A time for reflection

In 2015, in the early days of IP Inclusive, I gave a talk to IP professionals that yielded an illuminating response. Why all the fuss about diversity? they asked. Where is the problem?

If there were too few women or people of colour in the IP professions, it was not through any fault of the incumbents. IP professionals were ethical people who recruited on merit (how often I hear that one!) and knew no bias. They had some women on their staff. They had a Black person once. The women and the Black person were expected to pull their weight like everyone else; there was no discrimination; there were no complaints.

Where is the problem?

The problem, as I now know, was our own lack of awareness. We simply did not see the fear, the loneliness, the self-doubt that those women and Black people felt in a room full of Others. Of the hundreds of micro-aggressions they endured from well-meaning ‘bias-free’ colleagues.

We’ve come a long way since then. So I wanted to look back at how things have changed since 2015—when diversity and inclusion (D&I) were not even glimmers in most IP professionals’ eyes—and some of the causes.

A greater understanding

The seed for IP Inclusive was sown when, as Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys (CIPA) vice-president, I organised a round-table on diversity for representatives across the IP professions. We just wanted to explore, tentatively, the fundamentals: were the IP professions sufficiently diverse and if not, was there an appetite for change and how would that change look? But we touched a nerve. People were genuinely, energetically, keen to rally round and take action. Within a few weeks we had ourselves some concrete plans, working groups to progress them, and then a name and a logo and, well, there was no getting out of it after that.

Seven years on and I am constantly amazed at what’s been achieved on the D&I front here in IP. Without doubt there is much still to do, but there is also a lot to be proud of. We’ve gained not only a greater awareness of D&I but also a better understanding of the issues involved. We are more likely to, and better equipped to, talk about it. And, crucially, we now have a more mature appreciation of its importance.

“The focus has moved away from diversity per se towards a recognition that diversity stats are meaningless unless underpinned by inclusivity.”

The changes we’ve witnessed have come in a range of guises. At the most basic level, the language of D&I has evolved. We’ve moved from BAME to an arguably more flexible and more sensitive “minority ethnicity”. The LGBT acronym has gained additional letters. We’ve seen documents updated for gender neutrality, and begun to refer to “all genders” rather than “both” to recognise that gender is a spectrum; in parallel it has become more common for people to declare their pronouns.

Beneath those apparently cosmetic changes, however, swells a deeper understanding of the earlier barriers to progress. The focus has moved away from diversity per se towards a recognition that diversity stats are meaningless unless underpinned by inclusivity. We now seek not only to recruit a more diverse workforce, but to ensure the newcomers feel welcome and valued, so that they stay, perform at their best, and ultimately attract others.

With this increased focus on inclusivity, we’ve gained a greater appreciation of “intersectionality”. The word wasn’t widely used in 2015 but it’s a valuable addition to our lexicon: the idea that each of us is a unique combination of identities; that people can face multiple layers of challenge through being part of several under-represented groups; but by the same token, that we can all be allies to one another in some way.

Our understanding of “unconscious bias” has also moved on. Once viewed as an evil that needed to be exorcised from bad people with an expensive training course, we are now beginning to accept it as a natural product of the way we think, something that will always be with us no matter how good our intentions and that we must work on constantly, together, to alleviate.

An interesting side effect of all this has been mental wellbeing’s rise up the agenda. Initially, it wasn’t part of IP Inclusive’s remit, but we soon realised there are inextricable links between mental health and feeling you belong. That link is now enshrined in our objectives.

More talk and more action

Fuelling the progress is a growing appreciation of the business benefits of D&I. Leaders now understand its impact on recruitment and retention of staff and on their productivity. They can see that more diverse teams perform better, are more innovative and respond with greater agility to a varied, often international, client base. The corporate sector has led the way in setting D&I standards for private sector professionals to aspire to—at first reluctantly, perhaps, but with increasing zeal as they reap their own benefits.

Back in 2015, only the largest organisations would have had dedicated D&I staff; now virtually every organisation, from tiny private sector firms upwards, will have at least someone whose role it is to see that D&I is on the agenda and appropriately addressed. A pleasing number have internal D&I working groups that include people from across the organisation, allowing everyone a stake in their progress.

Individuals have become braver too. IP professionals talk about D&I now in ways, and in forums, that would have seemed alien when IP Inclusive began. They are more open about their identities; they bring those identities into work at last, sharing their experiences and helping others to do the same. LGBT+ professionals have come out with courage and pride. Neurodivergent professionals have taken ownership of the positive elements of their neurological identities. Disabled people, carers and parents speak more about their needs and seek more help, and their colleagues and employers have become more confident in their responses. And alongside this, wonderful relationships are being built between the under-represented groups and their allies. Somewhere along our journey we have learned that D&I is something that everyone should help with; that men are crucial in the fight for women’s rights, white people to support people of colour, and so on.

I like to think that IP Inclusive provides a nucleus around which everyone in the IP sector, with their increasing D&I interests, can gather and collaborate. Organisations are sharing best practices in ways they rarely would have done before; they are supporting one another for the good of the entire IP sector. This to me is so important. It is inclusivity woven into the fabric of the IP professions of the future. As IP Inclusive flourishes, so too does the community it stems from.

A shifting landscape

So what’s behind our burgeoning relationship with D&I? While IP Inclusive may have catalysed some of the changes, primarily it has been a mechanism for coordinating and amplifying our sector’s response to things that were happening anyway. There were the #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter campaigns—and the horrendous events that gave rise to them. There was the COVID-19 pandemic, during which the professional services, robbed of their corporate finery and canapé parties, suddenly realised the importance of their people and in turn of those people’s wellbeing. Regulators have also been challenging us to increase our diversity, measure it better and treat our staff properly.

And alongside all this, a new generation has found its voice. Today’s recruits are increasingly concerned about ethical issues. To attract and retain a pipeline of talent—always a hot topic in the professions—the IP sector is having to respond in kind.