We Are PoWEr Podcast
The We Are PoWEr podcast spotlights voices and perspectives that need to be heard. Our weekly podcast, with listeners in over 60 countries, delivers PoWErful conversations that inspire, challenge, and empower... from personal life stories to business insights and leadership lessons.
We share diverse experiences, bold discussions, and real solutions. Whether you're looking for career advice, topical themes, or stories of resilience and success - this is where voices spark change.
We Are PoWEr Podcast
How Ngozi Weller & Wayne Bennett Are Changing Manchester Forever
The brilliant Ngozi Weller and Wayne Bennett join the We Are PoWEr Podcast – bringing honesty, courage, and vision to a powerful conversation about racial equity, authentic leadership, and creating real change in Manchester and beyond.
Their partnership began on a train journey – a chance meeting that sparked a movement. Wayne, a visionary entrepreneur, and Ngozi, a fearless strategist and advocate, combined their complementary strengths to co-found The Racial Equity Group (REG) within Pro Manchester. What started as a shared conversation has evolved into RegConnect – a groundbreaking event that’s redefining how inclusion, business, and opportunity intersect.
Driven by the sobering reality that while Manchester’s ethnic minority population exceeds 18%, representation in leadership sits at just 5%, Ngozi and Wayne are confronting inequity head-on. Their work is about turning awareness into action – bringing corporate leaders and underrepresented professionals into the same room to connect, collaborate, and create lasting impact.
In this episode:
- How a train journey sparked a movement for racial equity in Manchester
- Building the Racial Equity Group and RegConnect: collaboration over confrontation
- The reality of representation: 18% of the population, 5% of leadership
- Why courage, not comfort, drives meaningful inclusion
- Turning diversity into business impact – and the data that proves it
- How authenticity builds movements that last
- The legacy Wayne and Ngozi are creating for the next generation
Find out more about We Are PoWEr here. 💫
Hello, hello and welcome to the we Are Power podcast. If this is your first time here, the we Are Power podcast is the podcast for you, your career and your life. We release an episode every single Monday with listeners in over 60 countries worldwide, where you'll hear personal life stories, top-notch industry advice and key leadership insight from amazing role models. As we Are Power is the umbrella brand to Northern Power Women Awards, which celebrates hundreds of female role models and advocates every year. This is where you can hear stories from all of our awards alumni and stay up to date with everything. Mpw Awards and we Are Power. Welcome to the we Are Power podcast. I have got a Never imitated, never replicated, singularly wonderful, everybody's wonder girl. Welcome to the we Are Power podcast. I have got a two for one special this week. Bog off, indeed, indeed. I thought you were being rude then. We've only just started. It would be unusual for me.
Speaker 1:Ngoziwala and Wayne Bennett. Welcome, welcome, welcome to the podcast. It's great. This is what we have to do, isn't it? To try and get. How often do we try and catch up? I?
Speaker 2:know this is. I was under the false pretense that there would be cocktails, dinner and stuff. Oh okay, hold on a sec, bring out no cocktails cue the cue the aperitifs no. No.
Speaker 1:Well, it's worth it. Just for you, simone, it is. You're just saying that.
Speaker 3:I think she's just lined up a nice meal for the next time, aren't you? Yeah, I like it. I'd like that.
Speaker 1:We've always talked about, you know, a late night version. You should, but now we're thinking of a culinary version, because because it's all about breaking bread and having great conversations across the table. For sure, there we go. Deal. We've just made a deal. Every podcast recently I think we've created, we are power oaky, we are power. Playlists you know.
Speaker 2:So today we are power poke bowls because it's the only thing I can think of with a P and it's not right. That's pretty good though.
Speaker 1:So Wayne Bennett, founder, made for tech global, and garci weller, workplace inclusion specialist and so much more. Speaker award-winning. How, garci, would you explain wayne in three words? Um spoiler alert, wayne, that's coming your way in a minute.
Speaker 2:I do it in two, or can I do it in five?
Speaker 1:Well, one of them. You can hyphenate them. I want to do it with five.
Speaker 2:I normally describe him in two as Mr Manchester, but I want to describe him fully. Mr Manchester with a heart, that's who Wayne is to me. Manchester with a heart, that's who Wayne is to me. There actually, to be fair, this guy is the male version of me as far as I can see. There you go. My husband describes him as my work husband. Yeah, he is like the male version of me and I've not met many people like that who I so readily identify with in both the light and shade and all of it. But I describe him as my brother from another mother.
Speaker 1:I don't know how many words you just had there. Yeah, because he can't, but it's okay.
Speaker 2:Anybody who knows Wayne knows you can't distill him down to three words.
Speaker 1:Words but equally, wayne is relieved because he's given him more thinking time.
Speaker 2:Can you do it in three words wayne?
Speaker 3:yeah, make it good, wayne uh, one of only a few people that has allowed me to be my full self and and continue to evolve in a safe safe. There is no area or subject that I don't feel safe talking with about, and to me, that allows me to be more powerful, but also know that I've got someone who's got my back, as the same way I've got my back, I think that's the yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my safe space. There's the three words, Wayne, just put it out there you're talking to two ADHDers.
Speaker 3:Two ADHDers, I mean, come on no, but that's amazing, isn't it?
Speaker 1:and how long have you two been playing out?
Speaker 2:no, it does feel like a lot longer, but actually it's only been a year, hasn't it? It feels like we've known each other. Like I said, he's like the male me, so I feel like I've known him for years, but it's only been literally a year in September yeah, and what was it that got you in step?
Speaker 1:I always think there's those sliding door moments and there's always those. Often you do it and you go oh, we could have done or we should have, and we can all be, would have, could have shoulders, but what made you get those shoes on?
Speaker 2:I. Are you talking about our working relationship? I'll tell you what it was from my perspective, because we met, because we have a mutual friend, martina, who Witta yes, you know her. We met at the MSD UK London event and I knew Martina. She was the only person in the room that I knew. So I did my thing and I just went over to her, shuffled over, hello. She was talking to her friend.
Speaker 2:I didn't know if it was her boyfriend work colleague, I didn't know and it turned out to be Wayne and he was just immediately warm and welcoming, as I like to think I can be, and I thought, okay, he seems like a nice guy. But it wasn't until we were on the train back up to Manchester together and he just did the thing that I do, that I find is so rare, which is you go deep really fast, so much so that we were having this really intense conversation about our backgrounds and our ADHD and his suspected ADHD and all this stuff. Martina left. She was like I'm sorry, I'm just going to, I just need to get on with it.
Speaker 3:We're having too much fun.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is really lovely, but I'm going to go down the quiet path. I've got a real job to do. Do you know what I mean? And from there I discovered that Wayne is a brilliant generator of ideas and I'm a fabulous executor of ideas and together we can make stuff happen. So he won me over instantly from actually, it was when he started talking about all the stuff that even I'm a bit like you were very zen. You were very chilled and telling me about how you have learned to overcome your uh, this executive dysfunction, challenges, through sheer force of will, of meditation and and good practice and all of that. And I thought that's unusual for a guy who comes from the ends of Manchester, that's unusual for a black man to be talking about. I'm intrigued and he has demonstrated that Wayne is exactly who he says. He is on the tin and I like people like that, because you don't have to second guess. You could just take them for who they say they are. So for me it was magic on first meeting.
Speaker 1:And did you know straight away what it is that you wanted to accomplish and achieve? No, did you.
Speaker 2:You went away.
Speaker 1:You kind of get off the train and you're kind of going back and you're thinking something here and it's the next day you go. I think it's that.
Speaker 3:I can say, everything that's happened today, and even where we are, was something I imagined, and Ngozi was, to me, the cherry on the cake that made it happen. She was able to take what was in my head and make it into a plan. I was like, oh, oh, my God. But it wasn't just that. It was the understanding of what the bigger goal we could achieve with. And you know I'm around surrounded by amazing women. I think you know I grew up with six sisters, so I've just had a recent revelation. Where is it six sisters when we've all got kind of multiple personalities? It could be like 18 really, but I was comfortable with it and to me it was like I was with one of my sisters. It was like it was family instantly and that freedom to just express and be checked. If I'm going off that, that's what you're amazing.
Speaker 2:I will, I will check and you do the same for me. You do, in fact, fact. But I think, in terms of the broader mission that we have about making Manchester truly equitable racially, to make it a truly inclusive city in every aspect, so not just socially but economically and in the workforce, and et cetera, et cetera, that it kind of came about organically. I was already of a mindset that I was going to do this work through Pro Manchester and that work had started before I'd met him, but until then, until I started talking to Wayne about it, I didn't have the support I needed so talk to me about the it talk to me about the it, because there'll be many
Speaker 1:people listening, watching that know you, but many across our 60 countries and followers that do not. What is the it.
Speaker 2:Let me tell you the genesis of the it. So Wayne has lived in Manchester all his life. I moved to Manchester in 2005. When I moved and I was living in a really great place called Sale, which is in Trafford lovely, lovely locale I was used to being in spaces that are predominantly white and I have that same understanding as many people from down south, which is there aren't that many black people up north, so I didn't have any issue with it.
Speaker 2:I was used to being one of only a handful in any space. That's how I'd grown up in this country. Because of going to a private school, going to the university, I went to working in the oil and gas sector. There was only me on my graduate course of 60 people my graduate cohort I was the only black woman and I think there was one black guy. I was the only black woman and I think there was one black guy, that's it. So I'm used to that. That wasn't.
Speaker 2:I didn't find that unusual, but I noted that over the last 10 years I was seeing a lot more black faces. I was so excited I'd be walking around, even in sale, and I'd be like, oh, I don't know that person Smile, and all of that. It's great. I noticed that even after George Floyd died, there was still a lack of black faces represented when it came to work. So I'd see black people around the city, see black people in restaurants, see black people in social circles, but whenever I'd go to a client to pitch or to train the executive team or anything, I wouldn't see any black people and I started to think that's a bit unusual, that's a bit rubbish.
Speaker 2:Then, in 2023, the Guardian released the Cotton Capital Report, which said that in Manchester there is a distinct lack of representation, particularly of blacks, but generally ethnic minorities. It's not comparable to the population of ethnic minorities or global majority people in the workforce. So there's something like 5% in leadership across any of the sectors, whether it's private, public or third sector, compared to a population that exceeds 18%. So it's not comparable. Which is to say, black people, brown people. We exist in Manchester, but we do not succeed in Manchester.
Speaker 3:And so that is, that's the genesis, that is the genesis, so the goal, I think from my point I kind of have the lived experience of the challenges setting up my business and if I didn't have the network not being invited into certain areas or having the confidence to network into places and then recognize there wasn't many like me and, with the stigma, turned in for a stereotype from someone who's come from a recruitment background rather than someone who generally wants to change the game, it seemed once I started the business I could see where the gaps were, where things weren't easy, and then you walk into another room and it seems very easy for another crowd. And I'd seen this in recruitment where the big organisations had all the literature to say they could do all this. But then you looked internally and most of the people yeah.
Speaker 3:So there was a definitely disconnect.
Speaker 1:So you were the fixes.
Speaker 2:Yes, Because I got an opportunity to sit with andy burnham and ask him how we were gonna, as a city, rectify this, and there wasn't an immediate answer at the time, and so, as often, uh, I'm, I'm left with. Well, if, if they're not going to fix this problem, if not you, who right? Then it's got to be me. So try to find different ways in which to resolve it.
Speaker 2:And the answer came through the goodness that is sam booth for the pro manchester right when she was able to say we, we will support you in trying to, to, to make our community more anti-racist, not just not racist, but truly anti-racist, truly inclusive, and we'll do that the way that you think, as an expert, we can, which is to create this committee, this network for racial equity.
Speaker 1:And this was your big event in July, wasn't it Early July, 4th of July?
Speaker 2:something like that Independence Day, 2nd of July, 2nd of July, sorry 2nd of July. It was very close yeah.
Speaker 3:It was kind of strange because even on that train journey and discussing with you guys inviting me to be a co-chair on the board, did I say twisted my arm?
Speaker 2:I didn't twist your arm.
Speaker 3:But everything did he say twisted my arm. I didn't twist your arm, but everything felt like the tuna. The two years that I'd seen all these struggles gone down to London, seen these events, seen the gaps and people telling me there was no appetite for that type of event and then. I met and it was like everything in my head, all the things I'd seen, and goes like well, that's exactly what we need to do.
Speaker 1:So what's next?
Speaker 2:Oh, so Reg is not an event. Reg is a Reg Reg, racial Equity Group of Pro Manchester. You needed to give it a catchy name. It's got to get a name, get people remembering what it's about. Reg is not just the Connect event, which was a massive success we sold out twice, was it? Bridgewater hall got people together in a collaborative, not combative, but a positive way of addressing this tricky bird. That is now inclusion. How do we do it? But it is a movement. So there will be more events leading on to RegConnect 2026, which is going to be even bigger.
Speaker 3:It's a whole day event.
Speaker 2:It's a whole day. We've got the commitment for a whole day this time, and for it to be an annual fixture of bringing corporates with racially marginalised individuals, who are either entrepreneurs or professionals, together ready to do business.
Speaker 1:What have you learned most in the last year? Because you're two individually accomplished humans, right. High achievers accomplished, but coming together, you know, will come together with amazing opportunities but also things that you've had to navigate. What have you learned most about yourselves in this last I'll you've had sisters so you're used to sharing, maybe or not. Well, I I think the biggest the biggest.
Speaker 3:Well, two, two lessons I learned one I was working for somebody else with gas business that try and understand why. The other, where the other person's coming from when they're in a conversation, because the resistance you might not understand. So if you can see their story and you'll be shocked and surprised and you're like, oh my god, now I can see why you were challenging. But the other thing is, sometimes you see gaps and it's a great idea which you think is simple to do, but the other person sees something so simple as a reason for it not to happen. So it's finding out. Okay, so how do we get us all to come together so we can move forward? What's the common goal? What's your interest that will bring us all to the table? So that's my kind of mission and I try and look at everything like, okay, how can I make sure you see it or I see you of it?
Speaker 1:so it's coming together, is it's like?
Speaker 3:a partnership.
Speaker 1:You've just talked about your work, husband. It it is coming together as a negotiation, an agreement, vows are there vows? I think there maybe need to be vows in this going forward.
Speaker 2:Okay, but now you're going to make me a joke. No, no, no, Okay. No, your husband's not going to tell me and Jill will kill me.
Speaker 1:What are you most proud of? Obviously, you've had the big event. You know, amazing profile on social media. But what have you been most proud of? It's the momentum.
Speaker 2:This guy's awesome. He's got so much energy. He's got an address book to rival anybody, but there's so much enthusiasm and energy it seems to have put a rocket up the bums of people who, when I was going to them before, and even some of the people that we invited to join us on Connect in advance I will not name and shame were. I'm not sure we can send anybody. Oh, I don't know if we can sponsor.
Speaker 1:But this is a big problem. We talked about this before and it's a conversation. We've had the wonderful Nazir Afzal on the podcast and we ripped up the cards of what we were going to talk about because we're like you know, this is tough right now.
Speaker 3:Okay, let me throw something in then. So, of the events that I see as successful, where my momentum and things move on, you have to have the council, higher education, private sector, public sector, all those people cementing so everybody is coming to the table and learning so we move forward. So there's no fear, it's understanding to move forward. And now the people seeing how successful that event was, those same people who were oohing and aahing we're now talking to about being leaders and other people.
Speaker 1:And I think leadership's really key here, because at the moment there's a pretty tough world out there, right and there's. There's some crazy stuff happening and lots of things being thrown out. You know, oh, we can't do that anymore, we can't say that anymore, we can't use that language, dni is gone, etc. It takes good leadership to change that. It takes leadership to go, but actually we need this. This is critical because this is for our people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it takes courage. The thing is when I was an idealistic young employee, graduated from university first class honours oh.
Speaker 2:I'm going to go and change the world, and the world is my oyster. That's why I firmly believed because I was not growing up in a deficit, being told that I couldn't do anything All the barriers that I came across that had anything to do with race. It was always well. There's no evidence that it's to do with race or there's no evidence to support your supposition. However, we've got tons of data, tons of data that proves that actually, inclusion is a win-win for everybody.
Speaker 2:You are not doing minorities a favour by giving them an equal shot at the brass ring. You're doing yourself a favour. If you say that your organisation is a meritocracy, then make it a meritocracy. There should be absolutely no cultural barriers to progression, none at all. It should be about who brings the best to the table. And yet that is not proven.
Speaker 2:And when you break it down really simply, for instance, are you telling me that of all the black and brown people currently studying masters and PhDs and graduating out of local universities, not one of them will progress to be senior in your organization, simply because none of them are good enough? Is that statistically possible? No, of course not. Okay, so then it's something else, isn't it? It's something else.
Speaker 2:So if I can have that conversation with you, simone, on a one-to-one basis, or any other person on a one-to-one basis, or any other person on a one-to-one basis, then you, as a leader, surely you know that it's the right thing for your organisation to go and say well, if Deloitte has backed up the fact that inclusion is beneficial for all companies there's a report that they've produced for the last two or three years running that proves it Diversity wins. And there's no way that I can say, well, we just don't want you. Why isn't the courageous leader saying I can hear the dissenting voices putting up saint george's crosses, but they're wrong. And whenever we close ranks, close our borders, close down, we all lose. It takes a courageous voice to do it, but that's your job as the leader isn't it?
Speaker 3:I'm gonna. I think this is where me. I think we have the balance, the kind of yin yang balance, because, my how I look at it, when I grew up, there was no role models. The only people around were people who were selling drugs or robbing people, or there was nothing. So you have to create an image and belief based of what you've seen on tv, I think, of what you can be, and then you achieve it. But one thing I look back on is is awareness and education and belief that you can be there, and I think what we've got now in in great manchester is some areas where it's not aware. We're not aware of the accelerators or the or the incubators or the whole ecosystem. Everybody should be aware, no matter from the age of 16 17. If I want to be an it director, there's I can clearly see it stories.
Speaker 1:Yes, if I want to be an entrepreneur.
Speaker 3:What's the what's the ecosystem? Everyone should be aware. The fact that it's not aware that is an issue, because anybody if we grow, most of these people want to be entrepreneurs and they build a business that then helps the ecosystem Everybody benefits from it 100%.
Speaker 1:Now we are at that point in the program where I'm going to ask you to delve into our Powerjar. What is the Powerjar, you might ask. Powerjar, we have questions from our previous guests and I'm going to ask you, Wayne, to go in grab a question.
Speaker 3:Oh, I could not. I'm going to ask. I'm going to ask Angozzi to go first.
Speaker 1:Look at that he's not forever friends. He's such a gent.
Speaker 3:I could never. I could never.
Speaker 1:No, you're picking one for the, you're taking one for the team. So whichever question, you both answer.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, there was Wayne thinking aha, and guys, it's on you.
Speaker 2:This is an interesting question, though, wayne, okay, and you, being a grandfather in disguise, will have a really good answer to this, I'm sure.
Speaker 3:Oh, wow, okay.
Speaker 1:Because he doesn't look old enough no, absolutely not to be a grandpa. What have we got?
Speaker 2:six, six grandkids, six grandchildren okay, you get a one-way ticket to live in any decade, past or future. Which would you pick and why?
Speaker 3:wow. And the first thing that came to my head is now and I'll tell you why I have grandkids that I now understand what it was like, because you said something before about growing up in Manchester. Actually, for the first six years of my life I grew up in London, chalk Hill, wembley, and with my grandmother and great-grand. Before there there was a fire. She passed away and then I moved back up here to end up living with my rest of my siblings and I ended up being the oldest of four siblings. That didn't know me. So that's the kind of background and history. So I've always had that. But now, seeing my grandkids and watching them I had two of them over the weekend and they're both neurodiverse on a scale, so to speak.
Speaker 3:To me, kids, or children, are the ones who are supposed to teach you how to be free again. They come into the life of their free and we're the ones who put the guardrails around them. As you get older, you realize that's the freedom they kind of show you how to be authentic. If you're aware of the resistance that they show you that, um, if you're becoming upset, and then hopefully you can see that as a way of looking into yourself. And why can't I let that go? What is the story behind that? And if you can look that as a beautiful journey every time you get angry or resistance from like, that's it. And I think grandchildren to me even show me how to be better with my own children and better with my own relationship, and I love that journey, so I'm going to go with now.
Speaker 2:You only have one second. That was a really romantic way of copping out of the answer. I would choose where are we now? 20, 24. I choose 20 years from now. I want to see what happens to my little kids 16 and 11. I want to see what happens to them in 20?
Speaker 1:and they're going, they're on this couch, yeah not with me I'll be. Yeah, but you know they'll be on this couch on the range grandkids or somewhere even higher.
Speaker 2:I'm just curious to see what will happen.
Speaker 3:But that's why it's great what we're doing, because we're trying to set something so it's easier and not as challenging, and it has a legacy.
Speaker 1:It's about breaking and paving that way. That's all it's about, simone.
Speaker 2:I can't look these kids in the eye and say that I didn't try. What a way to finish.
Speaker 1:I didn't try, I didn't mean it that? Way. Um, what a way to finish. Thank you for bringing this.
Speaker 3:Yeah, thank you, it's it's lovely to talk about something, and that's possibly the reds connected possibly one of the proudest moments in my life. We got something, we put the energy together and what came out of it? Because that event, just the, the energy was. I've not experienced like that. Everyone could talk to anybody it's breaking that mold and creating that uber connectivity.
Speaker 1:Thank you and guys. Thank you, wayne for joining us today.
Speaker 1:Please keep being amazing. Please keep connecting, joining the dots, breaking down barriers and not giving a damn Thank you. Thank you for joining us. Please stay connected with everything we're doing. Follow all the details of everything that RegConnect in our show notes and please get involved. It's all about Deeth, not words. We can all pitch up, but we've all got to be intentional. Thank you so much and we'll see you next week. Subscribe on YouTube, apple, amazon, music, spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Leave us a review or follow us on socials. We are power underscore net on insta, tiktok and twitter, or we are power on linkedin, facebook and we are underscore power on youtube.
