Advanced Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Training Open Course
Advanced EDI practice requires more than awareness. It requires the ability to examine complex issues, understand how inequality can operate through people, culture and systems, engage with challenge and translate EDI principles into meaningful organisational practice.
Open courses are public Equality and Diversity UK training dates that anyone can book onto, ideal when you only need training for one or two people.
In‑house courses are private sessions delivered exclusively for a group of people from your organisation, on a date that suits you, with the option to tailor the content to your staff and setting.
This advanced programme is designed for people who already have a good grounding in equality, diversity and inclusion and want to develop their practice further.
Rather than revisiting introductory EDI concepts, the course moves into more complex territory. Delegates explore how power, privilege and intersectionality can influence people's experiences, how organisational structures and culture can create or reinforce barriers, and how EDI practitioners can respond when progress meets resistance.
The course also explores practical approaches to designing and delivering EDI initiatives, using mediation approaches where appropriate and applying the 7Cs Framework and EDI Anchors to strengthen planning and everyday practice.
Throughout the day, delegates have opportunities to reflect on their own experience, learn from other practitioners and consider how the ideas explored can be applied within their own organisations.
This course is intended for people who are already actively involved in equality, diversity and inclusion and want to deepen their knowledge and practical capability.
EDI leads, advisers and practitioners who want to develop their thinking and strengthen their approach to organisational EDI.
Trainers and facilitators who already deliver EDI learning and want to develop their approach to more complex issues, resistance and participant dynamics.
Experienced Champions who want to deepen their knowledge and increase their ability to influence EDI practice.
Leaders with significant responsibility for EDI, organisational culture, people strategy or implementing inclusive change.
This is an advanced course rather than an introduction to EDI. Delegates should already have a good understanding of core equality, diversity and inclusion principles.
It is particularly suitable for people who have completed development such as our Train the Trainer – Equality, Diversity and Inclusion or Equality Champions courses, or who have gained equivalent knowledge and experience through their professional role.
You do not need to have completed one of our courses. Existing professional experience or equivalent EDI knowledge is equally appropriate. The important point is that you are ready to move beyond introductory awareness and engage with more complex EDI practice.
Knowing the principles of equality, diversity and inclusion is important. Advanced practice involves being able to apply those principles when situations become more complex, perspectives differ or straightforward solutions are not available.
The course encourages delegates to look beyond individual behaviour and consider the wider relationships between people, culture, organisational systems and decision-making.
Move beyond individual behaviour to consider organisational culture, systems, structures and patterns of inequality.
Explore how identities, experiences, power and organisational circumstances can interact rather than viewing equality issues in isolation.
Develop approaches for working with disagreement, resistance and difficult EDI conversations while keeping people engaged.
Connect EDI thinking with practical initiatives, training, organisational processes and everyday decision-making.
People do not experience organisations through one aspect of identity at a time. Different characteristics, identities, experiences and circumstances can intersect and influence how people experience opportunity, disadvantage, inclusion and exclusion.
The course explores intersectionality as a practical lens for EDI work rather than simply as a theoretical concept.
Consider how focusing on one characteristic or experience in isolation can sometimes obscure important differences between people.
Explore whose experiences are represented, who may be overlooked and whether different people experience the same policy or initiative differently.
Use intersectional thinking to inform training, consultation, organisational initiatives and decisions without reducing individuals to labels.
Advanced EDI practice requires the ability to explore power and privilege thoughtfully and constructively.
Delegates consider how power can arise through organisational hierarchy, professional status, access to decision-makers, social norms and wider patterns of advantage and disadvantage.
Privilege is explored without assuming that an individual has had an easy life or that people can be divided neatly into privileged and disadvantaged groups. Instead, delegates consider how particular characteristics, circumstances or systems may create advantages in some contexts and barriers in others.
The purpose is not to encourage guilt or blame. It is to develop the ability to recognise how power and advantage can influence participation, opportunity, decision-making and whose voices are most likely to be heard.
EDI problems are not always caused by somebody deliberately behaving unfairly. Organisational systems, established ways of working and apparently neutral practices can sometimes create different outcomes or barriers.
Consider behaviours, assumptions, relationships, influence and how people experience inclusion within an organisation.
Explore unwritten expectations, accepted behaviours, whose voices carry influence and what happens when established norms are challenged.
Examine how policies, processes, decision-making and organisational structures can support inclusion or unintentionally create barriers.
EDI practitioners and trainers will not always encounter agreement. People may question an approach, challenge terminology, dispute evidence, worry about saying the wrong thing or resist organisational change.
Different forms of resistance may require different responses. The course explores how to understand what may be driving a reaction before deciding how best to engage with it.
Listen carefully and identify whether the issue is disagreement, uncertainty, misunderstanding, anxiety, frustration or something requiring clearer challenge.
Use questioning, listening and facilitation approaches that create space for dialogue without losing sight of the purpose of the conversation.
Recognise when a response moves beyond legitimate disagreement and requires a clearer boundary, challenge or intervention.
The course draws on mediation approaches to help delegates think about how difficult conversations and conflict can be handled more constructively.
This is not professional mediator training. Instead, delegates explore principles and communication techniques that can strengthen EDI facilitation and organisational conversations.
Understand different perspectives, identify the underlying concern and distinguish people's stated positions from the issues beneath them.
Use questioning, reframing and areas of common ground to help conversations move towards greater understanding and practical next steps.
The programme explores the use of EDI Anchors to help connect equality, diversity and inclusion with the everyday work of an organisation.
Rather than treating EDI as a separate activity, delegates consider where equality and inclusion can be anchored into existing decisions, behaviours, processes and responsibilities.
The 7Cs Framework provides delegates with a structured approach to thinking about EDI planning, training and organisational initiatives.
Delegates explore how the framework can help move EDI work from broad intentions towards more considered activity, encouraging practitioners to ask important questions during planning and connect their work with everyday organisational practice.
The emphasis throughout is on practical application rather than simply learning another theoretical framework.
EDI practitioners may be involved in developing training, campaigns, staff networks, policies, action plans or other organisational initiatives.
The course encourages delegates to think critically about what those activities are intended to achieve and how they can move beyond activity for activity's sake.
What are we trying to change, why does it matter and what would meaningful progress look like?
Whose perspectives and experiences need to inform the work, and who may currently be missing from the conversation?
How will the initiative influence actual decisions, behaviours, processes or experiences rather than ending with awareness alone?
Sustainable EDI change cannot depend solely on individual enthusiasts, Champions or EDI practitioners. Organisations also need leadership, accountability and systems that support the behaviours and outcomes they want to create.
Delegates consider how they can influence change within their own sphere of responsibility while recognising where wider organisational action is required.
By the end of the course, delegates should be better able to:
One of the benefits of the open format is the opportunity to explore advanced EDI issues alongside delegates from different organisations. Discussion and collaborative learning provide opportunities to hear different perspectives, compare approaches and reflect on how similar challenges may be handled in different organisational contexts.
Advanced EDI is delivered as a one-day interactive course. The programme combines trainer input with discussion, reflection, practical activities and opportunities to apply advanced EDI concepts to organisational situations.
Open Courses are delivered live online via Zoom.
The course runs from 9.15 am to 4.00 pm.
We charge £395 per delegate.
Our in-house Advanced EDI course can be tailored around your organisation's priorities, the experience of your delegates and the EDI challenges they are currently working to address.
View In-House Advanced EDI TrainingOver 25 years' experience delivering equality, diversity and inclusion training, consultancy and professional development.
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