Martyn Sibley on how societies thrive when everyone is included

[00:00:00] Sarah Abramson: Speak to the Human is a podcast that explores how we build connections with people in their professional work. It's about the human experience at work and about how to foster that connection and belonging to support people and their organisations to flourish. I'm your host, Sarah Abramson, and I'm looking forward to you joining me in hearing from our brilliant guest.

[00:00:24] My guest in this episode is Martyn Sibley, entrepreneur, activist, and founder of the Purple Goat Marketing Agency. Purple Goat is uniquely a disability led, disability focused marketing agency. Martyn's experience and perspective is fascinating in many ways, not least because he challenges assumptions about the term disability.

[00:00:46] Explaining that it's really about the barriers that prevent some people from the same level of participation or contribution as others. In this conversation, he talks through a social model to give examples of what this means in [00:01:00] practice, but he goes further explaining how he works with companies to demonstrate and open up the commercial opportunities that are available by better servicing a large and overlooked population.

[00:01:12] I really appreciated Martyn's insights as well as his thinking about ways to bring together innovative ways to co-create new solutions. This is absolutely well worth a listen for everyone to encourage more open-minded thinking and creativity about how to see things that might not be visible enough.

[00:01:30] Please do like, share and subscribe to the podcast. And as always, we love to hear your thoughts and feedback.

[00:01:43] Hi Martyn, it is great to have you joining us on the podcast today. Um, I've been following your work for a while and I'm really interested in it and we've had some great chats, uh, in preparing and thinking about this podcast. So. I'm really excited to have you joining us and, [00:02:00] um, really keen to share a lot of the insights that you've got from the work that you do.

[00:02:04] So welcome.

[00:02:05] Martyn Sibley: Thank you for having me on the site.

[00:02:08] Sarah Abramson: Please. Can we start by you telling us a little bit about the work that you do and what led you into it?

[00:02:14] Martyn Sibley: Yeah, absolutely. So, I suppose the, the word change maker seems to be a bit of a catchall, which I know you can hear these words banded around, but I. Day to day, I am running a marketing agency at the moment called Purple Goat, which specialises around disability inclusion and representation in advertising of disabled people.

[00:02:35] Um, I've been creating content. Online it's about 2009, which has been very much that disability inclusion thrust. And I've recently founded a not-for-profit, a community interest company called The Purple Collective, and that's got a bit more of that sort of. Activism side to disability inclusion. So for me, [00:03:00] changemaker, it's social entrepreneurship and social activism, with a couple of examples of what I'm up to at the moment.

[00:03:08] Um, I, I suppose the why I've kind of ended up getting into all of this. So I am a wheelchair user. I have a genetic. Disability. So from birth it's called Spinal Muscular Atrophy. Um, so I've always had my disability. I had my first electric wheelchair and I was about three I sent on the other day. I've got, um, nieces and nephews in the family and a couple of my nephews, one's a bit younger than three, one's a bit older than three, and to imagine their age driving a heavy.

[00:03:41] Electric wheelchair around with their classmates. I dunno how I managed to figure that out, but obviously it was my, you know, lease of independence to be able to be able to move myself around with the joystick and be in the wheelchair. So yeah, all of my life has been, I [00:04:00] guess from that disability inclusion perspective, it's been that of a wheelchair user, which I think.

[00:04:07] As I've gone on to understand it as a broader societal issue and different types of solutions that we're, we're trying to enact to make the world a more inclusive place. It's obviously grounded in that, um, from that personal experience is, you know, going to school and navigating how to get around the school and going on holiday with the family and how that worked logistically.

[00:04:33] And then, yeah, employment and running. Businesses with some of my health know, I say health condition. I'm generally apart from the, the fact I can't do a lot physically for myself. I have carers that assist me, but, you know, day to day I'm, I'm generally quite healthy, but it's still just navigating the, the health side of having spinal muscular atrophy.

[00:04:55] So yeah, I think that that's obviously the big. Experiential [00:05:00] side. And then my first job was a, a, a big disability charity called Scope, and that was when I started to grasp it. As that social issues, like the large number of disabled people that a lot of people don't realize the scale of the size of the community, which I'm, I know we'll get into a bit later.

[00:05:20] So yeah, it's, it's become, uh, as much as I love entrepreneurship and campaigning and activism, it's always been that purpose and that mission of making the world more inclusive really.

[00:05:32] Sarah Abramson: Yeah. Brilliant. I, I mean, I, I know I've learned a lot just from listening to you about how big a population of people we have that, uh, could be classified as disabled.

[00:05:43] Although I think that term is, uh, it's tricky, isn't it? And I, I remember first hearing from you, um, at a webinar, I think it must have been about six years ago, but it really stuck with me how you, um, changed how we think about, or how you talk about. [00:06:00] What the concept of disability means and sort of changing it, helping us to change our thinking.

[00:06:07] About it being around exclusion and lack of access to places, things, experiences that other people can access rather than it being something that's a kind of innate property of the person themselves. Can you say a little bit about that and, and maybe give some examples of, of what that looks like and, and how you might experience it, or how other people that could be classified as disabled experience it?

[00:06:29] Martyn Sibley: Yeah, absolutely. So when I spoke of that first job at the disability charity. They were, I think it was like an when you joined the charity, the sort of onboarding training included disability awareness, which definitely makes sense for a disability charity to do that. And I think you know that there are more and more organisations that.

[00:06:52] Don't have disability as their core mission, but are starting to have that type of training, whether it be for a new [00:07:00] starter or, you know, later on. But, um, it's, it's good that that sort of broad disability awareness training is not only happening at disability charities as, as time has gone on, but the thrust of that training.

[00:07:13] Was around something called the medical model and the social model and the social model of disability says that I'm disabled by barriers in society. And that was what I kind of briefly touched upon before that, with my specific type of disability. It was so true and so powerful for me to look back on my, I, I think I started the job at 22 years old after I'd done my masters.

[00:07:43] So looking back then at the 22 years before, you know, the ways that when I tried to navigate schooling and holidays, like I said before. To see it in this light and they break the three, there's three types of barriers in the social module. There's the, the [00:08:00] environmental ones, which you sort of spoke to about access.

[00:08:03] So you know, an example would literally be if there's a building and there's steps. I'm disabled, but if there's a building with a ramp or a lift, I'm not disabled. I'm in my wheelchair, and I could go in the building and I can, whether it's a nightclub or a library or whatever I'm doing, going into that building for so.

[00:08:24] Environmental barriers are very logistical. The second one is attitudinal. And so again, looking back, I know some people see me in a wheelchair and have stereotypes and presumptions as to what they think my life must be like. And if we all reflect on that, the disability trope, there's often a kind of triumph over tragedy, which is often quite, um.

[00:08:51] Not only with Paralympics, but that that can be similar. There's this sort of, despite having a disability, [00:09:00] you've achieved amazing things. And that's not inherently wrong or bad, but like most disabled people are just going about the day to day life. They don't want to be a Paralympian on Climb a mountain.

[00:09:13] They just want to do the, the run of the mill day to day life. So that kind of the social model also speaks to that. Um, language and, and narrative as well. So with attitudinal barriers, if someone was to greet me, but then maybe to speak to my wife or my car assistant instead of talking to me, that's because of an attitudinal barrier.

[00:09:37] But if they, even with that bit of fear and nervousness that I still know is quite prevalent around people worrying they're gonna say the wrong thing or do the wrong thing. But if someone. Speaks to me as I am and, you know, talks to me as a human on the human podcast. So yeah, it's like they'll, they'll be able to have a normal [00:10:00] day-to-day interaction.

[00:10:01] And if for me or for other people there are like challenges around speech or cognition, it doesn't mean we shouldn't still address that person. There's like ways to still have a nice interaction and still talk to the person, say. Attitudes are a big one. And the third one is like procedural. There's a few examples, but maybe a business example would just be that if the, the recruitment process had the sort of barrier that meant someone wa wasn't able to show their talent and their ability.

[00:10:39] 'cause of a, like a disability related reason, like say that, you know, some, someone had to use a bit of software to be able to write their Word document, but the recruitment process didn't allow additional software. Then that that person, um, say like someone that's, [00:11:00] that's blind, the need of a screen read or something, like, they may not have the, as much chance of being successful for that role, not because they don't have experience or the knowledge or the capability, but because the, the process of that recruitment process isn't factoring in those barriers that can be.

[00:11:22] Removed or overcome or solved. So I, I very much appreciate that when we get into like academic theory of social model of disability, it can start to get a bit heady or a bit theoretical, but at the same time I found that so liberating that having spinal muscular atrophy didn't mean I was the reason or the problem for my challenges in accessing everyday life.

[00:11:52] Also not to get all like finger pointy, that society sucks 'cause there's all of the barriers because no [00:12:00] one's done it like on purpose. But in the end, if we understand that model and we overcome the barriers as best as we all can within our, you know, sphere of influence, then actually like disabled people like myself can participate more and more in society.

[00:12:19] And then that. Has benefits to business and to macroeconomics and governments as well.

[00:12:25] Sarah Abramson: Thank you so much. I think that is incredibly clear and I, I don't think it's too academic at all. I think it gives a really, uh, a clear way for all of us to think about. Those three categories are, are very, very helpful of the logistical, the attitude, and all of the procedural.

[00:12:40] I think we can all understand how those could exist. You know, frankly, how frustrating they must be if you're challenged by them every day. Some way or another, um, but also how easy it probably is for most of us to miss those things if we are not experiencing them ourselves. And we take certain things for [00:13:00] granted and we don't see those things.

[00:13:01] And if there's been a lack of education or awareness or a reason why we need to engage with those things, if we don't even see the consequence sometimes. Mm-hmm. Because somebody has been so excluded from a situation that they're not even present. So you don't even understand that. Somebody's not made a meeting with you because they can't get in the building or because you know you've missed out on a recruitment candidate because they literally cannot access your recruitment process.

[00:13:26] We don't even see it. So how do you, how do you think, you know, generally we could all become better aware of these things. What, what is it? Do we need to just. Kind of listen more. Is there something that should be happening in educational society? It's a big question, but

[00:13:42] Martyn Sibley: yeah, it's a, it's a big question and it's an important question.

[00:13:45] And it's interesting what my kind of professional journey. I did a lot of what I just spoke to. I said that was a lot of the work at the charity that did quite a lot of education through my content and, you know, [00:14:00] public speaking and media stuff. When I then started the travel business, which we ended up selling to Airbnb accessible travel business, and then the, the marketing agency, I, I haven't had as much kind of demand or focus on the more educative, I mean, I guess the, the marketing agency, we are educating the brands when we are doing the sales process.

[00:14:26] So they've got marketing budget, we've got a value proposition that's very. Newer and interesting to brands like, Hey, did you know that about, you know, one in four people in the case certainly have some kind of disability and your advertising and marketing don't have that anywhere near that representation.

[00:14:46] It's under 1%. So not just the right thing to do, the good thing to do, but it's makes business sense to actually have representation in marketing. So that's quite a nice example through Purple Goat. [00:15:00] That we are educating. Um, but that original point I was starting to make is that's, I've got, we're employing 20 people and I've got a team now that are doing lots of this as well, but I've definitely been coming back.

[00:15:14] Last year to what? If we want to look at how societies thrive when everyone's included, we really have to be able to articulate it like we've just spoken about those barriers. But we need those solutions, those strategies that aren't just a government policy or a multinational brand doing X, Y, Z, which matter as well, by the way.

[00:15:40] But there definitely is that. People within businesses can certainly just look at what their business does and what their role in the business is. And just having a little bit of a almost a daydream of like, well, actually, if I was in a wheelchair, or if I was blind or deaf for, you know, neurodiverse, [00:16:00] like what?

[00:16:00] What barriers are there? Barriers to my office building that I go to every day that someone else would struggle with? And, you know. What are my own attitudes to disability? You know, and I, I'll be really honest, like I keep banging on my experiences as a wheelchair user. So I've learned loads about what it is to live life from having, you know, a visual impairment or a hearing impairment and, and so on and so on.

[00:16:26] So I think it's, it's basically to learn and be aware. Is like, it's definitely the first step and it's almost the other step, which is follow logically. 'cause if you suddenly go, oh, well that, that, you know, there's steps into that part of our office, like maybe raise it with line manager or write an email to whoever's relevant but.

[00:16:50] Like that could end up being that suddenly the, the building goes, oh yeah, we never thought of that. And they, they get a ramp or they, they install a lift and it can be [00:17:00] as kind of easy as well as, and as simple as that. Yeah.

[00:17:04] Sarah Abramson: Yeah.

[00:17:04] Martyn Sibley: I guess again, like my bit, I, I went through that evolution of understanding disability for myself.

[00:17:11] I then saw that. Like with spinal muscular atrophy, there's only a fuck, I think it's like two, 300 in the country, maybe a bit more, but it's a rich rare disease. So the community of people with my disability is quite a, a small community. But if you go into like broader will changes, uh, there's around a million people in the uk Wow.

[00:17:34] But there's 15 million disabled people. And so I think this is a important point about visible and invisible disabilities, which. We can loop back onto strategies and solutions as well. 'cause I think there's more to say that, but I think it is important that as I evolve through my view and then other wheelchair users view, I think society always thinks that disability as a wheelchair user, like [00:18:00] even the, the disabled parking base is, is basically a wheelchair, use a symbol, but around 80% of disabilities are invisible.

[00:18:10] And I think that's something we've only been more aware of and conversing about. It feels like the last 10, 15 years, it's become more and more on the radar for people. And as you and I were speaking about earlier, the social model, the barriers don't always apply if someone has like chronic fatigue or chronic pain because however much.

[00:18:35] The building is accessible logistically, and attitudes are more open and inclusive and all those kind of things. I guess you could say procedurally, there are ways to be more flexible around those kind of disabilities. Um, and there are things in the environment and the attitude that, that are relevant.

[00:18:54] But you get my broad point here that it's actually, you know, if someone is literally in pain [00:19:00] a lot or has, doesn't have the energy, that that's a harder one. Purely from a social model perspective. Sure. But yeah, in the end, my point about awareness and empathy and just thinking about it will still uncover solutions for enabling someone with more invisible disabilities.

[00:19:22] And of course, invisible would also include someone who's blind or deaf. 'cause we wouldn't see. As well. So it is a very rich topic for, because yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of variables in there.

[00:19:35] Sarah Abramson: Yes. Yeah. And, and that's humans for you, isn't it? Exactly. I mean, it's not like, um, that's the danger as a whole of trying to clump everybody into one bracket and it's, that's problematic in so many ways.

[00:19:47] One of the things that I love about your work and, uh, the way that you talk about things is that you reframe. The whole conversation around disability as being a missed opportunity. Obviously it's important to do the right thing, but [00:20:00] beyond that. You, a lot of your work is around commercial opportunities that as a marketing agency, you are helping your clients to tap into of saying there's an opportunity here, there's a, there's a commercial opportunity.

[00:20:13] Martyn Sibley: Yeah.

[00:20:14] Sarah Abramson: Can you talk a little bit about that and the kinds of projects that you've done, or some examples of it?

[00:20:18] Martyn Sibley: Yeah, sure. And I guess on that personal level, that was another empowering moment for me that not only. And my, you know, SMA isn't the problem in that com. I'm not the problem. There's that social model stuff we talked about, but also when you go into where we are now with the business case, so it's not like.

[00:20:38] Hey, you know, holiday provider, could you please ensure that the hotels wheelchair accessible? 'cause I'd love to come to this hotel in Spain and enjoy a holiday like everyone else does. And so there's that sort of, you know, the social model element of, in this example is that holiday hotel [00:21:00] accessible, but then you also like, but I'm gonna pay for that holiday.

[00:21:04] So I'm, yes, I'm a customer. Right? There are considerations that weren't historically thought about and that we, as I said, my my way is not to get rowdy and angry about it. It's like we are where we are about how do we now kind of yeah. Create solutions. So even if there's a, a business might say, our cost to making this imaginary holiday hotel we're talking about now to be more accessible, but it's an investment because.

[00:21:37] If I and my, within that SMA community, I've got, you know, obviously a few friends through having SMA and suddenly you're like, oh, this holiday, this hotel in Spain is amazing for like wheelchair. It is like, where's gonna get around that? It's really accessible and it's all the other elements of why we all want to [00:22:00] go on a holiday, bit of sun, bit of food, whatever.

[00:22:03] So they're gonna get a load. More customers go into that hotel. Yeah, but it's, and and I think we talked about the narratives of triumph over tragedy and the other one I was gonna say was sort of pity, sympathy welfare. That in the news a few months ago was all this very one dimensional, you know, disabled people cost the government loads of money, and that's the narrative we heard.

[00:22:29] As to whether they were gonna cut the welfare a bit or not. And as we know, there's just nuance everywhere, right? Yeah. But, but ultimately, yeah, like it, it is just literally a lot of people have a disability that's fact. And if brands, you know, products and service providers want to have happier customers that already there, maybe not getting an optimal experience, but also.

[00:22:55] With some other bits, you know, tweaks and improvements and different design [00:23:00] access, a new market, that's a way of winning in business. I was like, that's a, you know, complete growth driver. And that's obviously what we, you know, talk about and do at Purple Goat. But it definitely transposes over into the government side.

[00:23:16] And if you've got. You know, that employment side to sort of having more employment opportunities for disabled people untapping the potential of entrepreneurship for disabled people, you get a double win because you've, you've got economic participation because the barriers are being removed, which means less reliance on the welfare bill means more.

[00:23:39] Taxes being paid more spending in the economy. So when we look at how the government bang on about, oh, we know productivity is a problem and we've not got enough money in the exec, but then they do quite shortsighted things where they like. Cut essentially solutions for disabled [00:24:00] people to be more included.

[00:24:01] It, it's gonna be worse off in the long run, even though they're saving a bit of money now. So I, I don't wanna get overly political, but like whether you look at the microeconomics of business or the macro economics or government, when you invest in overcoming the barriers, everyone wins. And I think that's been such a empowering message.

[00:24:25] To share rather than please let us as a community in because we are victims and it's the right thing to do. It's like, no, we all win when we do this.

[00:24:36] Sarah Abramson: Yeah, it totally makes sense, doesn't it? Put everything onto a more positive spiral, so yeah. Instead of, well, like I was saying earlier with the kind of tick the box to do the right thing, it's, it's just a reframing of what that looks like and what it means.

[00:24:48] If you empower people, give them opportunity, understand that they have got a really valuable contribution to make, and that they're bringing the kind of, it's like a, it's [00:25:00] diversity in terms of thinking differently, isn't it? Cognitive diversity as much as. Diversity in the way that we tend to think of it.

[00:25:07] What you want is people bringing in different perspectives so that you can understand what opportunity might be in front of you and how you might tap into that in business terms so that you know the business can be more profitable and that you're meeting a meet a need more effectively. So yeah, the whole thing makes sense

[00:25:26] Martyn Sibley: and it's so you know that obviously you can tell I'm, you know, from our pause chats.

[00:25:30] I'm very passionate about this stuff, but like when. Just see it. And it's not just disability, it's across the board, but it's such a divisive media narrative and political narrative. Like even what I was saying a minute ago about the welfare stuff, like people will go, yeah, but you know, the welfare bills ballooned and we can't afford it.

[00:25:53] And it's like, well. If that is absolutely factually true, because let's be honest, sometimes things are in the news that [00:26:00] have no basis of fact anyway. Yeah. But even if that's true, if we came at it from like a bit of empathy and what I think everyone would agree, like there are, there are certain situations where, you know, there are certain people with disabilities that however much we remove the barriers.

[00:26:18] Working would be impossible. Right. And like in a nuanced conversation, we, we acknowledge that like, of course we should have a welfare system for those that need it the most. You know, so I, I just. I found it very frustrating the last year or two that it's this constant, it's binary. It's that, or it's that.

[00:26:38] Yeah. Where do you sit on it? Yeah, yeah. Where do Wise sit on it? And if we're on the opposite side, we get really angry with each other.

[00:26:45] Sarah Abramson: Yeah. I think that feels true generally. I agree. You know, political discourse, it's true in what's going on with politics in America. It's true. It's true in so many ways that things have.

[00:26:57] Feel polarized and divisive. And I [00:27:00] totally agree. I think there's a sort of lack of nuance in so many of the ways that we, that we think about things and, and this is one area I think what. Strikes me so powerfully from listening to you is that understanding the difference between pity and empathy Yeah.

[00:27:16] Is really vital here.

[00:27:17] Martyn Sibley: Yeah. That's a really important distinction, isn't it?

[00:27:20] Sarah Abramson: Yeah, totally. And, and it completely transforms how you might approach something within a business. Say, you know, if you have empathy, you understand what people need, you're thinking about them, you're not sort of treating them in a patronizing way or in a.

[00:27:36] In a way that, you know, doesn't respect and recognize the contribution that they can bring.

[00:27:42] Martyn Sibley: Mm-hmm.

[00:27:43] Sarah Abramson: But it does enable thinking about how to get that contribution outta them.

[00:27:48] Martyn Sibley: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

[00:27:50] Sarah Abramson: Have you got examples of how or, or ways that you see that happening? Well, in organisations. You know, that kind of inclusivity goes [00:28:00] beyond the box ticking and the kind of, we we're doing this because we need to show our shareholders that we're doing the right thing and, and really thinks about getting the best from everybody.

[00:28:10] Martyn Sibley: Yeah. Because as we went a little bit into that, and we agree everyone would agree, that sort of political climate, that media narrative, I was mindful that it doesn't just get, you know, me getting on a, a soapbox or just. We can all obviously understand the, the frustrations around those sorts of things.

[00:28:29] But something that I, it was a particular book I read, it's probably a couple of years ago now, called Citizens, but it also called John Alexander, and there's loads of really rich examples exactly what. We are speaking to in that book. So for any of the people that love a good book recommendation, I would definitely say to read Citizens and what John's Okay.

[00:28:54] A little bit back to sort of social model as a, a theory or an academic principle, [00:29:00] but in a way that's kind of, John has nothing to do with disability. But it's about, in the past there were, I think he talks about the sort of royal, the royalty kind of, uh, model. You know, the, the fact that there was, the royal families were making the decisions for all of the citizens of, of the world back in history.

[00:29:22] And then the sort of, with, I guess more capitalism, the brands are creating the products and services that customers want to buy. So we ended up in quite a consumer model and as consumers it was better than, than being sort of literally the royalty told us what to do. And also with government, we have democracy.

[00:29:47] But what he's saying is we're moving into like a newer model where we as the people and recipient of goods and services and we as citizens of a country are more [00:30:00] participatory. Co-creating in the products and services and in the policies, rather than given a menu of options that we kind of vote for with our money or we vote for with our, you know, in the election.

[00:30:15] So again, a little bit academic, a little bit theoretical, but that gave me a lot of, of a newer passion around, well, yeah, how do we harness that in an everyday life sense? Yeah. Yeah. And through. I mean, you asked for an example. I mean the, I guess it is the stuff we do at Purple Goat that a brand will say, okay, we get, we are not doing enough for disabled people, but we dunno where to start.

[00:30:43] And we say, well, that's our role. That's why we are here as an agency. And we'll do a sort of listening piece, an insights piece, where depending on the brand and depending on the sector, uh, but one example would be. Tui the, the holiday [00:31:00] provider. So we did like round tables with people with different disabilities and different other socioeconomic backgrounds as well cross sectioned with the disabilities and essentially we were able to show TUI what this group of their target audience, their consumer base needed unwanted.

[00:31:22] So as a, and they were doing a lot of good stuff anyway, but as a result, they've managed to make their holidays a lot more inclusive. We did a marketing campaign which had ridiculous ROI like. Their phones were off the hook with people. I, I don't mean to use a holidays open and again, but maybe I'm, I'm

[00:31:43] Sarah Abramson: loving it.

[00:31:44] Think you wanna go on holiday

[00:31:45] Martyn Sibley: the back of my head today with that rain outside the window today. Yeah. But then TUI and us at Purple Goat. We won loads of marketing industry awards as well. So that's probably a nice [00:32:00] example of that. How to co-create what the product or service is. Then also co-create the marketing campaign, and it showed that the results were far.

[00:32:12] Better on a business level as well. It wasn't just some fluffy, kumbaya idea. It was absolutely grounded in business principles as well.

[00:32:23] Sarah Abramson: That's such a fantastic example. Thank you for sharing that. I love it. And super interesting that, um, connection with the the Citizens book. I'm gonna look that up for sure.

[00:32:32] It's making me think where you were talking there about sort of democratization. Participation and also, um, the ability to hear, to be heard. Uh, I, I like that you've run an exercise there to gather insights and listening exercise, and that you've been able to filter that, those insights through to something that makes a difference.

[00:32:51] That's based on co-creation and accessibility and, and, and you've got the results to show for it at the end. I'm interested in weather. [00:33:00] Technology as well as better engagement by agencies like yours. Is technology making a difference to the ability to hear from and include people more effectively?

[00:33:10] Martyn Sibley: Yeah, I mean, definitely.

[00:33:11] I mean, obviously technology, you know, historically I think about the electric wheelchair, like if I was born. A long time ago, I wouldn't be able to drive myself around in a, in a power chair. And, um, the hoist, which we'll come back to in a little while, I have the hoist to get listed out on my wheelchair.

[00:33:32] So those types of technology are obviously very fundamental in that sort of mobility part of disability. But yeah, like as, as my life's gone on, you know, I have been able to say, work at home a bit more. When, that's sometimes mid-winter when I'm a bit more wary of catching chesty coughs. And that's a bit of a consideration with my SMA so [00:34:00] that that's enabled something that couldn't have done decades ago.

[00:34:04] And then obviously the buzzword AI is people talk about now, but I use chat GPT lot partly because it's easier for me to speak than type. Mm-hmm. So I, I use the voice function in it. It gets more of what I've said than older versions of text to speech, um, or speech to text, I should say, in that instance.

[00:34:28] So that's a very tangible way that I, I can now speak to t and it can help turn. Into an email or a draft copy for a LinkedIn post and that kind of stuff. And that, that's definitely related to disability. I believe Siri was actually invented around the needs of a group of disabled people and Oh really?

[00:34:51] And that's a perfect, it's on. But yeah, so AI is generic use with a use case for disability. Something like Siri was [00:35:00] designed. Initially for disabled people, but then benefits everyone.

[00:35:05] Sarah Abramson: That's so cool. I didn't know that.

[00:35:07] Martyn Sibley: And that, that's the kind of, I guess the, the drumbeat now whenever I'm talking is that narrative.

[00:35:13] It's like when we design for the, again, you wanna like create over generic capital terms, but like. You know, if we say there are certain situations, it's harder to design with disability access requirements in mind, but when we kind of bother or think about doing that, there's often further reach and benefits on that universal design.

[00:35:38] I think there's another thing that you're going building and there's, on the left there's steps, and on the right there's a ramp. More people take the ramp who are on in a wheelchair, and also not to forget. You know, there are parents with buggies and those kind of, so universal design's, quite a rich topic around the benefits of inclusion for [00:36:00] everyone, which is sort of intertwined with your question around technology as well.

[00:36:03] Sarah Abramson: Definitely leads really nicely on to something that we, we touched on in previous conversations that be we could hear about, which is I think you have a plan to create, uh, sort of disruptive innovation around this whole space of, um. I think you're calling it Inclusion Solution Lab. Can you tell us what that is and, and what your plan is?

[00:36:23] Yeah, so

[00:36:24] Martyn Sibley: I mean, it's all what we've been chatting about. You know, you think that the accessible travel business was to disrupt, there wasn't enough provision, but the supply side of accommodation, but more. A platform that had vetted information of the accommodations that already exist. So even if that we could do with a bit more accommodations that are accessible.

[00:36:50] It's more important that I know when I'm booking, I'm not booking one that's inaccessible. So the information needs to be good. So we disrupted that as a [00:37:00] startup. And then Airbnb took on the, if you go on Airbnb, the filters for accessibility, that that's the legacy of the startup I was involved in. Same with Purple Goat, not enough representation of disabled people in marketing.

[00:37:15] So we've disrupted that. Then I think I just look in my everyday life. There are so many things I'm like, it doesn't have to be that hard, like surely in 2025. But for, for that kind of history of the way people understand disability not being as this business cakes, but being a, a bit of a charity model or, or a pity thing, whatever.

[00:37:41] You've got this situation with the example of the hoist. So I, as I mentioned earlier, need a hoist to get lifted out of my wheelchair into bed or into the bathroom and at home. I'm all geared up. I've got, it's called a ceiling track hoist, but when I stay overnight, there's about 10 rooms in all [00:38:00] of the UK that have a hoist.

[00:38:03] Now you might go well. If Martyn needs one, but how many other people need one? Maybe that's the problem. Maybe it's not that many people, but from the Change in Places campaign, which is around the provision of public toilets that have a hot East. They got the building regulations to change the regs. To say that if you are development developing a shopping center or a sports stadium, you now have to have a change of places.

[00:38:33] Spoiler, okay? There's none of that in the hotel world. There's a cord of a million people. That require a hoist

[00:38:41] Sarah Abramson: Good grief. Which is back

[00:38:42] Martyn Sibley: to the point earlier, right? Like that's business case. Yeah. But I've tried to talk to Holiday and I've tried to talk to Premier and I've tried to talk to various of the brands and they're just seeing it as a, a cost on the balance sheet rather than an investment on growing.

[00:38:58] The audience and [00:39:00] having happier customers. So yeah, the Purple Collective is the not-for-profit I referenced earlier. And so what the Purple Collective part of what The Purple Collective will do are these inclusion solution labs, which is bringing together different stakeholders to try and come up with new solutions that didn't exist before.

[00:39:20] And you know, maybe that's a type of portable hoist maybe. Maybe it is kind of getting the hotel brand in the inclusion solution lab, so they actually grasp what they've, maybe not grasped previously, but it's, it is about convening stakeholders across different sectors to come up with answers that are there but haven't yet been kind of created or, or realized before.

[00:39:51] Sarah Abramson: I love it. So it's almost a bit, maybe this is. Slightly the wrong way of putting it, but it's like almost a bit of the kind of hackathon approach. Yeah.

[00:39:57] Martyn Sibley: Hackathon rings a bell with that as well. [00:40:00] Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah, solvable.

[00:40:01] Sarah Abramson: You've got a problem and you're bringing together different ways of thinking about it to kind of interrogate what the problem is, how you might unpick it, what the opportunity is, and some really creative ways of addressing it.

[00:40:12] So, so this is a plan that you will be putting in place or are you already doing some of it?

[00:40:17] Martyn Sibley: Yeah, we bit of a sort of side point, but we had some delays in getting the infrastructure with the community interest company and then getting the bank account, all that kind of infrastructure stuff. So we, we launched.

[00:40:31] A bit over a year ago, and it was very much around a lot of the work that John Alexander and Citizen talks about, that it's that purple collective, it's that collective voice, and that's not just disabled people, that's anyone that cares about disability inclusion, but we still need like a vehicle to drive.

[00:40:52] Change and that that's what the Inclusion Solution Labs will be. And then we're, you know, gonna get lottery funding and [00:41:00] philanthropic giving to help fund that. And the way I also explain the difference with Purple Coat, purple Goat is where a brand is, is aware enough they wanna do something, they've got budget and they're ready to spend it.

[00:41:13] We are a marketing agency, we're not a charity. So Purple Goat. We need the budget and the revenue to exist as a business. But when brands or industries are like not wanting to engage on a topic like hoist in hotels, it's kind of where there's market failure, so to speak. The Purple Collective is galvanizing that public, but a bit of public pressure, but it is very important for me, it's solutions oriented, so that's where it's about convening.

[00:41:46] You know, influential people in different disciplines to come up with those answers.

[00:41:51] Sarah Abramson: I love that. It feels like a clarion call for an opportunity. Right, right, right there. Commercial opportunity that makes sense on so many different [00:42:00] levels, brings people together, you know? Like you say, galvanizes, that kind of entrepreneurial thinking that innovation brings in people with different experiences, different perspectives.

[00:42:10] I, I'm, I'm excited to see more coming out of it.

[00:42:13] Martyn Sibley: Yeah. And that is very important. It's got that, that kind of mass voice behind it. Yeah. So the, the, the labs will be of a select people with the skillset, but it should always be. Driven and decided by the collective's priority is of what matters.

[00:42:31] Sarah Abramson: I'm really aware that we don't have you for very much longer.

[00:42:35] We need to wrap up in the next couple of minutes, uh, which is, yeah, it's a shame 'cause I, I, I would love to explore this further if people wanna find out more about. About that? Is there somewhere they can go to read about it or, yeah.

[00:42:48] Martyn Sibley: The, the three kind of brands, the purple change makers is really my personal brand.

[00:42:54] So I'm, I'm, I'm martynsibley.com is my website, but I'm on LinkedIn and TikTok [00:43:00] and that's where I share lots of this sort of. I guess this thinking and this evolution in all these ideas that we've talked about today. So that's kind of more me personally. And then purple Go agency.com is all of the great work the team are doing on the marketing side, and then purple collective global.com.

[00:43:22] Is where there'll be more coming again soon. Now we're back off to the, to the races with the infrastructure. I mean, even with the hoist in hotels. I did a, a session for Visit England, the, the tourist board, and I, I randomly met someone. Who, let's just say they've got someone close in their network who's the CMO of Premier in.

[00:43:46] Sarah Abramson: Wow. Okay. For the

[00:43:48] Martyn Sibley: right moment.

[00:43:50] Sarah Abramson: That's the kind of channel you want.

[00:43:51] Martyn Sibley: Yeah. But because in the end it's network. Like I, a lot of the stuff I was doing in the magazine in like 20 11, 20 12, 20 13 [00:44:00] is not that different, but every. Yeah, I keep going. There are new ideas, but there are more importantly new people and, and I think my role is the sort of bridge building joining dots at the more, I kind of see that in a macro way.

[00:44:17] And so yeah, if anyone's listening that has other questions, feel free to reach out.

[00:44:22] Sarah Abramson: And if they have ideas, suggestions, ideas, arent they? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Brilliant. Exactly.

[00:44:25] Martyn Sibley: All that good stuff. And yeah, like you said earlier. It doesn't also need to be that the person is gonna fix waste in hotels, but it's having that empathy and awareness in everyday life.

[00:44:37] Well,

[00:44:37] Sarah Abramson: and I think you've brought to like how broad this is. Yeah. Like how many different aspects there are. And that in itself just speaks to how much opportunity there is in so many different ways, so many different paths that affects everything. And so that kind of creative thinking, I mean, I think it's really exciting, but as I say, we, we need to let you go.

[00:44:59] And it's [00:45:00] been just absolutely brilliant to have this insight. I, I really value it. I think it challenges thinking. I think it's, um, it's just brilliant hearing you talk about it. So thank you so much, Martyn. Really appreciate your time. Thank

[00:45:13] Martyn Sibley: you, Sarah.

[00:45:14] Sarah Abramson: And, uh, I hope that everyone has enjoyed this conversation as much as I have.

[00:45:18] Please do, like, share, and subscribe to the podcast. Bye for now.