Trinity’s Student Management Fund (SMF) reintroduced members to its flagship annual event on Wednesday evening with the return of the Leadership Perspective Series, held this year in the new Business School for the first time. This event aims to give SMF members relevant and up to date insight into the challenges and convergence of leadership theory with practise. The Leadership Perspectives series drew a sizable and involved crowd sufficient to fill the large Dargan theatre – admittedly a crowd perhaps boosted by the lure of a Trinity Ball ticket.
The theme of the night’s moderated panel discussion was “the power of diversity” and established fertile ground for guest speakers to explore and explain through their own experiences. Diversity being the theme it was refreshing to hear speakers drawing from a wide range of experiences and areas of expertise encompassing the worlds of professional sports, investment, food, taxation and the wider financial world. We were treated to four accomplished and accoladed guests – including former NFL fullback, broadcaster and speaker Cecil Martin; current CEO of Fulfil Nutrition Brian O’Sullivan; Dr Heather Melville, the head of client experience at PwC UK and Amanda Pullinger, the CEO of 100 Women in Finance.
Melville aptly summarised the event when she said that “I am looking for the day when we don’t have to talk about inclusion and diversity”. It was a message emphasised again and again by speakers and the overarching theme was that diversity is the common-sense route forward. O’Sullivan pointed out that to encourage diversity and expand perspectives is the logical approach to seeking new solutions: “We have lots of big problems in the world, to get to how we solve for those challenges and how we create opportunities for the future we need diversity of thinking. We don’t need people who come from the same background with the same experiences.”
Discussions about diversity in any sector often lead to debates about quotas and limits. O’Sullivan, who frankly said that “in principle, I don’t agree with them”, admitted that change may not come without regulations. Melville brought an interesting perspective, arguing that “none of us will accept targets if we don’t have a plan to deliver it”.
It was interesting to follow the discussion as it developed and evolved into different conceptions of diversity. Pullinger said diversity is a valuable, but rare, aspect of many workplaces: “Creating diversity of thought in a team is not very easy, partly because very often those diverse thinkers are hidden, they’re not necessarily voices we are hearing.” This suggestion of a hidden exclusion hindering more obvious diversity initiatives stood out as a valid take on the subject, justifying the effort and time put into enabling such a forum for this discussion.
