Let's Talk Disability

JACKIE: Hello, I'm Jackie Carter. I'm a professor in Statistical Literacy and the academic lead for Disability Inclusion at the University of Manchester. I live with a disability and a long-term condition and often describe myself as deaf, dizzy and disabled. Here's a fact of two. 24% of the working age population in the UK has a disability. 80% of disabilities are hidden or invisible as are mine.
I started the Let's Talk Disability podcast series to provide a platform to raise awareness of what it means to be a disability inclusive university. The podcast is a series of conversations which I host on the lived and living experience of our colleagues and postgraduate students of being disabled or having a long-term condition. On each episode I host two guests. One is a senior leader at the university, a person with influence and responsibility. The other is a member of staff or postgraduate student who is open to sharing their disability or long-term condition.
The aim is to demystify what being disabled means and create a culture of sharing. But, and this is important, each episode moves from dialogue to deeds, from talking to action. The senior leader is invited to commit to just one thing, an action they will take away as a result of the conversation. The disabled guest gets to say what one thing would make the difference to their lived experience as a colleague or a student at the university. So let's dive in and find out what today's guests want to share and what they will commit to, to make our university more disability inclusive.
Hello and welcome to episode five, I think we're on of series two of Let's Talk Disability. I'm Jackie Carter, I'm the academic lead for disability inclusion at the University of Manchester. And today in this quite hot podcasting recording Studio, I have two wonderful guests who I'm looking forward to seeing how the conversation unfolds. We've already been chatting, I think we've got some really interesting points in store. So I'm going to ask each of them to introduce themselves in a fairly short introduction because we've got so much to cover. Imran, can I start with you please?
IMRAN: Hello there, so my name's Imran, I work for the University of Manchester and I'm also a GP and I have a very obvious physical disability and I walk with two crutches.
JACKIE: Imran, how did you and I meet?
IMRAN: So I did a podcast which was a three part podcast to promote and make people aware of different views on how people may view their disability. I think the key aspect of it was that just because I have a very obvious physical disability, what I don't like is people always approaching me with the assumption that I've had an accident, something's happened, wanting to know my confidential medical records. So it's a conversation which is quite heavy really when you have it repeatedly and I was having patients do it.
And I appreciate that I probably wasn't the only person in this situation, probably other people with disabilities do have this. So the podcast is called The Journey of a Doctor with a Disability. Part one is myself and a wonderful medical student at the time who is now a doctor. We spoke about our disabilities before university, during university and after university and how our experience has been with our disability and you were made aware of that podcast and then we've just been in touch to do things together. Well, mainly you're doing things and I'm joining you on the journey!
JACKIE: No, we are definitely in it together. There's no doubt about that whatsoever. Thank you very much. Thanks for sharing your podcast. And Rachel, if you could do the same, if you could introduce yourself and then maybe say how you and I met.
Rachel: Hello, hello. Yes, I'm Rachel Lindley. I am a GP same as Imran but I'm here at the university as co-lead for service learning in the Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health. I used to sort of facilitate the work of the community-based medical education team in the MBCHB which is the medical program trying to grow people to be doctors.
JACKIE: Great.
RACHEL: How did we meet? I don't know, Jackie.
JACKIE: Well, you and I are in the same circles, aren't we? Gravitating around...
RACHEL: So yeah, so I think some of it is around me wanting to design really good quality experiential learning that has impact and benefit. So our students get to feel like they're making a difference throughout their courses and our communities, local, global, get some benefit from all our students' work. And I suppose my vision for that is how do we do it and how can we make it, you know, EDI inclusive and allow everybody to have these brilliant learning experiences.
JACKIE: Oh, wonderful. And we're all in this together really. So, you know, in terms of disability inclusion, EDI across all the protected characteristics, also experiential learning, you mentioned there, service learning, which is a big theme as the university moves forward for its 2035 agenda under the leadership of Duncan Ivison. So I think there's lots of points of overlap. But let's come back to the medical education part of this, because, you know, we've not had people from your part of the university on before. We've not had people who span sectors, who do two roles. And I think there's something really special I'd like to sort of elicit from this conversation. So, you know, over to you both, how can we pick that up?
RACHEL: I suppose for me, I was going to say around, you know, the more I've grown in my career, the more I'm like, just hate the medical model. Disability, like, I'm really raging against it now, because it just doesn't work. And it's really harmful in so many ways. And so, but it's so entrenched in so much of what we do. And it's trying to work with people to unpack it and the assumptions behind it.
JACKIE: Can you unpack that for the listeners? Maybe Rachel, as a medical trained professional, what does it mean to have a medical model of disability?
RACHEL: So the medical model is that all the problems are in the person, really. And that is their, that's their issues and their problems. And they've got to figure out how they're going to survive and their disability is within them. As opposed to the social model being that it's how you can succeed if your world is adapted to allow you to succeed. And that the disability is in that space between you and the world, as opposed to it's just in you. And it's all your problems and you're the flawed being, as opposed to society being the flawed being that needs to adapt. So that's how I would see it. You tell me what you think, Imran.
IMRAN: Yeah. So I've, I've been doing a lot of work with one of our colleagues. And our focus has been on neurodivergence. And I think it's, that is a big topic with the medical and social model, where it's a case of, and there's so many people who are coming out now with having a diagnosis, I quote on a podcast. And it's, it's one of them where they are seeing as a problem. And there's many stories that, you know, our students are saying and things like that, where it's saying the world is designed for the neurotypical. So, you know, whereas the reality is we're not focusing on strengths of the other people. So for me specifically, my main issue is obviously mobility. And I think this job has made me highlight how I work as well.
And actually what I need to function well. And I think that's like that with everyone. It's, it's all those human factors that you think about that help. So for example, you think, you know, going through medical school, there's always someone who's had, you know, a consultant shout at him or, you know, belittle them and then very early on, and that's kind of knocked their confidence. And, you know, further on from that, it means that they don't participate as well. And I think that's always, especially if you're... these kinds of scenarios that you have in your life, judge how things go in the future as well.
And I think if you are, if you have a disability as well, then that's further amplified as well, where you're thinking... the anxiety that it creates. So simple things for me is I plan everything sort of, if I have to do some form of teaching, for example, I will, and the start time's at nine, I will get there for eight o'clock, just because the amount of time it takes me to walk, if I can't find parking, if I, you know, the room, what floor it's on, what's the access like, if there's no lifts, if I have to climb stairs.
And then on top of that, which can take, you know, a simple, what were deemed on Google, a five minute walk for me is not a five minute walk. It's a reality 25 minute walk because I have the amount of times I have to stop because my hands hurt from the crutches. So it's all this planning. And I'm probably not the only person with a disability who has to really plan these, what would be deemed as little things to help me work. And then it's then having to kind of get myself back into a state where I'm ready to teach because I'm not in pain because of my hands, my back, my legs, whatever it is, I'm now prepared to be at my optimal level to help students, to help patients, whatever it might be. So there's all these factors and that's just me. And I'm pretty certain a lot of people are doing that. And that goes back to the social model of if things were made easier and we're not seen as problems that or the expectation is for the able-bodied person or, you know, the neurotypical person, this is a set design, everything else outside of that is a problem and it's therefore your responsibility to be in line with everyone else.
JACKIE: Yeah, if we designed inclusively then it benefits everybody, is what you're saying.
RACHEL: Because it is less work for you to have to negotiate and you can rely on things that are going to be there by design as opposed to being unsure and thinking I've got to add another hour into my day.
JACKIE: Thank you for sharing that because one of the things that coming out of these episodes is the lack of awareness of people who have never even had to think about that before simply because it doesn't impact the everyday experience.
And I remember you and I on the training course that maybe we talk about in a minute, the leadership training course at the university for disabled staff and postgraduate researchers, I remember meeting you outside an, outside a building, in a building where the, it was a Nancy Rothwell building, where there was a room that had been deemed accessible and actually it had come up on the university system as an accessible room, we have this app called AccessAble, but the trajectory, the pathway from the entrance of the building to the room which was in the middle of a very large building on several floors up that was very difficult to find signage wise, you know, it just had hidden that real experience of how much effort it took to get into that room.
So I think there's something really important here about not just making assumptions because of a pinprick on a map or something, but actually going and experiencing for yourself how to navigate in your case where you, where there are mobility issues.
IMRAN: I do appreciate from my end that this is stuff I probably need to vocalise and I think growing up it's, there's a cultural element to it. So there's the Disability SAP meeting that you chair.
JACKIE: SAP being the self-assessment team that we have for the disability confidence group, that's fine.
IMRAN: Yep. So, and one thing that I've been made aware of, and I kind of knew myself as well, is that culturally, me being of Asian background, is that we don't vocalise our disabilities, or the issues that we're having very well. And I've grown up with keeping my issues to myself and my parents were always saying your problems are private and actually you can... They felt that I had the ability to be just as good as the able-bodied person. And it was, it's one of them where with our community, with Asian background, so I'm Muslim and in a Muslim community, we were very, everyone is always asking sort of things and my parents don't want to have that conversation over and over again. What's going on with him, what's his disability? And I don't want to share that disability. So that's how I've grown up.
And I think a lot of, I was just seeing some of the students that I've been involved with, I think they have real, those with an Asian background, I've noticed that when they do have health problems, some of them have the same, I can see traits of myself in them where they don't feel comfortable opening up. They don't want to normalize it in a way because they've been told that this is a problem, whether that's from their family, whether that's from the systems that they're growing up in, which has been quite challenging for them.
JACKIE: Gosh Rach, where do you take that? How does that play back into the social model that you were talking about in terms of medical education? Yeah, I think, I suppose in medical education, crikey, that's a big one, Jackie! But I think it's hard because for me, like, you know, there's lots of things popping in my head about that. And it's like, everyone lives their own life, don't they? And you're like, this is my life. And you, we all come at it with our narratives from our families as well. And we, as you get older, you realize, oh, that what is me and what is the narratives that I've been given from my upbringing or the important people in my life.
And so I suppose what I was thinking about when you were talking about that was I was thinking, oh, wow, because I grew up in a family whereby, you know, lots of people would say, well, my nan was blind. My step auntie had a very severe like genetic disability from birth. And I've done lots of volunteering things where we've got people who want to go sailing, like tour ship sailing, you know, up to the top of crow's nests, or we've done holidays, or we've gone clubbing with people on ventilators who, you know, are quite immobile and taking them downstairs.
And so I've sort of worked in a world more where it's like, yeah, this is you and you more like very activist model where they're like, this is me. My voice is not your voice. And I'm going to speak really loudly. You need to shut up non-person that... that doesn't have my experience. So I've like probably internalized a bit of going, 'oh, well, I know I don't have your voice. You have to speak. Come on, speak. Tell me what you think', you know, in a very different way, probably a bit more like Scousey Liverpool bossy-Rach' way of going, you know, I haven't got a clue. You just tell me because we're going to go wrong. So it's coming from it from a really different angle as well. And sort of expecting sort of wondering and trying to get people to go like, this is what I want.
IMRAN: Yeah. And I guess that's the point where we were talking about this, this building issue where the probably the feedback that they've had is that this is okay. Yeah. Because that's what they've known is maybe it's not been revisited in a while. Whereas it might be okay for those set of people, but for others, obviously you were able to, you kind of stalking me that day weren't you, following me
ALL: (LAUGHTER).
RACHEL: In a nice way I'm sure!
JACKIE: I was thinking I was being supportive!
ALL: (LAUGHTER)
RACHEL: But I guess it comes back to that co-production and co-design and by design, as we were saying, if you don't have the right people in that room that have that lived experience, they cannot say, look, this is utterly ridiculous. Yes, you've ticked the box, but it's really just annoying everybody who might be able to take advantage of that.
JACKIE: Can we pick that up? You've just both touched on something that over intersects and overlaps and it's really important. It's being in the room and it's having a voice. Okay. So, and it's about leadership. Okay. You know, all of this is about, there are people who are more vocal than others, are disability inclusion advocates, but in a broader EDI space. What are your thoughts? I've got you both here today. What are your thoughts about how, you know, we are where we are, the University of Manchester, a 200 year old university that isn't particularly accessible in many cases, but we are at a really exciting juncture where our new vice chancellor is coming in and talking about inclusive by design for the future. What can we do as disabled people, as leaders, as people in education spaces and elsewhere to really raise a profile of inclusion for all and, you know, designing for disability, therefore it's inclusive for all. What can we do? What can you do in this space?
IMRAN: So... just a bit about my role, which will come on to then this leadership stuff. So my role, I work for the CBME team, which is having a refresh.
JACKIE: And it stands for?
IMRAN: Sorry, community based. I need to stop with the acronyms. Community Based
Medical Education. So it's basically a group of... with our focus is on primary care teaching within the university. So that was the main reason why we've been employed. And then we have other roles within the university. So my role initially was focusing on simulation stuff. And one of the projects that I'm leading on with some encouragement from Rachel was to try and get diverse, simulated patients into our university. So I think doing the podcast and obviously meeting yourself, Jackie, I have become surrounded with people who would say they have disabilities. And I think I've never really been in that sort of position before, because as a GP, the majority of GPs are able bodies. I'm not aware of many that diagnoses is, whether that be mental health stuff that, you know, we don't tend to have that chat too much. And so it's, you know, other than physical disabilities that you can see whether that could be, you know, limb issues or, you know, mobility issues or visual impairments whatever it might be. So I've always been, to my knowledge, surrounded by people who I thought were able bodied. So I think then having, being my perception of people with disabilities before was... and I think because I do GP, where a lot of the patients I'm seeing, it's about them and the struggles they're having with their medical issue. So that's what I'm going off, and that's why I felt I wanted to kind of stay away from doing work which evolved around disability, because I spend so much time at my GP work, and it's quite hard. I know GPs get a lot of stick, but actually it is quite hard and it's quite draining that you, you know, you're having to take on board a lot of people's problems to try and help them when the reality
Is I probably can't do that much for quite a lot of people. Yes, we do try to help as much as we can, but I think because of how society is, you know, the struggles that they may have, the very specific natures, it's very difficult for me to fix their problems all the time. So my assumption was always that I'm going to go to these disability meetings and it is going to be like counselling. So that's why I kind of wanted to stay away, and I remember the first meeting I had and it did feel like that, and I think I thought, no, I'm going to persevere with it, and I think when I started to do more work around it, it kind of opened my eyes to things really, to sort of how things are and how leadership is and things like that really. So, and I think I've learned a lot really, so that leadership course that you/we
piloted Jackie, the Result CIC, I think that was the first real time that I was surrounded with people who had disabilities from an educational point of view, and it was interesting because I've been surrounded by medics, so, I said that quite aggressively, I don't know!

RACHEL: It's okay, it's okay.
JACKIE: You smiled when you said that!
ALL: (Laughter)
IMRAN: So yeah, surrounded by medics, I think it's always been... but having, you know, people who are non-medical and hearing their views on it and hearing sort of what they have to go through, and educationally, it helped me so well, not just to think from my view, not just to think from the able-bodied's view, but to think of someone who has visual impairments, to have hearing impairments, then think, okay, what things do they need to make it, and things that I wouldn't have considered. So, for example, one of them was sort of how the sound projects in a room, something similar to that, which I would never have thought of if I'd never been in that, actually, that kind of thing made me want to do more work, and for sort of people with disabilities, because I know that I'm quite confident in my personality, so I'm quite loud. So, that's where you're supposed to go, Rachel!
JACKIE: Sorry, I was going to say you're very certain, and I like that.
RACHEL: Clear, clear, so I was thinking.
IMRAN: And therefore, I'm happy to have that voice to say and to help people, because that's what I've gone into medicine for, to help people, and that's what my parents always told me, that, you know, you have a disability, you know, it's not going to affect you, you can be better than the able-bodied person, you know, and you're there to help people, and that's why I've gone into medicine, because of them, and it's having this new knowledge, trying to be a leader in this role is what I'm attempting to do.
JACKIE: Thank you for sharing that so authentically and openly. Yeah, I was in awe of everything you were saying there, because I was on the course, and I saw the other people on the course who had both hidden and invisible, and also non-invisible disabilities, and it was a real learning opportunity, I think, for all of us. Rachel, where does that bring us to, though, in terms of sort of leadership? Because what you described there, there's a lot of work. Energy that goes into doing everything you've described, and I know you've got some thoughts on that, so please share them.
RACHEL: Yeah, so I suppose me, like, as the, you know, what was the leader of that team, facilitator of everybody's success, perhaps, like, I think, for me, when I saw you coming into the team, you didn't have that construct of going, this is me, and this is, I didn't get a sense of, you know, you as a more of that activist changemaker within the university. Obviously, you're new, you're trying to figure this out, you've lived in this world where it's like, you are the same. And I suppose me, as a leadership role, I was like, Imran's not the same. Imran has got a really unique perspective on things that, you know, I need to hear, and we need to use his unique perspectives on the world, on medicine, to be able to bring that into the team to make our output as good as we can make it. You know, and I suppose probably selfishly, I'm like, what is the team doing? What are we doing? How can we make an inclusive team? You've got a voice and a perspective that we need to hear. And so for me, as a leader, it's like the challenge is how can I make a space and a team that allows you to have that voice? And I know we've probably had different views on that, and I've encouraged you. It's maybe the word I would use. You might at the time not have felt it very encouraging, or, you know, and that's fine, because I was like, you know, you're trying to, I know, I could see that you had a clear voice, and you were confident in saying your voice. And I was probably in my head a bit confused, oh, this is a great voice, but the voice is not speaking. The thing that I think you have the really unique perspective on that I really, I want to see this change. I want inclusive, simulated patients. I want our simulated patients who are actors, who pretend to be patients, who act being different sorts of patients. They need to represent the population. And I appreciate there's lots of problems with liability and validity, and all these things and good quality assessments and stuff. But I was like, oh, I can't fix this problem with my voice. And I was like, Imran, Imran's got a really clear voice. And, you know, you're not afraid of saying it. And you're like, this is ridiculous, calling a spade a spade, which is useful, like in some of these spaces where you're having conversations, you're like, look, we need to, as a leader, you're like, we need to be in this space over here. We're not there. This is where, you know, sector wide, nationally, globally, this is where the movement is going. This is where we know we should be. How on earth are we going to get there? You try and make change yourself. And you're like, oh, my voice is not the right voice. I can't, I don't have the right words. I don't have the right ability to bring this change. And I'm like, we've got to get there as a team because the university needs to get there. We all need to do it. We need doctors that are learning with really inclusive experiences, you know, back to experiential learning. It's got to be very, you know, there's got to be safe spaces, but you've really got to be able to have that safety of the push, the challenge of going, this is really difficult for you, but we're going to do it in a safe way, safer way. So that if you have to press a pause button, you can, because you're really being pushed to your limit, not just being kept in the safe space. So I was like, Imran come on, let's get this voice. Let's make your voice louder.
JACKIE: Do you feel that's happened? Because I'm hearing the sort of, you know, on the one hand, you've got the voice, you've got the lived experience, you're committed, you're passionate about this. There's leadership work that needs to be done to get what you pointed over there that we're not where we want to be yet. But there's still that tension to me, that conundrum that the people who are representing the minoritised group, in this case, disabled people, are doing the work. Is that work being recognised? Because I think that's something we really need to grapple with at the university. It's not just at the university, it's sector wide. But you know, people in spaces of being minoritised for whatever characteristic are disproportionately affected because they're minoritised, but they're also doing the disproportionate amount of the work. So how do we grapple with that? How do we make it fairer, more just?
JACKIE: So I'm going to reflect on both of you, and this conversation is so rich and we could just, you know, talk for an hour on this alone. For me, it comes down to what you use—a value word—feeling valued, unrecognised and rewarded. Because I think, you know, reward doesn't have to be monetary. It can be through a title or an acknowledgement of the amount of advocacy you're doing in this space, or activism, whatever you want to call it.

For me, there's something more about this, and I'm thinking about it really hard at the moment because I'm writing a book where I've interviewed 30 women on their atypical routes through academia or working in and with academia. We haven't talked about role models today, but role models have come up before. And role models in the disability space is something that I'm sure we'd all sort of have an image in our heads. But I think it's more than being a role model.

I think you're a torchbearer. I came up with this idea of "torchbearer" for my book because if that path hasn't been torched before—if there is no clear...

IMRAN & RACHEL: (Laughter)

JACKIE: Literally, if there is no clear path to go on, you're the person who's not only creating a path forward for yourself—and you've spoken really eloquently about the personal cost of that to you, about flipping the script in your own mind based on how you've been brought up and how you've perceived your success so far—and then how you're stepping into this disability inclusion space. And that's exposing you. That comes at personal cost.

Not only are you doing that for yourself, but you're doing it for the people who can come after you and all the people who are going to come through the medical education at Manchester and benefit from the immense effort that you've put personally into your own development, but also the development of the university.

And for me, the reason I'm animated about this is because I think that does come at a huge expense. That has meant you expending your energy, coming in on your days off because you want to be the voice in the room, you want to be at those meetings.

And I think the role of the leaders then, Rachel, is to recognise that and to put that on paper or somewhere digitally to say, “Well, this is what's happening behind the scenes.” It's not hidden. It's real. It's tangible. It's hours of your life. It's your effort going to training courses in order to be able to create a better outcome—a more equal outcome—for others in this space.

Until we capture that—and I did spend 18 years working in business engagement, so I'm not a traditional academic—until we actually capture and put that down as a business model about how we need to enumerate and quantify that effort, I think we're still not making the progress we need to make to put the right allocation of resource to where we want to go.

So I probably shouldn't have said all of that because I'm not part of the conversation, but it does seem to me we've got a big piece of work to do here. And actually, we've got a brilliant case study sitting across the table from you and I, Rachel, that we could just take and articulate what this took in terms of hours, whatever, in order to be able to get all the recognition—in terms of your work with me at the global university level, what you're doing outside of your division, your school. We have to raise the profile of that because it's a model that others could follow.

RACHEL: Yeah, I agree.

IMRAN: Yeah, I think it was—I remember you just saying, “EWL everyone.”

RACHEL: Me? I said that?

IMRAN: Yeah, you said that to me. Self-promotion. Yeah, self-promotion. And I think that's what I did. I think I remember answering to you, “Yeah, I'm doing that anyway.” And it's just more to get your voice out there, which is really important, isn't it? To do those leadership things and have those qualities and get yourself in with the right people to impact change and, well, make an impact in order to sort of make the system a bit better.

I mean, we work in a building—the Stopford Building—which I was a student at Manchester Uni for a year in 2004. So I used to come to the Stopford Building. It's barely changed. And I just think to myself, the difficulty I have every day going into that building—it's not great. And I appreciate they're doing some work now to try and change it, but that's like 20 years in the making.

JACKIE: Hamid Haroun works in that building, doesn't he? Hamid is a senior researcher. He's been on the podcast and he's the co-chair of the National Association of Disabled Staff Networks. I think there's a continuation conversation to be had here, because I think we're probably going to have that conversation just at the right time—not in terms of changing the whole building, but in terms of sharing some of the great work that's taking place.

IMRAN: But I guess what we don't want is another 20 years where we have to keep fighting to make the change. But I'm hoping that, obviously, it seems it's the kind of go-to thing at the moment. I think there are a lot of characteristics—protected characteristics—that have been explored. I feel like disability and neurodivergence is kind of, in a weird way, next on the list, where people are focusing on that a lot and trying to become more aware of the impact it's having on the individual and how—what can be done to help them be the best version of them. So my hope is that the next few years it does improve and we get better with it.

JACKIE: So I'm going to reflect on both of you, and this conversation is so rich and we could just, you know, talk for an hour on this alone. For me, it comes down to what you use—a value word—feeling valued, unrecognised and rewarded. Because I think, you know, reward doesn't have to be monetary. It can be through a title or an acknowledgement of the amount of advocacy you're doing in this space, or activism, whatever you want to call it.
For me, there's something more about this, and I'm thinking about it really hard at the moment because I'm writing a book where I've interviewed 30 women on their atypical routes through academia or working in and with academia. We haven't talked about role models today, but role models have come up before. And role models in the disability space is something that I'm sure we'd all sort of have an image in our heads. But I think it's more than being a role model.
I think you're a torchbearer. I came up with this idea of "torchbearer" for my book because if that path hasn't been torched before—if there is no clear...
IMRAN & RACHEL: (Laughter)
JACKIE: Literally, if there is no clear path to go on, you're the person who's not only creating a path forward for yourself—and you've spoken really eloquently about the personal cost of that to you, about flipping the script in your own mind based on how you've been brought up and how you've perceived your success so far—and then how you're stepping into this disability inclusion space. And that's exposing you. That comes at personal cost.
Not only are you doing that for yourself, but you're doing it for the people who can come after you and all the people who are going to come through the medical education at Manchester and benefit from the immense effort that you've put personally into your own development, but also the development of the university.
And for me, the reason I'm animated about this is because I think that does come at a huge expense. That has meant you expending your energy, coming in on your days off because you want to be the voice in the room, you want to be at those meetings.
And I think the role of the leaders then, Rachel, is to recognise that and to put that on paper or somewhere digitally to say, “Well, this is what's happening behind the scenes.” It's not hidden. It's real. It's tangible. It's hours of your life. It's your effort going to training courses in order to be able to create a better outcome—a more equal outcome—for others in this space.
Until we capture that—and I did spend 18 years working in business engagement, so I'm not a traditional academic—until we actually capture and put that down as a business model about how we need to enumerate and quantify that effort, I think we're still not making the progress we need to make to put the right allocation of resource to where we want to go.
So I probably shouldn't have said all of that because I'm not part of the conversation, but it does seem to me we've got a big piece of work to do here. And actually, we've got a brilliant case study sitting across the table from you and I, Rachel, that we could just take and articulate what this took in terms of hours, whatever, in order to be able to get all the recognition—in terms of your work with me at the global university level, what you're doing outside of your division, your school. We have to raise the profile of that because it's a model that others could follow.
RACHEL: Yeah, I agree.
IMRAN: Yeah, I think it was—I remember you just saying, “EWL everyone.”
RACHEL: Me? I said that?
IMRAN: Yeah, you said that to me. Self-promotion. Yeah, self-promotion. And I think that's what I did. I think I remember answering to you, “Yeah, I'm doing that anyway.” And it's just more to get your voice out there, which is really important, isn't it? To do those leadership things and have those qualities and get yourself in with the right people to impact change and, well, make an impact in order to sort of make the system a bit better.
I mean, we work in a building—the Stopford Building—which I was a student at Manchester Uni for a year in 2004. So I used to come to the Stopford Building. It's barely changed. And I just think to myself, the difficulty I have every day going into that building—it's not great. And I appreciate they're doing some work now to try and change it, but that's like 20 years in the making.

JACKIE: Hamid Haroun works in that building, doesn't he? Hamid is a senior researcher. He's been on the podcast and he's the co-chair of the National Association of Disabled Staff Networks. I think there's a continuation conversation to be had here because I think we're probably going to have that conversation just at the right time—not in terms of changing the whole building, but in terms of sharing some of the great work that's taking place.
IMRAN: But I guess what we don't want is another 20 years where we have to keep fighting to make the change. But I'm hoping that, obviously, it seems it's the kind of go-to thing at the moment. I think there are a lot of characteristics—protected characteristics—that have been explored. I feel like disability and neurodivergence is kind of, in a weird way, next on the list where people are focusing on that a lot and trying to become more aware of the impact it's having on the individual and how—what can be done to help them be the best version of them. So my hope is that the next few years it does improve and we get better with it.
JACKIE: Is it the case that Manchester's still the largest medical school in the UK?
RACHEL: In Europe.
JACKIE: In Europe?
IMRAN: Yeah, I think so.
JACKIE: In Europe. Okay, even better. We've got high aspirations in terms of... we're going to have to move on sadly. I know we could talk for much, much longer. We've covered most of the main themes we set out to cover, and I'll ask you if there's any wrap-up comments at the end. But this is a nice bit where I get you to each commit to an action that comes as a result of having this conversation. Because talking's great, but actually it's actions that make the change, as we've been saying. You, Imran, first get to ask which.
IMRAN: Oh gosh.
JACKIE: So you've got the question in front of you if that helps.
IMRAN: So the question is, what one thing will you commit to do as a result of this conversation?
RACHEL: I feel like I've got a lot to do.
IMRAN: You do?
RACHEL: Yeah, absolutely. But there's always a lot to do. I know one thing.
IMRAN: One thing.
RACHEL: Well, before the podcast started, we did talk about self-care and we did talk about the work that you were doing and the extra work you were doing. And obviously this is brilliant, but I guess I also have a guilty conscience in that I was like, “Come on, Imran, you'll be great in this space.” Shove. Encourage. Encourage.
IMRAN: Encouraged.
RACHEL: Got like a shove. And I guess, you know, I know that about the amount of work that that is, and I know that you've got loads of SIM work and related work to do as well. So I guess my commitment might be to your self-care and making sure you get your annual leave somehow. And we do something. Yeah. Think about meetings, which I know is not me, but it's about—that is something that I have heard today from you. And I don't want you to, like, wear yourself out.
Like, I get all that on one level. I can understand you've got the weight of this responsibility that I've placed a bit—or encouraged you—into that space of having that burden of responsibility and that work. And that isn't just your work. It's all our work. And that's a new space for you, relatively. And, you know, you've had to look at things slightly in a different way or view yourself differently and all these things. And that's a lot.
And I guess it's just making sure that you do take your annual leave properly and work out how can we do that in a way that you still have your voice there and there isn't stuff happening without your voice. Yeah. You know, and if—and there's maybe a bit of just a conversation about how that... I don't know, coaching-type conversation about how do you advocate for that and making sure that those decisions are not happening without you. Because you do need to be there. Like, that's what I'm thinking about. But that's the thing I'm going to do for you.
But what am I going to do? I guess I'm going to do that for you.
JACKIE: Is there anything... I'm going to probe a little bit further. You said your one thing, but I'm just going to ask a cheeky question about—given what we're talking about: roles, leadership, recognition, value—is there anything that you could take away as an action to progress that?
IMRAN: So I guess...
JACKIE: I'm asking Rachel.
IMRAN: Oh, sorry!
RACHEL: I suppose I'm thinking what, you know, you can...
JACKIE: Sorry to sound so aggressive, I didn't mean to!
ALL: (Laughter)
JACKIE: Rachel, that was an add-on question for you in terms of recognition of the work.
RACHEL: Yeah, I guess, on one level, I can do that—contacting people to make sure they know what you're doing. I suppose I'm not in the role of leading that team anymore. I'm not really in that position to be able to, or in any of those meetings or conversations that I used to be in, to say, “This is Imran and this is what he's doing.” But I think I can do that. That's an easy, relatively straightforward sort of doing—and try and work with you to make sure we've got a summary package of what that is so that people can digest it in their language.
But I guess for me, thinking about what's in my control is the service learning element of it. And thinking about if we're doing inclusion by design, how are we... because I haven't got to that stage really. Like, I know it's a core value of that work, but how am I going to make sure that the disability element of the EDI part within the experiential learning activities that we're designing does have that disability sensitivity within it? Because that is what I can control and influence.
I've got an ethical-type framework about needing to think about what are we doing? What are the ethics around what we're doing with the community, with ourselves, with the work? But I haven't yet gone, “Right, how are we going to design that?” So maybe you can do that with me.
IMRAN: Yeah, yeah.
RACHEL: Another bit of work. You can steer me.
JACKIE: I would be interested in that as well because Rachel and I are already in a working group—I can't remember what it's called, it's about experiential and service learning. So if one of the things that we could do is pin some movement, come together and foreground inclusivity in anything that's designed through that group, and use you as a case study, for example, through the work that you've been doing to feed into that as an example, I think that would be a really practical way of building on this conversation. Do you agree?
IMRAN: And I would love to do that. And I guess it comes back to that being acknowledged for that work as a specific role title.
RACHEL: Maybe quickly. I'll quickly write it all now, share it.
ALL: (Laughter)
RACHEL: And then you're very invited to apply.
IMRAN: And then I'm in then—bish, bash, bosh!
ALL: (Laughter)
JACKIE: So, Imran asked you a question, Rachel. Over to you.
IMRAN: Me? Um, I guess...
RACHEL: What one thing would make a positive difference to your experience at the university?
IMRAN: One thing could make a positive difference...
RACHEL: One thing. It's hard, isn't it? One thing...
JACKIE: You can dream big. You can knock the Stopford Building down and rebuild it or something. It's up to you.
IMRAN: It would actually... I mean, I would happily do that. I think the planning of Stopford Building is awful. So I park at the back of Stopford Building, and our meetings, as you know, are the other side of the building—and that building is massive. So we are first floor usually, and then our main meetings are in Committee Room A and B. The double doors are horrendous.
RACHEL: Yes.
IMRAN: There's no chairs in those corridors for me to take a break. So I have to lean on bins—yellow bins that are there—because my hands hurt. So it's those kinds of things, really.
And I think one of the things which I've noticed is—it's a difficult one because I get both sides of the argument—is hybrid meetings. Where some of the meetings that I attend, I wonder, could they be hybrid? I do get the value of face-to-face meetings. But the flip side I have is the hybrid meeting would just be for me.
RACHEL: Yeah, it singles you out.
IMRAN: The reality is it singles me out.
RACHEL: And then you miss out.
IMRAN: And then I miss out because I don't have the same conversations as in that. And that's kind of the battle I have really with these—if it's a hybrid meeting purely for me, it's not worth it. Whereas I feel like I kind of have to struggle to get in to do that.
So the building itself would be great if we could just knock the building down. Simple things—the doors be a little bit easier, because there's like a billion double doors to get through, which are really heavy to push. Then, you know, chairs—flip chairs—on walls that you could easily put in if you're struggling, because it's quite a long corridor for me to take a little break.
RACHEL: That feels like it should be quite achievable.
IMRAN: Yeah, a little flip chair, like stuck onto the wall. You're tired, it folds up, comes down like a cinema chair.
RACHEL: Yeah. Yeah. I've seen them at the bus stops.
IMRAN: Yeah. So I think it's stuff like that, which would be very easy. Then when I do come in, it's like, I don't have to do that walk in one go.
JACKIE: Well, my commitment to you both—particularly you, Imran—is to speak to John Ashley, who's a Director of Estates, who has been on this podcast, who is a fantastic advocate for disability inclusion. He's not looking for projects, but always listening for where there is a need.
And I'm going to take—when this is recorded and published—I'm going to take, in fact, even before it's published, I'm going to share it with John, with your blessing.
IMRAN: Yeah.
JACKIE: And we'll see what we can do in that space. But you're right—singling people out because of their needs is not the approach we want to take. We want to make it inclusive by design, which is where I'm going to finish my comments today.
Have you any further comments? Either quick comments that we didn't cover and you really want to say before we turn off, we go off air?
RACHEL: No, I think just so many more conversations to have.
IMRAN: Yeah, I'd agree.
JACKIE: Well, thank you both.
RACHEL: Thank you.
IMRAN: Thank you for having me.
JACKIE: I guess I really enjoyed this conversation. It's fired me up and I can see both of you are quite fired up. So let's keep talking, but most importantly, let's keep making the change.
IMRAN: Marvellous. Thank you all.
JACKIE: Thank you both.
IMRAN: Thanks Rach and Jackie.