Month: March 2025

Introduction

I bought David Brook’s How to Know a Person *many months ago. It had been sitting in my line up of audiobooks not so much neglected as passed over as books demanding my immediate attention were favoured. 

The book turns out to be an extraordinarily powerful guide on how to be a more inclusive person. The trick is to pay attention to other people as they are, not how you think about them. There’s not a huge amount to say other than if you want to find ways to develop your capacity to be more inclusive, this book is an outstanding guide. 

Below are a few quick reflections

The power of curiosity

What is that person really like? When a person is habituated to being subject to discrimination, they can express reserve and uncertainty. It is easy to appear to lack social confidence. 

I need Canadian crutches to stay upright. During a break in a meeting of my department’s Disability Employee Network [DEN] when everyone else was standing around chatting, cuppa in one hand and biscuit in the other, I had to find a place to sit and ask somebody to get me a coffee and biscuit. I sat alone. I needed a chair and a table to put my cup on. There was nothing closer than 20 metres from the group. Then the Secretary of my department came over and introduced himself. He said he had noticed I was off by myself and wanted to know if I was okay. I was fine. I just couldn’t stand with the others. We chatted the rest of the break. 

Later, when I became Chair of the DEN, I remembered that conversation. I felt comfortable reaching out to the Secretary and that led to a collaboration that was fundamental to the DEN’s subsequent success. 

Wanting to know whether I was okay became the foundation of a partnership that benefitted many staff with disability. Had the Secretary not been open, curious and concerned I don’t know what might have happened later. I do know that that chat gave me the confidence to build a partnership that was instrumental in transforming how the DEN operated.

When we are uncertain

It is easy to be open with people for whom we have formed a liking and assume there will be reciprocation.   But when we have no idea whether we will like them, or if we see something that hints that we may not like them, we can project our discomfort onto that person and anticipate coolness or rejection. 

Brooks reminds us that we can be centred in our own goodwill, and we can make the interaction about the other person and not about our anticipation. And if we are met with coolness, our concern for the other person’s welfare can guide us to want to know more. Why have they acted coolly toward me? This is better than reacting, feeling offended – “I am a good person. I am hurt by that response.”

It’s not always about me.

We humans naturally make our way in the world about us with a certain ‘selfish’ perspective. Looking after our own needs and making sure we are okay is natural and normal. But so is looking after the welfare of other people in our community. We need that balance to build a healthy place to live and work.

In the complex, pluralistic and diverse community that we live in it would be utterly psychologically exhausting to process every interaction with other people consciously. Our biases, stereotypes and projections are our energy efficient ways of managing interactions. But they are not well attuned to the reality we live in now. We can learn when to be more open to those who are not like us so we can embrace the diversity around us with curiosity, empathy and confidence.

If you see yourself as a good person who is inclusive and not discriminatory – not unkind or unempathetic, you must be conscious of the difference between your reflexes and your ideals. 

Living up to our ideals takes conscious effort to overcome reflexes which trigger anxiety and fear in the face of uncertainty. We can think ourselves open and inclusive but also avoid encountering people who are unfamiliar to us. 

It seems that there is a common thing that was epitomized to me in a story of an American senior manager. He said he was supportive of Disability Inclusion, but he felt he couldn’t approach and talk to staff with disability for fear of giving offence. Maybe that was a climate of militant advocacy in his workplace? But probably not. It could have been he came across a passionate advocate whose message was interpreted as being reactive to inexpert efforts at expressing sympathy for the cause. It could have been that he knew so little about disability he saw people with disability as somehow inherently different.

Still, had he the skills David Brooks explores in his book maybe that uncertainty wouldn’t have been as daunting to overcome.

Being certain isn’t always the best approach though

A few years back I was visiting an office I used to work in for a meeting. I was waiting in reception to be invited into the secure area. Suddenly the fire alarm sounded. It was a drill. I was on the 5^th floor, and I don’t do fire escape stairs because of my disability, so I sat patiently waiting for the drama to die down. I was sitting near the lifts, as I might be instructed in a real emergency.

A woman approached me and asked if she might find my carer for me. I very nicely let her know that I was a fellow employee, a Senior Project Officer, here for a meeting. She fled in embarrassment. I never saw her again. There was no way I was offended. It was hilarious. 

She was so kind. She was concerned for my welfare, and I appreciated that. I still would like to know why she thought I looked like a person who had, or needed, a carer. I liked her confidence. Had she not assumed I was in need of care I am sure our interaction would have gone more smoothly. But then, I wouldn’t have such a good story to tell. 

Conclusion

Being inclusive requires conscious intent. We cannot banish our reflexes, but we can modify them and refine them. 

There’s a reason the Good Samaritan story is in the Bible. It isn’t so much a religious story as a psychological one about being a good neighbour by not reflexively responding to impulses to not see another person in need as somebody worthy of our care and empathy. 

Hospitality to strangers is a common theme in many cultures around the world. In a few cultures reflexively killing strangers is also a thing. That’s unfortunate, but also true.

If you support the ideals of celebrating diversity and living inclusively you support the hospitality-to-strangers principle. 

But in our densely populated world the stranger isn’t necessarily from a faraway land. They could be from next door, from the next desk, or the seat beside you on a train. They could be that person sitting alone when everyone else is standing together. 

I don’t know how my time as DEN Chair might have gone in a parallel universe in which the Secretary assumed I was okay and wanted to be alone. I do know that how things did go was determined in a big way by an act of curiosity and empathy – by an act of inclusion. I am grateful for that. I think a lot of other folks should also be grateful, and will be, now I’ve told this story.

*I show links to Amazon because it is uniquely inclusive in providing information about ebooks and audiobooks which are more accessible to many. I encourage users of 3D books to buy from local independent bookstores.

Introduction

Make Work Fair by Iris Bohnet and Siri Chilazi was published in late January 2025. It argued that the adverse political passions targeting DEI in the US were a very good reason to abandon the language of DEI in favour of the idea of fairness. There is a lot of merit in this suggestion. But it’s not ideal in my view.

DEI has been denigrated by ultra conservative influencers determined to misrepresent its goals and how it has been implemented. Like any aspirational set of values DEI hasn’t been manifested perfectly, but that’s no reason to attack it.

In her 2023 book Left is not Woke, Susan Neiman argues that the Left isn’t Woke, but it has allowed itself to be identified as such. Being Woke has become an insult because it has become associated with the identity politics that inhabit the Left extremity of the political spectrum. The Right extreme employs the insult against the Left in general, and the Left has fumbled its response.

This fumble has hurt DEI and, by extension, the cause of Disability Inclusion.

What is woke?

Here are some quotes from NPR’s Morning Edition on 19 July 2023. The show’s host is Domenico Montanaro, and his guest is Elaine Richardson is a professor of literacy studies at the Ohio State University. They are discussing What does the word ‘woke’ really mean, and where does it come from?

RICHARDSON: In simple terms, it just means being politically conscious and aware, like stay woke.

MONTANARO: The word has a long history. It was used in Black protest songs dating back to the early 20th century, including by Huddie Ledbetter, better known as Lead Belly, the singer of the 1938 song “Scottsboro Boys.”

RICHARDSON: It comes out of the experience of Black people of knowing that you have to be conscious of the politics of race, class, gender, systemic racism, ways that society is stratified and not equal.

MONTANARO: Modern Black activism and the Black Lives Matter movement used it widely as a rallying cry. At other times, the seriousness of the word has been diluted, used facetiously and ironically on social media. And now the word has been co-opted as a political slogan on the right…

MONTANARO: On the campaign trail, though, there’s no sign of the candidates abandoning the word as they continue to use it to galvanize the conservative base around culture war issues.

DEI isn’t political

DEI is a philosophical value set accepted by people who identify themselves as either Left or Right – to the extent that these terms have meaning any more. Some on the Left prefer to call themselves Progressive, but folks on the Right could do the same – if the term hadn’t become co-opted by the Left.

Wokeness, as Neiman observes, is a term that members of Far Left have adopted to convey concern for just causes, but it has become enmeshed in identity politics through identification with the victims of those real injustices.

DEI risks being identified with Wokeness because it recognises the members of our community who, because of identified attributes, are subject to discrimination. Those who see themselves as members a of minority group within their community may respond to the injustices they experience in ways that don’t necessarily sit well with everyone. Identity politics can play out under the umbrella of DEI without necessarily being an inherent element of DEI.

This creates a complex challenge for DEI practitioners. The principles of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion don’t give cause to exclude advocates of Wokeness who see that being a member of a minority group as a bona fide political concern. A political response isn’t invalid, but it may not be well suited to a setting – especially an organisational one. This can leave a perception management problem that must be handled adroitly.

So, is changing the name the solution?

Name changes can solve problems. I like the idea of fairness at work being a theme. It presently lacks any political contamination. I also like kindness at work. Having a workplace culture that is fair and kind expresses two universal values that no reasonable person would object to – you’d hope.

A problem emerges when we think about to whom we should be fair and kind – the same people DEI intends to help. The how of being fair and kind runs into the same issues the how of DEI struggles to overcome.

DEI lays out principles at a head level in a shorthand way that can be unhelpful. Each word represented by an initial is a conversation that rarely happens. As a consequence its detractors have an easy target to misrepresent what DEI is about. Of course, DEI is Woke in the proper historical sense. It embraces Woke in the contemporary positive sense. But it isn’t Woke in the pejorative sense of identity politics that Right extremists have crafted. But who can figure that out?

On the other hand, fairness and kindness seem to speak for themselves – and from the heart. If we are being systematic, we might say that kindness is the action and fairness is the outcome.

How do we become kinder?

That’s a pretty deep question, when you pause to ponder it. But before we can answer it there’s another question to be asked – Do we want to become kinder?

I will guess that you do, since you are reading this. But can you speak for everyone else in your workplace?

Being kinder is what DEI is about essentially, but it assumes that the way to get there is via formal strategies that focus on individual attributes [especially those that make a person a victim] and training [disability awareness, anti-bias and the like]. This makes sense from a bureaucratic perspective, but it may also explain why DEI practitioners often struggle to achieve the success they desire. In this they are not alone. Efforts at organisational change frequently fail to attain their objectives.

Asking other people to become kinder without asking the same thing of yourself won’t give the best guidance on how to make that happen. If you explore being kinder yourself, you will likely discover vulnerabilities and uncertainties that can’t be explored and addressed in a half day Kindness Awareness course. Some things aren’t as amenable to efforts at training as we’d like to think.

There are better ways to promote the creation of a kinder workplace.

It’s complicated

There’s merit in DEI. Any effort at changing workplace behaviour needs a theory or two, a strategy, measurements and methods of accountability. But then it’s time to climb down out of your head and find a comfortable place in your heart before you devise actions to take. Changing behaviour, even to become kinder, takes cognitive effort. Hence it requires personal commitment that is best stimulated by demonstrated personal commitment from others.

It interests me that DEI training and strategies are something executive leaders expect to be delivered to everyone other than themselves. In one respect they are expected to know this stuff and be competent at it because they are executive leaders. But that’d be wholly unreasonable and unrealistic. It’s also unfair, and not inclusive.

There is an abundance of evidence that when executive leaders live what are considered the core values of the organisation its workforce will follow. We have a natural urge to want to emulate how high-status individuals behave. DEI isn’t bottom up. Its top-down. The same applies with kindness.

This doesn’t mean that we wait on executive leaders to be kind. Kindness is an inherent human attribute that can expand when unshackled from bias. This can be part of workplace behaviour by anyone who wants to participate in being kinder and strengthened by shared engagement.

What the top-down flow does is express a core organisational value that will permeate a workplace culture and dissolve those pockets of resistance that are responsible for most of the harm done.

Conclusion

DEI isn’t inherently political but suffers from the association claimed by supporters and imputed by detractors. It’s a difficult path to manage well. But its greater challenge is that it is often seen as an add-on – a moral obligation imposed from on high. And when those on high do not walk their talk, the workforce gets the message that this value isn’t important.

Arguably we have a right to be unkind and unfair in our private lives, but not at work – if kindness and fairness [indeed DEI] are our employer’s core values. And that’s about performing those values, not just saying them.

There is difference between complying with imposed moral obligations and personally adopting universal human values expressed as kindness and fairness – and embodied in DEI. That distinction is something each one of us must contemplate – and then decide how to behave. 

We can sit under the DEI umbrella and engage in our identity politics provided we are aware that our passions might wreck the umbrella. It’s not about whether our cause is just, just how we campaign for it.

There’s no inherent or necessary separation of philosophy and politics, but the practice of the former isn’t the same as the practice of the latter – and we need to know the difference.

Being Woke in the original sense is a good thing. But it can be enacted in an unwise way. The fact that credible researchers like Iris Bohnet and Siri Chilazi suggest walking away from DEI language does expose a very real problem – one of a lack of capacity to articulate a compelling defense. 

We have an opportunity to open up the conversation and tap deeper and richer veins of thought and feeling.

Introduction

Some of my former colleagues are still traumatized by actions of egregious discrimination and abuse perpetrated by those who hold positions of power. Others recall acts of astonishing insensitivity and bewildering refusals to act in response to access requests to avert impending injury. Former colleagues have had to resort to workers compensation claims for psychological injuries caused by such insensitivity – and breach of the organization’s obligations. Never once has the person responsible been known to have been required to account for their conduct. 

A former colleague and friend who had experienced an extraordinary degree of discrimination because of their disability was horrified when I sent them a draft of this post – now completely rewritten – because I argued that accountability begins with us all. Yes, abusive leaders should have been held responsible for what they did. But they weren’t – and that reality still causes very real distress. I wish it were otherwise. 

If we are ever to ensure accountability is an inviolable core value in any organization we must understand why it is so hard to make it real. 

If we want equity and inclusion, we need a culture of accountability that enables self-correction at an organizational level. Those at the bottom of the power pyramid cannot passively stand by and demand those at the top model what they want – even though they really should be doing so. 

Accountability can’t live in one part of an organization’s culture and not elsewhere. It must be manifested as universally as possible. As social creatures we tend to conform to norms – so to make accountability the norm to which others will conform we must begin with ourselves. This does not excuse past wrongs. But creating a culture that honors accountability might lead to reflective self-awareness by perpetrators and those who looked the other way. Well, to be honest, I don’t hold out much hope for that. But we must start somewhere.

My purpose here is to support the reader who might be frustrated or distressed by those who talk accountability for discriminatory actions but do not convert words to deeds. Learn to understand why this happens, and then you can formulate an effective response.

We don’t do accountability well as a culture. I think this is because we have a culturally ingrained reflex to see accountability as a punitive response.

I grew up in a time when getting a hiding from one’s parents or teacher was acceptable. Those whose role it was to love and guide us thought inflicting pain was the right and good thing to do in service of guiding our behaviour. No wonder we don’t like being held to an account – if it means pain or shame. 

There are fundamental psychological difficulties as well. We are more lenient on our in-group members and tougher on members of out-groups. I learned this lesson a few decades ago in a stark and powerful way

A few decades ago, I was urged to run for the role of chair of a community board responsible for managing a funded community service. I was urged to do so by the service’s staff who were distressed by the behaviour of their manager. They had been complaining about him to the board for months. The manager sat in on board meetings, so the staff were perplexed that nothing had happened. 

At my first board meeting, as chair, I ensured the manager would not attend and asked the board why it had not acted in response to complaints from staff.  There was a pause and one member spoke up. They had talked about it privately. They felt that taking action against the manager would be an act of disloyalty. Of the 12 members of the board 9 were managers in their own right in small businesses in the community. They understood how hard it was to be a manager so they couldn’t punish this guy. So they did nothing. 

This is a true story. It was the first time I had experienced in-group protection so starkly, but I had no language for it back then. It was just a stunning experience I filed away for later. Now I look back and realise that punishment was the only option to the board. These were blokes in a country town, and they couldn’t imagine acting in a caring or nurturing way in this scenario.

The big problem with striving for inclusiveness for any ERG is what to do when one’s organization, despite avowing zero tolerance for abusive behaviour is utterly unmoved when one of its managers or executives is implicated in bullying or discriminating against a staff member who is a member of a ‘diversity group’. 

How do we transform inaction into meaningful, effective and accountable action?

How should we respond?

For reasons noted above accountability is a complex matter – especially when it is seemingly absent. We must respond with insight, patience and respect. Self-righteous anger, or frustration, can muddy the message and lead to push back.

Accountability can become a chorus line repeated by people who know it is a good thing, but who haven’t yet found the need to look deeper into how it may happen. Nothing is more counterproductive than talking at cross purposes and with emotional heat on a matter everyone essentially agrees upon.

In my union delegate days, I was often dismayed when my comrades misread the intent of management representatives and generated conflict when there was no need at all. We can come out fighting from our corner when the other party wants to parlay, but we don’t yet have a shared language. And the reverse is also true. We want to talk but are met with defensiveness and anticipatory retaliation. Same problem – no shared language crafted from mutual understanding and trust.

The creation of a cultural climate in which mutual understanding and trust is necessary before anything else about accountability can change.

Making accountability a person-centred thing

There will be times when a punitive response to an accountability issue is warranted. Maybe it is the only thing to do. Being responsible for such an action is tough enough, especially if the individual in question is a member of one’s in-group. 

If an organization openly says inclusivity is a core value but does not respond when a leader does not uphold that value it is easy for others to see that, despite the talk, it’s not really. Under these circumstances a punitive response is neither reasonable nor fair. 

So, before we can muse on whether a failure to be fair, kind or inclusive merits a punitive response we need to address commitment to values at an organizational level. 

With the exception of 5 years (1996 -2001) I worked in the NSW public service in 4 departments. The commitment to values has been generally strong but the failings I witnessed were stark – and unaccountable. This included an alleged rape of a subordinate staff member by an executive. It was unreported because there was no faith in the accountability process.

The current NSW public service asserts its core values. Here’s an excerpt:

“All NSW government sector employees are required and expected to act ethically, lawfully and in the public interest. This can be achieved by adhering to the government sector core values of Integrity, Trust, Accountability and Service.”

I am going to sound like a pedant here, but please bear with me. When I see wording like “(All) employees are required and expected to…” I wonder why anybody would approve such a contradiction in terms. Required brooks no exceptions. But expected does. We can see the echoes of expected everywhere.

The 2024 People Matter Employee Survey [PMES] showed that 81% of respondents had a favorable view of the sector’s ethics and values but 61% had an unfavorable assessment of leaders’ decision making and accountability. However, we must remember that the survey’s overall response rate was 51%. These numbers could conceal a deeper level of discontent. 

I prefer to look at these figures a different way – as if people mattered. If 19%, nearly 1 in 5 staff, are not content with the sector’s ethics and values and only 40% (2 in 5) are content with leaders’ decision making and accountability a different picture emerges. The problem with PMES results is that there’s an openly declared ‘pass mark’. A score of 80% looks good until you see it in terms of people – 20% or 1 in 5 are discontent. Is that okay?

The survey ranks the score into 3 groups – 0-49%, 50% -74%, 75% -100%. The impression I get is that it is a bit like grading school work into fail, pass and credit. That doesn’t work for people, surely. 

Generally speaking, the 2024 figures seem pretty good – only 14% experienced bullying, only 5% experienced sexual harassment [but that might be close to 10% of women], only 8% experienced discrimination [of what kind?], only 4% experienced racism [what portion of the workforce is likely to experience racism.?] But again, that’s only of the 51% of the sector who responded. Non-responses to surveys are for a variety of reasons – including disengagement and despair. Even among respondents the employee engagement score is only 62% positive (2 in 5 not feeling it) 

The 2024 survey had only one key topic area (ethics and values) at over 75% (81%). That’s 1 of 20 key topic areas.  There were 3 ‘fails’ – action on survey results (42%), pay (44%) and senior executives (48%). 

I think the PMES deserves a deeper and more sophisticated assessment than a school mark approach. Official interpretations understandably are inclined to put a positive spin on the scores, but digging deeper is something we must do. What’s a pass mark when it comes to psychological wellbeing of staff?

The 2023 State of the NSW Public Sector Report shows that 13.2% of staff experienced bullying but only 25.5% of the 49.2% of staff who reported bullying were satisfied with the outcome of their complaint. 

Let’s put that another way. Only half of the staff who say they experienced bullying reported it and of those who did 75% were unhappy with the outcome. 

Some readers might object that not all perceptions of bullying are real. That’s true. But satisfaction with an outcome of a complaint is more about how it was handled than whether the complaint felt justified. Regardless, this is still a woeful number. 

I am not picking on the NSW public sector here. There’s no reason to believe any other public sector is any different. I just happen to know the sector well. I also have extensive experience in complaints investigation. 

Here’s an excerpt from the 2021 State of the NSW Public Sector report. 

“As with other negative workplace behaviours, the numbers are low. However, any level of discrimination and racism is unacceptable, and we need to work together to ensure that everyone has a positive experience at work.” This is an entirely sensible statement, but I want to draw the reader’s attention to the word “unacceptable”. 

It’s another soft articulation of a declaration of required behaviour. 

Bullying has decreased from 29% in 2012 to 20% in 2016, and 18% in 2019. So, a score of 14% in 2024 can justifiably be seen as a significant improvement since 2012. That’s a 50% reduction in reported incidents over 12 years. 

I am not critical of the NSW public sector, but I do want to point up a problem that is deeply entrenched in bureaucracies, organizational culture and individual behaviour. 

It is that if you require a certain standard of behaviour as an expression of core values it isn’t okay to water down the language and change required behaviour to ‘expected’ and prohibited behaviour as ‘unacceptable’. 

Saying behaviour is ‘unacceptable’ and that better behaviour is ‘expected’ is what we have heard as children from people who voice their disapproval and nothing else. There is a message that shaming a person for misconduct is enough. If we are powerless to act to hold a person to account, an expression of disapproval and frustration might be the best that we can muster. 

Even if the younger generations don’t have similar experiences those attitudes are already baked into organizational culture and bureaucratic culture.

The data on bullying, even in 2024, shows that it is still happening to at least 1 in 10 people. Okay, let’s change that and imagine 100 colleagues. Now imagine 10 say they have been bullied, only 5 feel it was worthwhile drawing this to the attention of leaders, and only 1 later said they were satisfied with the outcome of their report. 

Ask yourself how this fits with an organization’s assertion that accountability is a core value. 

Here we have several problem areas. The first is when we reduce people to numbers. The NSW public sector can look at the rate of bullying and celebrate that the rate has halved since 2012. Or it can be horrified that still 13% of staff report being bullied, reporting rates are so poor, or that so few staff are happy with the outcome of their efforts to seek accountability. If accountability is genuinely a core value that number should be 0%. 

There’s a fundamental difference between an aspiration and a core value. Accountability isn’t expressed as an aspiration. It’s what is on all the time. Can you imagine a public sector with integrity, trust and service being expressed as an aspiration? We want to get to the point where we act with integrity and can be trusted. I don’t think service is a core value, that’s just lazy thinking. 

Core values are what we embody all the time and what others expect of us – all the time. 

So why is it so hard?

Thinking a punitive reaction is the only response is ingrained in our cultural reflex –  that’s one problem. 

If we want a person to be held accountable for their actions but think a punitive response isn’t the right thing in any circumstance – that’s another problem. 

If being punitive is easier and more satisfying than supporting, guiding or coaching a person whose behaviour is in need of correction – that’s another problem. 

Add the in-group leniency and over-reaction to out-groups into the mix. 

In short, we can paint ourselves into corners and become unresponsive and ineffectual because we confuse ourselves by mixing up core values and aspirations. I think the NSW core values are aspirations and its dishonest and misleading to claim otherwise. It’s as if the authors didn’t understand the distinction and those who approved the text weren’t aware there was a contradiction. It is fine to have aspirations, but not as a string of single words. Calling them ‘core values’ makes single words seem more potent. We are trapped by brevity and then confused.

Researchers into organizational behaviour and effective leadership say breaches of core values must be responded to with immediate and effective action that leaves no doubt that required behaviour is just that, not expected behaviour. 

I am not suggesting a plan to fix problems related to accountability not being upheld. That’s a big thing to fix. What I want to do is stimulate reflective thinking on what we mean by accountability and what we expect – of ourselves, our colleagues and our organization.

The risk is that when we sense that accountability is lacking it is easy to become frustrated and disengaged. If we go this way our capacity to productively raise concerns about accountability will be impaired. 

There are some important takeaways for ERG leaders here. They are:

• Accountability is a complex matter, so any attempt to engage one’s organization on the matter must be informed, nuanced and blame free. 
• Nurture or coaching based accountability is initially preferable, unless the person in question is recalcitrant and irredeemably averse to changing their conduct. But commitment to remedial action to change behaviour must be present in all related parties. 
• Be realistic about what you can achieve. But also be prepared to have a nuanced conversation with your executive leaders. Talking to executive sponsors and champions first is a good idea. 

Conclusion

There is no doubt that the cause of inclusion and fairness in any organization is impaired if accountability is asserted to be a core value – and then there’s no follow through. There must be an agreement or protocol on how there can be effective and consequential follow through. 

Issues of accountability arise in several key contexts:

• Egregious acts that require a formal response.
• Failures to act, or misguided action that are generated by unintentional action, including being exacerbated by stress. These can be dealt with in a supportive manner – as a learning or developmental opportunity or just some help – and no judgement.

Many ERGs will have terms of reference that prohibit direct intervention in incidents that give rise to demands a colleague or leader be held to account for their action or inaction. These are necessary limitations. But that doesn’t mean that discussion on, and negotiations about, how accountability works as a core value can’t or shouldn’t be engaged in. Neither does it mean that an ERG may not be supportive, acknowledging the pressure middle management is under to be across many complex demands. ERGs often have subject matter experts who could be supporting over-taxed middle managers.

Accountability is a fundamental value that informs who we are as individuals in our private lives, and how we behave as staff members as we add our personal dimension to the character of our organization’s culture.

It is the one core value that defines the organization and creates a climate in which ERGs can be effective contributors to achieving their agreed missions in partnership with the organizations. Partnerships with no functioning capacity for mutual accountability don’t work and can’t survive.

I will come back to this theme in coming months because talking on such a complex theme requires ideas that are well-developed and language that is comfortably employed. And it may take a bit to get there.

Opening note

I have been getting comments from people who have discovered the nearly 2- year-old post. These comments have moved me to repost it. The need hasn’t changed, and I do hope I might inspire you to make a commitment to financial support. I am on a very restricted income these days, but I still contribute the very modest sum of AUD$10 a month. If a lot of us do the same thing, we can have a big impact. It doesn’t hurt us, and it helps our friends with disability in Bali immensely.

Introduction

I am not a fan of the tropics. I’d rather go to Antarctica than Bali, though I suspect accessibility might be an issue there – do Canadian crutches [despite their name] and ice go together?

A few weeks ago, I received an email from Bali – from Linda – a friend and associate I thought I had lost contact with. I had left a message on her Facebook page so long ago that I had forgotten. She likes Facebook as much as me, so years later she gets around to updating – and sends me an email.

Some background 

We worked together back in the late 1990s up in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales writing grant applications and delivering government funded projects when we were successful – which was often. We were a pretty good team and kicked some major goals. Linda’s career morphed into working on international aid projects, and I moved south to Katoomba to join NSW Department of Ageing Disability and Home Care. On one of Linda’s aid projects she contracted Haemorrhagic Dengue Fever in Vietnam around the time I got GBS in Katoomba. She was left with a debilitating poly-arthritic disease that created mobility issues as a complication of her Dengue Fever. Linda went to India in search of a cure and found it. It’s a wild story, worthy of a book or movie. 

She lives in India most of her time these days, but still travels doing humanitarian work. She returns to Australia regularly to visit family.

Disability support in Bali

For the past 12 years, Linda has been supporting a non-for-profit organisation in Bali called Yayasan Penduli Kemanusiaan (YPK) Bali, founded in 2001. Linda tells me a rough translation of the name is ‘humanitarian care foundation’. Bali doesn’t have a National Disability Insurance Scheme [NDIS] or even strong legislation to support people with a disability, so people living with a disability rely on…well YPK Bali and similar organisations. That’s it. To date, YPK has helped 5,234 people with physical disabilities, and has conducted 59,950 hearing checks. The organisation survives on volunteers, and grants in an increasingly constrained pool of opportunities. It does astonishingly well with what it can pull in, but it’s a constant struggle, and it shouldn’t be.

Bali’s population is around 4.36 million. In Australia the prevalence of disability in the community has been estimated at 1 in 6 or 1 in 5. I don’t know what would be a fair figure for Bali, but for the sake of this argument I will propose 1 in 10 to make my point. That’s 436,000 people – not all of whom will require support or services. Let’s say only 25% do – that’s 109,000 people, but if the number is only 10% that’s still 43,600 people. YPK is one of only a handful of services supporting people with disability. 

YPK was set up by Purnawan Budisetia, who is regarded as the father and leader of the organisation. He sadly died September 2022, leaving a gulf in skills in international networking and fundraising. Linda is the senior consultant, working pro bono for YPK. She is the only westerner, and the only one who can write grant applications and provide marketing strategies for YPK to help it continue to raise the funds that it needs to continue its work. The difference between Balinese culture and the European culture [the source of grants] is significant and this makes grant application writing a major challenge.

What YPK Bali achieves on what, for most of us the smell of an oily rag, is remarkable. For younger readers that image may be unfamiliar, but it’s the difference between a can of petrol and just the fumes. YPK Bali operates on the equivalent of less than USD$186,000 [AUD$282,000] a year. With modest resource it employs 23 staff, and provides equipment and services for rehabilitation, education programs, a mobile rehab clinic to villages, hearing testing for ALL children, and transport for clients to the YPK centre. That’s stretching limited resources impressively.

Why supporting YPK is a smart thing

You may wonder why I would think supporting a disability org in Bali is a good idea when I have been banging on about the lack of movement at home in Australia. Don’t get me wrong. I think supporting YPK has self-evident merit, but it can be a win-win as well. Sometimes taking attention away from ourselves helps our cause.

The contrast between Bali and Australia is telling in several important ways. The currency conversion is, at the moment, AUD$1.00 to 10,241.00 Indonesian Rupiah. When you can divide a dollar into more than 10,000 parts that suggests you can ‘get a lot of Balinese bang for your Aussie buck’. YPK’s annual budget of around USD$186,000 [AUD$282,000] is next to nothing in our terms. That’s around 10 NDIS clients [give or take]. YPK had 222 active clients in February. That’s as well as an education centre [120 kids in February 2023] and a mobile outreach [106 clients in February 2023]. 

Indonesia has a population of 275.40 million [2022] and a GDP of USD $1.186T.

In contrast the GDP of Australia is USD $1.553T, with a population of 25,

978,935 in 2022. Even so, we can scarcely afford our NDIS – and our aged care system is seriously underfunded. The prospect of people with disability in Bali being supported by domestic funding is a long way off. This is no criticism of the Indonesian government, just a reflection of the realities of demands on the

public purse.

It’s tough competition for funding in an increasingly constrained international

funding environment. Linda assists YPK by chasing international grants of 

around USD$30,000 [AUD$45,000] to survive. That’s an exhausting pressure on an organisation that isn’t culturally attuned to seeking funding on European

terms.

There is the constant risk of failing to attract sufficient funds.  In the aftermath of the global paralysis caused by the pandemic, donors have signalled funding reductions around the world.

Disability solidarity 

Climate aside, visiting Bali would be problematic for me because I would have concerns about accessibility. But I could not, in all conscience, expect publicly funded enhancements to the public space – as I do here. Even what I enjoy here in terms of accessibility isn’t ideal. But it is a huge improvement on how things used to be, and I am grateful.

A google search tells me that Accessible Indonesia is a member of the European Network for Accessible Tourism [ENAT], so perhaps I shouldn’t be so concerned. Still, there’s the climate thing for me.

As I became aware of how things are in Bali, I became acutely conscious of how immensely fortunate I am. Yes, in terms of our expectations, I am doing the right thing in pressing the issue of disability inclusion. But it also seems so much like a ‘first world problem’ in comparison. I can do both – continue to agitate for positive change and support YPK. These days I am on such a limited income I was thinking about having a donate button on my blog. Somehow that now seems self-indulgent. I can afford $10 a month.

Bali has been called ‘Australia’s playground’. It’s only been fairly recently that we have been committed to ensuring our own playgrounds are inclusive. I am a member of my local council’s Accessibility Advisory Committee and I have been deeply impressed by the commitment to ensuring that playgrounds are

inclusive. Great journeys begin with small steps – we must support disability inclusion for people with disability in Bali before we can expect an assurance of accessibility when we visit.

How to help?

There are presently three important ways to help YPK.

1. Assistance with fund raising is vital. Ideas for and help in executing fundraising activities are always welcomed.  
2. Skilled grant application writers for international tenders are immensely valuable. It’s better to have a team than a solitary hero.
3. Financial support is foundational. The disparity in currency values means

that a little in our terms can have a lot of impact in Bali. There are donation buttons on the website ypkbali.org. The website needs updating to better accommodate potential international buyers of products in their online store. That’s being addressed. 

There is a range of things we can do.

• Disability activists can widen their vision from their own imperatives to include a wider perspective on how they can help.
• Disability ERGs can add support for the YPK to their own philanthropic vision.
• Individuals who are people with disability or allies can set up periodic contributions and/or preferentially purchase from the website [when updated]
• Those skilled in grants writing can offer their services pro bono.
• Down the track I can imagine setting up an online community that can actively develop other ways of helping.

Conclusion

Linda has always challenged my thinking, and I have always been grateful, well mostly. It had been around 22 years since we last spoke, and it felt like it was just yesterday. Some readers will understand this sensation.

My focus on disability has been laser focused on my experience and context. That’s perfectly fine. But now that focus has been disrupted and suddenly there’s a far greater dimension to my appreciation of disability. Seeing a kid in

a wheelchair in an environment that will not be friendly to wheelchairs causes me to pause. How tough do they have it?

My immediate response was to write something reflecting my reactions to what I have learned. My second was to set up a AUD$10 a month payment to YPK.

A final thought. AUD$282,000 is only 2,350 people donating $10 a month. That’s not much, is it?

You can contact Linda via her email [email protected] or WhatsApp +61 419 427 274