Voices4All Conference

08.45

Registration & coffee

09.30

Welcome from the Chair

Mark Thorpe, Chair Voices4All Council

09.40

Solidarity!

An interactive session that explores Solidarity as the foundation of progress and a joyful discovery. Led by the MRS Social Equity Group, it examines how shared lived experience across class and ethnicity can spark unexpected connections.

Drawing on recent research conducted with CORe, the session reflects on the power of reflexive, sensitive, ethical research where both researcher and participant bring their full selves to the conversation to generate unexpected moments of empathy and connection. Delegates will explore how empathy, shared passion and honest dialogue can uncover solidarity in surprising places.

Rachel Lawes, Semiotician, SEG board member, author "Using Semiotics in Marketing"

Annabelle Phillips, Founder, AP Research & SEG Co-Chair

10.10

Panel

Making menopause matter

Menopause is not a protected characteristic, yet it signals deep-rooted inequality worldwide. Long overlooked, menopause is now gaining overdue attention across society, culture and the workplace. 

Join panellists who have a passion and expertise in the researching and lived realities of menopause. Examine progress made, persistent gaps, and what organisations and researchers must do next to drive meaningful, lasting change.

Chair

Dr Matilda Andersson, CEO, Truth Consulting

Panel

Clair Montgomery, Head of Consumer Marketing, Bayer UK

Maria Antidormi, Head of Quant & Analytics, Truth Consulting

Emma Cooper, Chief People Officer, System1

10.40

Break

11.10

Workshop

Driving equality through social norm change

This interactive workshop equips participants with practical tools to identify, measure and shift social norms to advance equality and inclusion. Drawing on international social change campaigns, the session introduces a framework for identifying social norms, guidance on researching and measuring change, the use of vignette techniques to unpack how norms drive behaviours, and a behaviour-change toolkit for shifting harmful norms and creating new positive norms.

Dr Philly Desai, Director, Turnstone Research and Consultancy

11.55

Round table

How to protect DE&I when budgets tighten: a discussion on proving business value

DE&I initiatives are often morally supported, but financially vulnerable, especially during difficult business periods. In this collaborative round table, delegates will share ideas and techniques they are using inside their organisations to 'prove' the business ROI.

Sumran Kaul, Independent Insight & Commercial Strategy Consultant

12.30

Lunch

13.30

Deaf-led and deaf-inclusive research: what good practice looks like

What does it truly mean for research to be Deaf-led and Deaf-inclusive and how does that approach generate stronger, more accurate and authentic insight?

This session brings together practitioners behind pioneering projects designed with and for Deaf communities. Panellists will examine what “Deaf-led” means in practice - from research design and preparation, recruitment and pre-research communication, facilitation to synthesis and delivery. They’ll share practical guidance on planning, community engagement, interpreter collaboration, Deaf facilitation, and validating synthesised findings.

Chair

Christine Hemphill, Managing Director, Open Inclusion           

Panel

Giles Barker BEM, Workplace Disability Lead, Channel 4

Naomi Bottrill, Co-Founder, Love Language

Laura Goldberg, Deaf/Hard of Hearing & BSL Community Lead, Open Inclusion

14.00

Handing over the power: innovation in participatory grantmaking

What happens when communities are not just consulted, but given real decision-making power? This panel explores a participatory grantmaking pilot in Brixton and Peckham that placed funding decisions in the hands of residents to fund local projects that serve marginalised communities. Using innovative recruitment, a community board was formed to design and run the fund end-to-end.

Panellists will share lessons learned, practical guidance for making participatory models work, and reflections from board members demonstrating what genuine, community-led inclusion looks like in practice.

Dr. Kenny Imafidon MBE, Co-founder, ClearView Research

Resident community board members

14.30

Afternoon refreshments

15.00

Who taught you to doubt yourself? Understanding the inner critic and learning how to show up anyway

Self-doubt is often treated as a personal confidence issue. But what if the inner critic is something we learn, shaped by professional norms, power dynamics and ideas about who gets to be seen as credible?

Explore how self-doubt shows up in research environments that prize certainty, expertise and being “right”. Discover why imposter syndrome disproportionately affects women, minoritised researchers, neurodivergent people and those from non-traditional backgrounds and gain practical reframes for reclaiming authority without assimilating.

Rachael Fraser, Leadership Coach, Rachel Fraser Coaching

15.30

Changemaking in practice: creating workplaces where everyone thrives

Changemakers share inclusive workplace initiatives that are making a tangible difference in their organisations. Delegates are invited to share novel initiatives they have set up in this idea exchange.

Chair

Sabrina Trinquetel, Account Manager, YouGov

Panel

Rachel Pound, Senior Recruitment Specialist, Research Opinions and Acumen Fieldwork

Alec Fuller, Recruitment Specialist, Research Opinions and Acumen Fieldwork

Diba Jedo, Lead Strategist, The Mix Global

tbc

16.00

The power of play for connecting teams

In the ever-changing world of work, improv comedy can be used to help people strengthen connection and confidence. Improv encourages participants to step outside their comfort zones, trust their intuition and respond with curiosity rather than fear.

Inclusion, accessibility and empowering voices is the undercurrent of all Charlie’s work. In this session she will share her experiences of the transformational power of play and demonstrate how this unique and practical approach can help delegates sharpen key communication skills and build trust as a team.

Charlie Vero-Martin, Comedian and Founder, Jollity Coaching

16.30

End of day