It’s nice to feel like you belong.
But it’s something I’ve struggled with for a long time.
The brown colour of my skin, formed from a white dad from Devon and a black mum from Birmingham via Montserrat is a likely root cause.
Not “black” not “white”, something different.
When I entered the world of work and advertising, everyone seemed so confident.
I was told that my afro hair suggested I would be a big personality, not only an assumption framed by racism but also horrendously untrue.
So this feeling of non-belonging stayed with me.
Then Covid. Now Covid.
Everyone has approached it in their own way.
And I have been on the most hesitant and nervous part of the spectrum.
I haven’t been in an office since March of last year.
I could count the number of times I’ve done something social on two hands, then again I was never that social before.
When people have been talking about looking forward to “getting back” I’ve backed away.
But in spite of all of the above, in the past 12 months I have never felt more like I fit in.
More like I could express these feelings to people I work with.
I have been able to be myself at New Commercial Arts and I think there are some learnings arising from my experience:
1. Involve everyone
How do you make people feel like they belong? Include them, no matter how experienced or inexperienced they may be.
2. Take people's thoughts and feelings into account
I didn’t go to the agency birthday party – yes NCA is one year old now – because, as a Covid-nervous, non-drinker (yes, teetotal too), I felt really uncomfortable meeting the agency in a pub.
So I told some people at the agency and that was that. No shaming me for not going, no, "oh you really should come", just an understanding of my perspective.
3. Acknowledge that we all have lives outside of work
NCA is a start-up, in a tough market, during a pandemic. The hours have been and can be long.
But if you know and can cover for one another when there are other important things happening outside of work, then you all feel part of something.
4. Employ different
If no-one is the same, then everyone is, right? When you realise that there are non-white people, disabled people, non-British people, non-London (shock horror) people that you work with every day, you also realise that this is a different sort of agency, with different people, who, in turn, think differently.
5. No hierarchy
This is easy to say and harder to do.
If you work with people that simply want to get to the best output, regardless of who it comes from, then you can focus on doing just that, rather than saying “the right” thing to impress someone more senior.
I wrote this, because I finally feel like I belong.
And it’s because this agency doesn’t celebrate differences, it just accepts me and everyone else and carries on.
I only hope more agencies realise that different people are their biggest asset and make them feel like they aren’t that different at all.
John Blight is a senior strategist at New Commercial Arts