to ask you one more question. I call it the magic wand question. So if there was one thing in your five years of being vice Dean, what would be the the magic wand, what would you do employing sciences that you know would change, Eddie, if you had the magic wand? 

00:35:02:10 - 00:35:04:06 

Beverley Isibor 

And I think. 

00:35:04:08 - 00:35:06:12 

Anna Cox 

It's a really difficult question. 

00:35:06:14 - 00:35:11:02 

Beverley Isibor 

I know you can answer it. 

00:35:11:03 - 00:35:14:08 

Beverley Isibor 

And you love a challenge. 

00:35:14:10 - 00:35:27:07 

Anna Cox 

The one thing that I would kind of change or try to make happen. Well, I don't know, 

00:35:27:09 - 00:35:37:20 

Anna Cox 

I think it's easy to sort of think. Oh, well, I try to get rid of these challenges or those challenges, you know, like the things that got in the way of us wanting to do more. 

00:35:37:20 - 00:35:39:19 

Beverley Isibor 

00:35:39:21 - 00:35:46:09 

Anna Cox 

But those things are all part of the experience that led us to where we are. So I don't know that I'd really want to change any of them. 

00:35:46:11 - 00:35:49:06 

Beverley Isibor 

Oh that's a first. 

00:35:49:08 - 00:36:05:18 

Anna Cox 

If I had a magic wand I would increase the resources that were available across the whole of the faculty because, you know, then maybe with it easily been able to do much more. Yeah, I don't know, but. 

00:36:05:20 - 00:36:07:04 

Beverley Isibor 

But that's an easy answer. 

00:36:07:04 - 00:36:18:13 

Anna Cox 

It is. I think, you know, my experience across lots of different situations is that when you're constrained, you have to be more creative. 

00:36:18:15 - 00:36:19:13 

Beverley Isibor 

Yeah. 

00:36:19:15 - 00:36:26:02 

Anna Cox 

And that that has many benefits. So yeah, I don't know if I've really answered your question. 

00:36:26:03 - 00:36:49:14 

Beverley Isibor 

You have you have because this is your magic wand. So you can do what you can. But on that note, I would like to say thank you so much, not only for coming on this podcast, but just being an amazing vice team. As someone who's worked really, very closely, I don't think you get told enough how great you are, how amazing and inspiring you were during your role. 

00:36:49:14 - 00:37:07:20 

Beverley Isibor 

I'm still, I really hope that you see in yourself as well that you've made such incredible change in brain sciences and, have been such a beacon to everyone else at UCL. So I wanted to say thank you. And I'm sure everyone that has worked at Brain Sciences will say the same thing about you. And also, thank you for being an amazing Vice Dean. 

00:37:07:20 - 00:37:20:16 

Beverley Isibor 

And also thank you for joining us on this podcast on speaking about leadership and how you navigated that. I hope this was a great reflective session for yourself as well as to your achievements. So thank you, Anna. 

00:37:20:18 - 00:37:35:01 

Anna Cox 

Thanks very much for having me. You've said some very kind things, and I really want to thank you and everybody else who contributed to what we achieved, because none of it would have happened without everybody else. 

00:37:35:01 - 00:37:42:04 

Beverley Isibor 

Thank you. That's just Anna being so nice. 

00:37:42:06 - 00:37:51:13 

Beverley Isibor 

So on that note, I hope to see you in the next episode. Bye now. 

00:37:51:15 - 00:37:59:13 

Beverley Isibor 

Thank you for joining the EDI chronicles at Brain Sciences Podcast. I'm your host, Beverley Isibor, and I hope you join us next time.