Confessions of an EDI Trainer — Episode 2: The Time I Was Told I Was Punching Above My Weight

During a Cultural Competence Workshop with a Fire Service, I ran a session I call First Impressions.

The idea is simple. I break the room into small groups and give each group a different photo and ask them to write down their immediate first impressions. No time to think. No time to filter. Just their initial gut reaction.

It is one of my favourite exercises because it is where the magic happens. When we reflect afterwards and I give them the story behind the people in the pictures, most people laugh at themselves. They catch their own assumptions in real time.

One of the images is of a beautiful Asian woman. Softly focused, distant look in her eyes.

The feedback from that image is often predictable.

"She looks like she's in a forced marriage."

"She doesn't seem happy."

"Maybe she's oppressed?"

Then, once they've shared all of that, I pause. I smile. And I say:

"That's my wife."

The shuffle that follows is one of my favourite sounds in a training room. Awkward giggles. Slight embarrassment. People shifting in their seats. It reminds me of being in school when some of my friends would say something dismissive about South Asians and then look at me and add, "not you though, you're alright."

After a few seconds I tell them I'm joking. It's not actually my wife. And the room exhales.

But on this particular occasion, before I coud tell them I was joking, one participant shot back with:

"You're punching WAY above your weight!"

The whole room laughed. And so did I.

Why that moment mattered

Here is what is important about what happened.

That participant did not wait to see how the room would react. He did not check whether it was safe to be funny. He just said what he thought, out loud, in front of his colleagues and trusted that it would land.

That is psychological safety. And it does not happen by accident.

It happens when a trainer has created an environment where people feel comfortable to be themselves. To say what they actually think. To be challenged and to challenge. To learn without shame.

I may have lost that particular exchange. But I won the room. And winning the room is always the goal.

Because EDI training that keeps people quiet is not training. It is performance. The real work happens when people feel safe enough to be honest, uncomfortable and imperfect.

That afternoon in the Fire Service, we had some of the most genuine, open conversations I have facilitated. And it started with one participant's very questionable assessment of my romantic prospects.

Episode 3 involves a very senior NHS manager and a question I will never forget. It is not funny. But it is important.