Season 2 Episode 4: Tools for Creative Equity with Lena Nahlous

Written By Patternmakers

Our guest today is a powerhouse and champion of cultural diversity and racial equity in Australia’s art sector. Lena Nahlous, Executive Director at Diversity Arts Australia, joins me to discuss the Creative Equity Toolkit, an incredibly valuable and practical resource to help organisations make headway in this area.

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Image description: A black and white photo of Lena smiling at the camera, wearing a zipped up jacket and shoulder-length hair. The episode title “Tools for Creative Equity with Lena Nahlous” is displayed next to the photo of Lena.

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In many ways, racial equity is one of the most important challenges of our time. We have certainly made progress in this space, but there is more work to be done. 

Our guest today is a powerhouse and champion of cultural diversity and racial equity in Australia’s art sector. Lena Nahlous, Executive Director at Diversity Arts Australia, joins me to discuss the Creative Equity Toolkit, an incredibly valuable and practical resource to help organisations make headway in this area. 

With a long list of achievements working with migrant and refugee communities and a range of roles in community and cultural development, Lena took on her role at Diversity Arts Australia to help influence change at a systemic level. The Creative Equity Toolkit is a curated collection of easily accessible resources, language prompts and practical checklists, helping organisations make real cultural change from within.

Lena talks about how the toolkit works, the topics it includes and how to navigate through the numerous resources available. We talk about what meaningful progress looks like in an organisational setting, and how this must be done first in order to create a real shift in our society. 

We discuss how important it is to have an action plan with tangible goals, responsibilities, an allocated budget, and review processes in place and how diversity and inclusion is an ongoing journey because things are always shifting.  There is always more to learn but every small step we take has a ripple effect. Keep listening, keep learning.

Key points

[3:00]: Lena’s work background, anti-racism activism and why she came into the role as Executive Director at Diversity Arts Australia

[6:45]: How the Creative Equity toolkit came about in connection with the British Council and how it’s so accessible and practical in helping organisations become racially diverse

[10:30]: The toolkit enables Diversity Arts to support and provide information to organisations without exhausting individuals who are labouring because of the systemic issues 

[12:00]: Before you go to your friends for information, do the work first by reading and listening to the vast amount of resources available.

[13:15]: The topics included in the toolkit and how it’s so easy to navigate and inviting. Lena shares examples of how to navigate through the toolkit to determine which resources you want

[16:15]: The toolkit includes different actions you can take for each topic and a practical checklist. Lena shares some of these under the anti-racism section and how it’s a great entry point for a lot of people unsure how to approach situations.

[18:30]: The Calling Out and Calling In resource. Lena talks about what these terms mean and what the section includes to help people speak to others and know how to be an ally

[22:30]: The practical language that the toolkit provides 

[24:20]: The Fair Play Project and how it’s important to take the time to do the work ongoing, not just as a one off training. Diversity Arts works with organisations to establish equity action plans.

[27:00]: Language is always changing. This work is always continuing and Lena approaches it as education which is always practical and evolving. 

[28:00]: Organisations must have a good equity action plan with concrete outcomes, a budget and review process. It needs to be owned by the whole team and wholly embraced by the leadership. 

[29:50]: When you diversify the leadership team, the flow on effect goes into the programs you offer, the language used and the audience

[32:20]: Music Victoria and the Opera House are two examples of organisations using and recommending the toolkit

[35:30]: One thing business can do for real change and renewal is to listen, read, watch, access the content out there and review your own practises. 

[37:00]: The next steps for the toolkit is to do an overview of the First Nations Content, funded through the Australian Council Reimagine program. They will be collecting in depth case studies to make the information accessible. 

[38:30]: The toolkit will go international, working in many countries with multilingual resources.

[40:25]: Top takeaways from this episode

[41:40]: The most clicked resource in last month’s newsletter was the Australia Councils Toward’s Equity Publication

Links

The Creative Equity Toolkit: https://creativeequitytoolkit.org/   

Colour Cycle Podcast: http://diversityarts.org.au/project/the-colour-cycle/

Stop Everything! on Apple Podcasts

The Towards Equity Research Overview 

Diversity Arts Australia

LinkedIn: Lena Nahlous


Supported by Creative Victoria, Theory of Creativity Season 2 is focussed on 'Real Change and Renewal'. Tune in on the first Tuesday of the month as Patternmakers Managing Director Tandi Palmer Williams speaks with experts in audience trends, strategic planning, organisational change and resilience.


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