June 20, 2025
Another year, another fantastic CIPD Festival of Work in London and as always, it didn’t disappoint. This year felt particularly energising, with lots of brilliant conversations (especially with charities and not-for-profits) and a real buzz around accessibility. If you haven’t heard of this event, it’s well worth considering, as everything is free and they have some great speakers and sessions (and it’s really accessible at the Excel via the amazing Elisabeth Line).
One of the standouts for an accessibility nerd like me was seeing the excitement around the new AI British Sign Language solution provided by the Charity Learning Consortium. This is definitely one to check out if you’ve missed it.
Here’s a quick round-up of some of the standout sessions from me, Jennifer Compton, at Little Man Project. If you’re curious about Day 2, head over to the Charity Learning Consortium blog – the link is at the bottom of the post.
Day 1 Highlights
Leading with Confidence in Times of Crisis
Sarah Armstrong, Chief Security Advisor at Microsoft, reminded us that when it comes to crisis management, people need to come first. Often, organisations blame individuals as the weakest link in security, but she challenged us to consider: What if you’re the problem? Is your culture the real issue?
Key takeaways:
- Staff need safe spaces to report mistakes without fear.
- Human-centred leadership is crucial; it’s not just about financial or security impacts, but how incidents affect people.
- True empathy and psychological safety help build trust and resilience.
Rethinking EDI: All Action, No Thought
Prof. Binna Kandola and Jo Kandola delivered a thought-provoking talk on why EDI sometimes falls short. The reason? Organisations were doing more EDI, but not necessarily better or by people with the right skills. They challenged the use of quotas and specific EDI training. The benefit of menopause training for one which generated a lot of discussion!
The talk encouraged EDI professionals to really reflect on their practice:
- Define what diversity and inclusion really means for your organisation.
- Focus on evidence-based practice, not just trends.
- Keep learning, reviewing skills and addressing gaps.
Owning Your Power: Championing Women’s Confidence and Leadership
Advita Patel (CommsRebel) gave a powerful session on women’s wellbeing and confidence in the workplace. She highlighted that women’s health and confidence are too often seen as personal matters when they are very much workplace issues. Training on women’s issues was high on the priority list, so it was very interesting to attend two sessions back-to-back that had different perspectives on the benefits (or lack thereof) of this approach (for example, the benefits of menopause-specific training).
Key takeaways:
- Did you know? Nearly 1 million women in the UK have left work due to menopause symptoms – that’s not sustainable.
- We need to embed confidence into leadership frameworks and create visibility, mentoring, and allyship at all levels.
- It’s not just mentoring, it’s sponsorship that makes a lasting difference (how do people talk about you when you’re out of the room).
How to Emotionally Engage Your Team
This interactive, high-energy talk by Think Productive had us clapping, dancing, and sharing our biggest fears with strangers! Their aim was to reinforce how emotions drive engagement. Essential, as recent research found 62% of staff are not engaged and 17% are actively disengaged.
So, how do we keep people engaged? We can’t logic people into engagement; it’s about emotional connection, and almost no leaders are trained in this.
Enter their framework, the seven human needs at work: safety, play, power, belonging, self-expression, inspiration and purpose. When leaders understand these, it creates a ripple effect of wellbeing and motivation across the organisation.
Head over to the Charity Learning Consortium blog to read our Day 2 highlights and watch our 45-second wonder around the event.