Race in STEM: Countering the ugly truth of bias in life sciencesRace in STEM: Countering the ugly truth of bias in life sciences

The conversation began with Fuller explaining, “Race in STEM is a global community for people of color and culture.” The name itself is a play on words: it illustrates race in terms of the color of one’s skin, as well as the race within the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) industry.

He emphasized that the organization supports diverse cultures within the fields of STEM, and it wasn’t long before he shared the driving force behind its creation: "lived life experience."

Fuller grew up in Northampton, UK in what he described as “a very religious household” that was also “very musical.” He left Northampton for London to complete a degree in music performance and then went and embarked upon a career in jazz and the pop industry.

Though he worked with the likes of Lily Allen, Olly Murs, Gloria Gaynor, and Alicia Keys, the economic crisis in 2009 forced him to become a self-employed musician. He then retrained and gained a graduate teacher program (GTP) certificate for teaching at the University of Warwick, UK. “I was fortunate enough to be able to teach within both commercial state and special needs schools.”

Fuller’s past professions are significant. He made it abundantly clear that part of the solution Race in STEM is providing is intrinsically linked to “education and the schooling environment.”

Fuller spoke about how for many (including himself) the only jobs discussed at school for those with an interest in science were either “science teacher or scientist. There were no discussions regarding jobs that might be in clinical engineering, quality assurance (QA), quality control (QC), regulatory affairs, and medical affairs. There is no talk about biotech, medtech, clinical research organizations (CROs).” Therefore, “nobody can see a representation of what it could be like.”

Fast forward to 2015, he described a “very early midlife crisis” and how he met James Cox (now CEO of recruitment firm BioTalent) through a friend. The discussion they had included Fuller’s experience of discrimination while working in the music, education, and sales sector.

“In music, things had been thrown at me on stage in certain countries. In education, it was very tokenistic. I'm apparently the cool black music teacher that can get everyone up singing like I'm Whoopi Goldberg from Sister Act, and this travels right through to the lack of representation on a sales floor within recruitment (at that specific time).”

Prevalence of the pandemic

Fuller reflected on the COVID-19 pandemic and how “a lot of reflection took place, positive and negative, the challenging as well as the good.” He described how there “must have been about a week” where everything on the TV “was either George Floyd, COVID, or Black Lives Matter (BLM).”

This created a knee-jerk reaction for Fuller.He began to start thinking “about the work I am doing now.” He reached the conclusion that “Life Sciences is an industry that’s never going away, there is a need for it, it is not something that is wanted, it is what we need.”

When fuller returned to work, one of the managing directors asked him “do you want to manage your team again?” He agreed but admitted he did not “sound too enthusiastic about it” because “at this moment in my life, I needed to do something that is more impactful for my people, for my communities.”

He questioned specific systems and tendencies of the job and sector he works in. For example, why did the firm he represented only predominantly work with European or American pharmaceutical companies? Such questions led to “lots of conversations” about how jobs are advertised,  why the firm was not working with applications from “Africa, India, Saudi Arabia, Hawaii, Australia, and New Zealand” and why it was so difficult to provide an opportunity for those people wherever that opportunity is?

The conception of Race in STEM

After this conversation, Fuller expressed how he wanted “to create a platform where I can actively bring the challenging and very destroying and disrespectful conversations of what I’m having with people on a day-to-day basis to the forefront.” He wanted to induce a “shock factor” of what is really happening within interview processes and how people are being treated inside organizations, so “companies can either act on what should be better practice or be a part of something that can actually promote that they are trying to be better.”

To make a difference across the industry, Race in STEM has been built on four areas of impact. “The first one is social media,” said Fuller. “That's where youngsters who are up and coming are, and the more mature will find it hard to understand but they need to get on board. The second is the events that I do. So that's the podcast, the webinars, the round table discussions, the speaking at conferences that facilitate discussions.”

When Fuller is on stage “there might be 5,000 people in the audience who have paid to go to that conference. They're listening to me have a conversation and challenge the professional and the person on stage. There are certain questions that they might have thought about at their companies, specific things they might want to ask, but they don't know how to as there are   certain topics where they are unsure how to approach it.” By having these conversations on stage, there is the potential delegates can “take it away and use it back at work.”

The third area of impact is “access to diverse candidate pools.” By this, Fuller means helping companies with internal facilitation, or working with human resources (HR) to “help them identify how they can attract more women in industry for typically male dominated jobs,” for example.

Additionally, there have been times the company has “done a census check or an audit” to support companies who might “want to improve their Hispanic community by let’s say 1.8% over the next two years.” Fuller would then “introduce the client to a specific brand and more importantly, teach them how to retain their services when they’re there and give them the tools and skillset to enjoy the gain of true equitable representation at the table they are all sitting at.”

The fourth area of impact is working with senior leaders to attract better diversity at board level / c-suite, but most importantly “how to retain their services.”

The ugly truth

Part of educating a workforce lies with sharing uncomfortable truths. Fuller related a horrifying story where a black female was asked if they were named after a monkey at an undisclosed workplace, despite the female’s name being very easy to pronounce and “just three syllables.”

The reason for sharing what some might find uncomfortable is to “bring these true stories which are happening in front of our eyes, in the rooms right next door to where we are, the people who we think are amazing, and have provided a real, true, equitable space which is inclusive of this and diverse in that” and expose how they “are the same people who are acting in a certain way.”

He continued: “That is what Race in STEM is. It is about showing an ugly truth, but at the same time, finding a solution to changing mindsets.”

There’s beauty in difference

Of course, changing mindsets is inherently difficult and that is partially because “not everyone can see things the same way.” However, Fuller said the difference we have “is the beauty of this world and we need different people in different positions to make the world turn. We have to appreciate and respect that.”

Thus to try and change mindsets, he circled back to his belief “that education is the real key and identifies hot spots for what the future can look like in terms of representation.” Fuller outlined that representation “is not just for people of different color and culture” but also any area of the diversity equity and inclusion (DEI) world.

“Whether you've got disabilities, whether your part of the lesbian gay bisexual transgender queer (LGBTQ) community, or neurodiverse, I think education is a real key area, and the message is to encourage them to keep going.”

One of the challenges the industry is facing is that “a lot of undergraduates will get a degree in biology or chemistry, and they'll be disillusioned into thinking there's no opportunity at the end of it,” said Fuller. "Or they go into industry, and they see in the labs they're the only person of color there, and they'll look outside the lab, and literally, the only other person of color might be the caretaker, and they don't feel like they belong.”

He said one of the ways to tackle this issue is with “each company having someone who's taken ownership for what representation looks like.” That way, there is always someone "looking to see what things are like" within a company or organization.

His time in working in multiple sectors also exposed Fuller to cohesion between industries. “What I want to do is have Life Sciences learn from what is happening in technology. Technology understands what is happening in the financial services sector, and financial services understand what is happening in engineering and use best practice where possible to create pathways for people.”

If you want to find out more about Race in STEM you can keep up to date with their latest activities on LinkedIn. Additionally, Fuller will be attending LSX World Congress USA in Boston, Massachusetts in September this year.