L&D TV VIDEOS

In this newsletter I’m revisiting a recent project designed to reduce collisions in a bus fleet by influencing behaviour with video drama.

Fill your heart with love today Don’t play the game of time Things that happened in the past Only happened in your Mind You might be familiar with this Biff Rose song from David Bowie’s recording. It’s a beautiful idea. If we can let go of things and move forward, a world of possibility is open to us. But people’s identities are tied up with stories. Stories of past events that are hard to escape.

This is an important cue for learning and development professionals to further the discussion of how a diversity and inclusion agenda can be properly served in the workplace. The problem is that, as a great deal of research has repeatedly shown, diversity training doesn’t work.

We’ve just produced an advert for TV and social media designed to boost recruitment for Brighton & Hove Buses and Metrobus. I’m pleased to say that job applications have already significantly increased. 

In most large organisations there is a problem that seem impervious to everything you throw at it. Training and mandating, workshops and awareness campaigns don’t make a dent. These problems usually boil down to one thing – behaviour.

I make video for learning and I specialise in drama. When people think of training films, it’s not what they think of when we say “Netflix”. After a lifetime in the sector, during the lockdown, I took a hard look at video drama in learning to work out how we can improve things.

I had the rare opportunity to direct a short promotional film for Fairlight School in Brighton – where my two children attend. It was an unpaid piece of work which was a treat because it took off the usual pressure of corporate deadlines. Also, we aim to do at least one project for a local community organisation in Brighton, where Nice is based, each year.

Drama doesn’t tell people what to do, but it can stimulate them to think deeply about a problem.  If you can create a safe space around that experience, discussion and sometimes solutions can arise.