National Inclusion Week is an annual week of workplace activities and events that shows the importance of inclusion across the UK. Some of these activities can vary from quizzes, blogs and video chats. National Inclusion Week provides everyone with a great opportunity  to analyse, learn and reflect on what we can do to be better human beings to one another.

National Inclusion Week was founded by Inclusive Employers, it celebrates inclusion and making moves to make inclusive workplaces. The goal is to become naturally inclusive, where respecting and celebrating one another’s diversity simply becomes second nature.

Here at Take One TV we have been delighted to work with a number of organisations who specialise in raising awareness and giving support to the value of DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion). In particular this year we have worked with The Makaton Charity to help them create a video library of their concept signs which are aimed at helping those with cognitive and processing challenges to be able to communicate more easily.

The Makaton Charity helps people by using signs, symbols and speech to develop communication, language and literacy skills. The Makaton Charity provides advice, training, and resources for families, carers and professionals. They work to share their knowledge and influence society to improve communication for everyone.

We’ve also been privileged to work with The Art of Brilliance over a number of years by creating video content for their online library of educational and supportive information aimed at schools and colleges with a particular emphasis on wellbeing and inclusivity.

The Art of Brilliance team help people perform better psychologically and physically so that they ‘flourish better in the workplace’.  They also help anyone who is struggling with mental health and wellbeing challenges.

The National Inclusion Week 2024 theme is ‘Impact Matters’. The theme has strong messages that focuses around interpreting, recognising and calculating impact on excluded groups and taking actions that makes for authentic, sustainable change.  The week has exponentially grown, reaching across to thousands of organisations and millions through social media.

‘Inclusivity’ is very important in various organisations values as they’re trying to create a delightful, secure and thriving work environment for all of their employees. Furthermore, many organisations that celebrate diversity will gain many of their employees’ trust, value and respect.

Showing support and inclusion helps people to feel authentic and true to themselves. In addition, it helps tap into their potential, enabling them to be more confident and thrive in their workplace as well as life.   Many organisations focus on inclusivity in meetings and unconscious bias to ensure that everyone is being included in the discussion.  The Film and TV industry has long been open to those with diverse needs and recognised their value and creative input.  The negative aspects when an organisation doesn’t become inclusive can cause some marginalised groups to become angry, knocking down their self-esteem and in many people’s, mind prevented them from doing as well as they could.

Many people that have various special needs that require more energy and focus have found the Film and TV industry welcoming and offering opportunities for them to learn and grow in a positive environment.  Listening and valuing the perspectives of people from different backgrounds helps us create new innovative ideas; fortunately challenging the status quo constructively is becoming the new norm.