Doyin Atewologun Podcast Transcript

Melody Moore:
Welcome to the Secret Resume podcast, hosted by me, Melody Moore. In this podcast, we explore the people, places, and experiences that have shaped my guests. Those which have influenced who they are as people and where they are in their work life today. Or as I like to call it, their secret resume. Before we dive in, I want to tell you about something that I’m really excited about, which is our being free membership. We’re developing an online community which is designed for people who are interested in personal growth. If you’re navigating career transitions, maybe feeling stuck or burnt out, or simply seeking more meaning in your life, then this is for you. Membership gives you access to a range of resources, a supportive community and monthly group coaching calls.

Melody Moore:
It will allow you to explore what freedom means to you on your own terms. Head to liberareconsulting.co.uk/beingfree to join the waitlist. And now back to the podcast. My guest today is Doyin Atewologun. Doyin, you and I have known each other a long time, but please do introduce yourself to the listeners.

Doyin Atewologun:
Absolutely. Oh, it is such a joy to be in conversation with you today, Melody. So my name, exactly as he said, is doreen at. I am a business psychologist. I also run a business which is called Delta. It’s a leadership and inclusion consultancy. And I’ve run the business on the side for about ten years because at the same time, I had an academic career. And you know what? We can talk about that in indie course, but I’ve kind of, generally speaking, taught in business schools and worked in various universities.

Doyin Atewologun:
So, yeah, that’s who I am.

Melody Moore:
Yes. And we will definitely come back to that, where we will definitely talk about the many hats that you wear. Diane’s like superwoman, with all these different roles and things that she has. So we’ll definitely come back to that. But let’s. Shall we start at the beginning? Let’s talk about Lagos and you growing up there.

Doyin Atewologun:
Yes. Yes. So I often tell people, I grew up in Lagos. I have been in the UK 30 years, which I cannot believe, but I certainly very much see Lagos as my happy place and my happy home. And now the reason I think about Lagos in that way is because it was a time of my life, a period of my life where life seemed very normal, life was, and reflection was really quite healthy, positive, joyful, privileged, full of fun, full of family, full of good times. Lagos is a very. Lagos. Nigeria is a very vibrant city.

Doyin Atewologun:
And I had my family and friends and loved school and loved my family. And so when I think about home and I think about what home means to me. It is very much that sense, to some degree, a carefree sense and a sense of being loved and accepted. And I wouldn’t have appreciated, I don’t think I would have appreciated all of that if I hadn’t left Lagos and moved to the UK and grown up in a country that is, to many a country that, to many intents and purposes, is home, because I’ve been here for 30 years. But that idea of what home is and that sense of being welcomed and seen and celebrated isn’t to be taken for granted as much as it was when I was in Lagos. So, yeah, Lagos means a lot to me.

Melody Moore:
So when you say home, like, everybody uses that phrase, home, don’t they? Home to you is Lagos.

Doyin Atewologun:
That’s a great question, Melody. So it’s a question that I sometimes use when I’m facilitating. I do a lot of work with, with students and young professionals who come from different parts of the world. And I ask one of the questions is, what does home mean to you? And, you know, I’ve had the opportunity to answer that question. And so I would say it depends on where the question is coming from and also depends on how I’m answering it. And many times, yes, home means kidlinton, just outside Oxford. It’s where I’m settled, it’s where I work from. And other times, home, that is my origin story.

Doyin Atewologun:
And where I go back to for familiarity, where I find familiarity when I go back to, you know, home is also Lagos, Nigeria.

Melody Moore:
And you said that it was like a bubble living there. Can you say some more about that?

Doyin Atewologun:
Yeah. So one of the things I think about often is that I grew up in a. Well, I think about it often more these days, you know, when I’m kind of outside Lagos than when I’m in Lagos, is what the privilege and advantage is of growing up in a. In a country where you are, quote unquote, the norm or the dominant. And I grew up in, you know, Lagos, an african country on the african city, on the african continent. I had easy access to doctors, architects, accountants, lawyers. There wasn’t like, there was lots of different types of people doing lots of different fantastic things, ambassadors. We travelled, whatever it is we wanted to, you know, there was no, there was all of that.

Doyin Atewologun:
And I lived and grew up in a. In a. In a community, you know, with a group of people who were, on reflection, on leaving Lagos quite socioeconomically advantaged as well. So I lived in this world which was very vibrant, which was very in some respects, very diverse, very kind of globally aware. A lot of the people I grew up with were well travelled, et cetera, around the african continent, but also very much around the global north. And it wasn’t until I stepped out of Lagos that I realised, for example, things like what it felt to be on the margins, what it felt to be, what it felt for one’s kind of ability and competence to be questioned, but also how protected you can be based on your socioeconomic advantage or youre ethnic or religious advantage. So Lagos is quite diverse from a, well, in many dimensions. So ethnicity, so nigerian ethnic groups and also religion.

Doyin Atewologun:
But I also am lucky that, or I was privileged in that I grew up in a state that was my ethnic group state, so I recognised the language. So there was lots of things that I realised that I had taken for granted, I would say then I left my bubble of Lagos and realised how unequal in many ways the other parts of the world was. Not just in Lagos as well, I just hadn’t noticed it as much. And I was younger, so I think I also give myself that grace in that when you’re in high school, you’re not as preoccupied with inequities in the world. So that’s why I describe it as a bubble. It is very inequal. There are many people who do not have socioeconomic advantage. People who have disabilities are rendered invisible.

Doyin Atewologun:
Wealth is terribly, terribly disproportionate, and there’s much, much in the world, much in Lagos, in Nigeria, that needs fixing, as in many other parts of the world.

Melody Moore:
And in Lagos, your grandmothers were in Lagos. Tell me, you said they’re a very important, paid an important part in your life.

Doyin Atewologun:
They did.

Melody Moore:
You’re smiling so much now. I can see how much they meant to you. Tell me about your grandmothers.

Doyin Atewologun:
Absolutely. So now my grandmothers are very different. So I think if people who know my family are listening to this, they would be. They would think exactly that. So my maternal grandmother, her name is Miriam Fola Ojo Kehinde and my paternal grandmother, her name is Janet Layade Atewologun. Now, both of them had such. So I knew them for all of my life. I was very grateful that I knew my grandmothers I knew them from the beginning of my life and they were present for the first nearly 40 years of my life.

Doyin Atewologun:
But my maternal grandmother and I got really close after two really sad things happened. My mother died when I was in my late teens and my grandfather, my mother’s dad and I were quite close. My granddad was great everybody loved him. He held, he threw the most fantastic parties. He opened his house to everyone. He was a lawyer, he had lots of charisma, etcetera. And it was after my granddad passed away that I actually saw the wit and the wisdom that my grandmother had. Now, my grandmother, my maternal grandmother, she was like 4ft and a half.

Doyin Atewologun:
Like she was, you know, very small in terms of stature, but she would. She had the most fantastic sense of style. She would, like, be wearing makeup and she had phenomenal jewellery and she had her crew. Up until beyond age 80, she had a crew of girls and they were called the girls and there was like 15 of them. And it would be like, well, you know, well, you know, how the girls doing? And, you know, it’s like, well, the girls need to wedding. They need their special seating at this table. But in addition to that, my grandmother had such wit and wisdom that I had totally missed, I think because of the other relationships that to my granddad, like I said, he had a lot of charisma. And what I found was in one to one conversation.

Doyin Atewologun:
So around the time me and my maternal grandmother started getting close, we, you know, I’d have, you know, kind of conversations about relationships, about marriage. You know, I had lost my mom, like I said, when I was a teenager and, you know, about cultural norms and kind of, you know, navigating those sorts of things. And she, she would put things in, you know, I’d come with a problem and she would. She would distil it, she’ll go to the heart of it and she would simplify it and she would make it easy to make decisions based on, generally speaking, based on rightness and wrongness, or even just pragmatism. But she also had this way of just kind of throwing jokes into conversations. And sometimes she’d speak in Yoruba, sometimes she’d speak in English and there was just so much wit in it and she’d diffuse quite tense situations with a throwaway comment. And I will never be like her. I was so jealous.

Doyin Atewologun:
I was like, how does she, like, come up with these quick, witty things and diffuse things? So that’s what I love. So she was such a spark, like sparkle. She had so much sparkle. And I’m blessed, blessed, blessed to have known her. And often I wish I had kind of known her for longer. Like I said, I’ve known her all my life, but I, with my, you know, when my mother was alive and when my grandfather was alive, I hadn’t really spent enough time with her. One to one, my paternal grandmother, very different, more solid, humble, you know, almost like a solid presence in the background. But one of the things I loved about my paternal grandmother is she was, she, she clearly was devoted to her grandchildren and she spent like, for all of the time that I’ve known that I knew her, she was with her grandchildren like literally for the decades I can think, you know.

Doyin Atewologun:
Well, from 1985 to 1990, my grandmother was here with my cousins in Chicago. From 1990 to 1998, my grandmother was in Ijaboade with my cousins in, you know, in Nigeria. From 1996 to 19, my grandmother was with us in, and she, so with that way and she was there, she provided such a degree of comfort and presence. So my mother did lots of travelling because of her job. She was a translator and interpreter and she worked in the, like the west african version of the EU. So she travelled quite a lot when she worked with Ecowas. And so my, you know, I have many memories of like my grandmother caring for us, making sure we ate, making sure, but she was, she also had solid faith and I think, you know, during really dark, difficult times for the family, she was, she was a source of faith. And one other thing to say is my grand, my paternal grandmother was a Jehovah’s Witness and I know Jehovah’s Witnesses get, get, you know, you know, they, they don’t get very, in some respect, in some channels, they don’t get very positive and oppressed, so to speak.

Doyin Atewologun:
But that one to one contact with my grandmother and all of the people, all of the witnesses she was with, that, you know, who were her friends? Like, I never had one negative, questionable, like I was, I felt loved, seen, accepted by, by Jehovah’s Witnesses that my grandmother hung out with. So I had, I never had any experience. So when people were like, oh, you know, Jehovah’s Witnesses, aren’t they, like, I’m like, no, I’ve never had that experience and I have other members of my family who are with Jehovah’s Witnesses as well and, you know, there’s a lot of love, there’s a lot of generosity that I’ve experienced in that community.

Melody Moore:
Is faith important to you?

Doyin Atewologun:
Oh, great question, Melody. Wow, wow, wow. I am a Christian. Faith is important to me. But I also know it is so personal, it’s so complicated. So, for example, you know, like when my mum died in a car crash when I was 16 and a half and that shook me. Like, it changed my life, it changed my family’s life. And, you know, as someone who is Christian, as anyone who has any faith? I think, you know, that kind of thing raises big questions with regards to, you know, like why did that happen? What was it? You know, what was all it in aid of, etcetera? And, you know, I think we all find our ways through grief in many different ways.

Doyin Atewologun:
So I can’t, you know, what I’m about to say is just my journey, you know, and, you know, perhaps some listeners will, you know, take, we’ll take from it what. What they want. So one of the things that I’ve come to understand is, I think when you’re younger in, in faith, you see, yeah, your be, your behaviours on earth as almost like reciprocal, like you expect, you think if you do good, that good will come of it. And, you know, it’s a little transactional, it’s a little, well, you know, if I do the right thing, then my life will be fine. But in reality, there’s no real expectation of that. Even in the Bible does talk about blessings, storing blessings in heaven, for example. Yes, it talks about grace, but it doesn’t say your life will be devoid of any kind of pain and harm and trauma. And so I think that was one early lesson that I had to learn, that losing my mind, mother wasn’t necessarily a reflection of me being bad.

Doyin Atewologun:
Because I think that’s what some, you know, I carried that for a while and loser. My mother wasn’t like, you know, aware of the universe rebalancing or equipped, you know, a sense of equilibrium. However, also having faith, of course, or being of a particular faith also can be a source of solace, a source of comfort, a process in which you, you have permission to talk about hard, hard things. And I think that certainly my faith has helped me. You know, we’re going to be talking about the work I do, you know, in due course in this conversation. And, you know, there’s so much beauty in conversation where there are conversations about faith. And I know not everybody, you know, needs to be, not everybody wants to have a conversation about faith, and that’s absolutely fine. But where I have conversations with people who are Muslim or Buddhist or Jainist or, you know, any, you know, the range of different religions, I find that there is often a point of connection and comfort and kind of like just peace, for lack of a better word, and just.

Doyin Atewologun:
And so I. That’s. Yeah, so faith is important to me. And in that way, I don’t have.

Melody Moore:
A faith, but I often look at people who do and often see the community that comes with faith. It’s a really beautiful thing, actually. And, you know, sometimes I wish I did, but I just don’t. But, you know, I really see that, like you say, the solace and the community and the connection that you get from that, I think, is very powerful. Yeah. Let’s move on. Let’s talk about. So, let me ask you, when did you come to the UK? Did you come straight from Nigeria to the UK? Did you go somewhere else in between?

Doyin Atewologun:
Yeah, I came straight from Nigeria to the UK. So it was just after high school or secondary school, we call secondary school in Nigeria. And then I moved to the UK, and, like, you know, I graduated in June, and I started my A levels in September in Northampton. So I left Lagos.

Melody Moore:
Yes.

Doyin Atewologun:
And then went to Northampton.

Melody Moore:
I won’t say why. But why? Why did you come to the UK? You know, I know plenty of Nigerians who have done exactly that, but I’m hearing, Christy, your reasons for coming here, other than the beautiful weather?

Doyin Atewologun:
Indeed. So. Well, there are a number of things that happen at the same time. So, the summer I graduated from high school was the summer I lost my mum, and my dad’s only sister lived in Northampton with my uncle and my cousins, so with her husband and my cousins. And so for my dad, it was a natural, you know, it was a period of transition, and so it just kind of made sense at that point in time. We’re a close family. I knew my cousins. I knew Northampton.

Doyin Atewologun:
I’d come to Northampton many, many times in the years before for on holiday as well as London. So I just kind of transitioned to move with my cousin. So that’s what happened. And my cousins happened to be in Northampton. And I’m so grateful for my cousins and my auntie because. Yes, and my uncle, of course, my cousins. There’s three girls, and we had so much fun. Like, I think it was a tricky time for me, but just kind of moving in and going to school with my cousins made things so much easier in many ways.

Melody Moore:
So you kind of got absorbed into there finally.

Doyin Atewologun:
Absolutely, yeah.

Melody Moore:
And where do you fit, age wise, with your cousins? Were you all in the same school?

Doyin Atewologun:
Three of us were in the same school. So, age wise, the oldest is about two or three years older than me, and then the next is one, or is two years younger than me, and then the next one is, like, two years younger than her. So we’re all all about kind of similar ish ages.

Melody Moore:
Yeah. Yeah. Lovely. Yeah. My daughter has mostly boy cousins, you know, a couple of girl cousins. And you really see how I didn’t have any female cousins. So I see, yeah, I just have a very few cousins. But yeah, my daughter has that real kind of closeness.

Melody Moore:
She really loves having her girl cousins who are close in age to her. I’m envious of that.

Doyin Atewologun:
Yeah, I have many cousins. I have about, I have over 21st cousins and I’m quite close to the vast majority of them. The vast majority of them, yeah. And I feel very, very privileged, very lucky.

Melody Moore:
I have two. It’s nothing, is it? Yeah. Right. Which is funny because my family’s quite, you know, immediate family is quite large. There’s four of us, but, yeah, two cousins. Tell me about studying psychology. Why did you study psychology? You know, what, how did all of that come about?

Doyin Atewologun:
Well, you know what, I felt so again, very lucky and very privileged because I think I was about age seven when I decided to be a psychologist. Wow.

Melody Moore:
I don’t think I knew what the word meant when I was seven.

Doyin Atewologun:
This is where the story starts. And I haven’t looked back, like literally. Well, I’ll tell you, when I look back, it was because somebody else made me look back, etcetera. But so, so, you know, I think I was seven or eight or something like that. I was around that and my mum’s sister had studied psychology at university. And I remember, you know, just asking randomly as you just get to, you know, like, what is university? What are you doing? And she said, she said, it’s like, I was like, what is that? And she said something like, you know, it’s about people. And I was like, that sounds great to be about people. And I must say, like, just after that.

Doyin Atewologun:
So, you know, as the years, as I started speaking to like the career counsellor when I was in secondary school and I said, oh, you tell me a little bit more about psychology. And then she told me a little bit more about it and then I kind of started looking at what subjects to study for a levels. I didn’t study psychology at a level, but I was able to look to see what was required to study psychology at university and which a levels were required. And essentially, the more I heard about psychology, the more fascinated I was. I was like, oh, my gosh, this sounds right up my street. And it very much was because I am fascinated and inspired by people at the same time. So I studied psychology at the University of Birmingham. I did my first degree there and before I started my undergrad degree, about the time I was in my a levels, I was trying to make a decision about what area in psychology I was going to focus on and I knew I didn’t want to, you know, it was clear to me at that point in time that I didn’t really, really want to work with kids.

Doyin Atewologun:
I didn’t really really. So therefore I didn’t want to be like an educational or child psychologist. I didn’t really, really want to work with ill health. So not clinical psychology. And then I thought, well, you know, like regular people spend a lot of time at work. And I thought, actually, let me look at work psychology. And so again, I was quite fortunate in that even before I started my undergrad, it was reasonably clear to me that I wanted to do business psychology. And so I picked, like, the things that I selected, the options that enabled that.

Doyin Atewologun:
I made sure my undergrad was, you know, quote unquote vps accredited, so accredited for listeners. The British Psychological society kind of accredits undergrad degrees so that you have what you need in order to do a masters in the masters that you want to, can I say? And then I did my master’s in occupational psychology. Can I tell you what I would have been if I wasn’t a business psychologist?

Melody Moore:
Go on, tell me.

Doyin Atewologun:
So I would have been a cognitive psychologist because people are so fascinating. And this is because, like, I am so, like I said, I’m so inspired by people and I’m so intrigued by like, the humans and humanity. And in particular, I did my undergrad dissertation on the memories of bicultural people, of bilingual people. So I was curious about how people who speak different languages and therefore inhabit different culture spaces, faces, like, what goes on in their minds. And, you know, even today, you know, these days I think so much and, you know, I’m busy enough. But if I had, if I had.

Melody Moore:
To restart in your 5 seconds a week spare time, this is what you’re going to do.

Doyin Atewologun:
This is what I’m going to be doing. You know, I’m really curious. I’m curious about things like, for example, what language people who speak different languages dream in, you know, like, and what determines that. But I’m also curious. So again, I have the privilege of speaking. I speak Yoruba, nigerian language, you know, speak English. I have a. My parents spoke French and German, so I’m not bad in French.

Doyin Atewologun:
I lived in a french speaking country for a few months and kind of picking up Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese. So I’m, you know, kind of familiar with different languages. But I do wonder, like, that idea of being immersed or kind of somewhat immersed in multiple ways of thinking and living and speaking. Like, what insights does that offer us in the world? And if you straddle to kind of seemingly oppositional cultures or context and you’ve found a way to inhabit that in a way that is meaningful for you, that brings you a sense of identity and purpose. What are your tactics and strategies for doing that? And how can you help us be better in the world? You know, like, how do people who, for example, who identify as Arab and Christian or white and Muslim, like, what does, what are the, what insights and wisdom can we glean from them so there is less them and us in the world? And yes, I’m so curious about, you know, questions like that, particularly. Yeah. When we think about humanity and complexity, that’s so interesting.

Melody Moore:
It really makes me think about identity and how we identify and, you know, I really think of it from two angles, from what work I do. One is the DNI work and sometimes I think people become a particular element of their identity and it’s just one, you know, so that’s what they lead with, that’s what their entire business is based around. And it becomes very one dimensional because they are so much more than that. But that becomes everything and every comment they make is based from that single perspective. And I think it’s really interesting, but also from a. I’ve just finished a three year developmental trauma therapy programme.

Doyin Atewologun:
Oh, really?

Melody Moore:
I think very much from that perspective of different parts of ourselves and how we’re all very complex and actually, authenticity is super complex because most of us don’t even really know who we are. So I find the whole, I’m with you on everything you just said. I was like, yes, yes, yes, because it’s, it’s so interesting, isn’t it, about who are we. Therefore, depending on who we define ourselves as, has an enormous impact on how we behave and how we see the world and, oh, yes, I’m going to come and study it with you, Dorian.

Doyin Atewologun:
Love it. Love it. Well, you know, you’re hitting. We’re exactly aligned because. So my PhD was on authenticity and identity in the context of leadership and so those are themes, ideas that I’m. Yeah, yes.

Melody Moore:
I actually didn’t introduce you correctly, did I? Because you were Doctor Doyen and I dropped that from your. From your title. Yes. So, yeah, I mean, you’ve done all the studying.

Doyin Atewologun:
Yeah, done a lot.

Melody Moore:
So when did you do that, then? So you did. Did your degree, did your masters?

Doyin Atewologun:
Yeah.

Melody Moore:
But your PhD was later.

Doyin Atewologun:
Yes, it was a little later because I did. After my masters, I got a fabulous job at a business psychology consultancy called OPP and I met this phenomenal woman and, well, I looked so much looked up to you, you seemed so confident and you kind of like, said the right things and you kind of knew all about all of the new projects. And I’ve never said that to you. I’ve seen it to you now.

Melody Moore:
Yeah.

Doyin Atewologun:
And it was, you know, you were one of those, the more senior consultants that I thought, you know what, actually, Melody’s got it. You know, Mel kind of knows what she’s doing. And I looked up to that. So I just wanted to. Wanted to say that. And so as just to kind of go back to the career, I started working as a business psychologist alongside you and a number of other kind of colleagues. And you may not remember this, but we started doing a lot of work on authenticity and leadership. Right.

Doyin Atewologun:
And this was. This was around. This was like the 2005 six time, I would say. And it raised questions in my mind about, you know, like, we did a lot of work with a lot of clients, leadership development, leadership assessments. We were using lots of psychometrics, but we’re also doing lots of coaching and really helping our clients think through what is the, you know. So for some of our clients, there was a, quote, unquote, a template or, you know, competency set of competencies in terms of what they wanted to nurture in their leadership cohorts. And we would, you know, help the client working, like I said, through coaching or assessment centres, kind of develop a certain set of aptitudes, characteristics, perspectives in their potential leadership or their current leadership cohort. And I would not have said this to you then, because partly I didn’t have the language.

Doyin Atewologun:
Partly, yeah, it was probably intertwined with what was going on with me personally. There were questions in my mind about the extent to which psychologists generally, at that time, were going in with an assumption of what leadership looks and feels and sounds like. And certainly a lot of leadership researchers were doing that, because by that point, in that time, I would say 95% of what we know about what was effective leadership came from white American Mendez, more or less, in terms of the research body of what leadership looks like. And so I started, raised questions in me about the extent to which you could show up as a leader, regardless of the expectations put on you by other people or your employer, with regards to what leadership looks or feels like. And therefore issues of authenticity, issues of identity, naturally came to the fore. And while I was at Oppennae, which is a wonderful, well respected, well rounded business psychology consultancy, I started looking at the opportunity to kind of look at some of these questions via a PhD. And so I had the wonderful opportunity. And again, you know, I use, I’m very intentional when I talk about my life to talk about things like lessons and privilege because I.

Doyin Atewologun:
But I also of course understand that there’s an underlying competency, right. I need to have been able to do a PhD in order to get a PhD. But also you have opportunities and I think it’s very important for all of us, particularly when we find ourselves in more privileged positions, to acknowledge the role that luck or opportunity or privilege has to play in our success. So I just wanted to give a little bit of a segue there. But I had the opportunity while I was at Oppennae to start my PhD at Cranfield at the International Centre for Women Leaders. And I did the PhD. I was, I got funding for the PhD. Again I had the opportunity but yes, it was a merit based scholarship grant but that PhD was fully funded and I also had the opportunity to continue to work at OPP depending on what kind of.

Doyin Atewologun:
What the pipeline was like. So I was able to do my PhD full time while working with a reputable company and that set me up for where I am today because I have had the opportunity to blend and build an academic. So build from an academic basis as well as an industry or consultancy, practise basis and provide a unique set of insights, perspectives to clients. That very much is kind of built on those two pillars. Being able to study and work at the same time opened up that opportunity for me.

Melody Moore:
I just sit here thinking do you ever sleep? In fact, have you ever slept? Is the thing that came to my mind. Always do seem to be doing at least two things at the same time. So I’m in awe of you Dorian. I could talk to you honestly, we could spend 3 hours talking about authenticity and leadership and competency models and all of that because I’m totally aligned with you. And funnily enough that when we were looking at authenticity at that time, that’s exactly what got me slightly obsessed with it too. And it’s always been something that I’ve cringed when other people talk about authenticity because I often think we talk about authentic leadership and then say it’s these five things. It’s like that’s not authentic leadership, that’s someone’s definition of leadership. What’s authentic about that? What happens if you’re not like that? So yeah, I’ve had funnily enough, maybe we didn’t talk about it at the time, but maybe we’re having similar thoughts.

Melody Moore:
Talk to me about something completely different, which is your, your crew, you said your grandma had a crew. You had to, you have your own.

Doyin Atewologun:
I do have my own crew. And, you know, they come into the story because they remain part of my life. So, you know, throughout kind of growing up in Lagos, you know, with my wonderful family, transitioning to the UK, going into psychology, doing a PhD, starting in academia and consulting, I’ve had the same for a lot of that time. I’ve had the same core group of friends. And, you know, I bring this up, you know, when we think about key people or experiences that have influenced who we are because sometimes I hear the thing around, well, women can’t be friends. Women can’t be friends with each other. And it just kind of throws me, like, I don’t, like, I don’t know what friends you have, but I have my girlfriends and we’ve been friends for like 30 years. And I think it’s important to say to, you know, I just want to shout.

Doyin Atewologun:
I want to shout out and want to call them out. So I want, I wanted to give them this because they are, we are very, very different. So we met. We all met about the same, you know, we all went to school together and we all met in form, about form one. So when we were all like 1213 years old. And right now we’re across the globe, so broadly speaking, in Nigeria, in the US and the UK, broadly speaking. But in that time, you know, we’ve grown from teenagers to, dare I say, to middle aged women and that experience. We sit with, with each other with, with joy, with anger, with childbirth, with grandparents and parents death, with divorce, with mental health, with good times and bad times.

Doyin Atewologun:
And we are a mix of, you know, we’re very similar in terms of, you know, age and of course, you know, nigerian identity. But we’re different in terms of ethnicities, we’re different in terms of religions, different in terms of social background. And, and there is, I see there’s a space for me there. Regardless of what I’m going through in my life. There’s a space for me with my crew, with my babes. We call each other babes. So my grandmother and her friends, they call each other the girls and we’re saying, how the babes doing? And I am seen, I am loved, I am celebrated, I am held, I am talked straight to when I need to by these women. They are my babes of life.

Doyin Atewologun:
And I just want to celebrate the friendship group that we have and we’re not, you know, so there’s 13, there’s 14 of us, so there’s 13 of them. And with me, that’s 14. And not everyone is best friends with everyone all the time. Right? This is not like, it’s not that there are. There are some people who are closer, some people who are not as close, some people whose, of course, relationships have changed over time. So some of the people that I used to live very close to when I was growing up in Nigeria, I don’t live as close to these days, so I’m not as close. But we’re still all part, and we celebrate each other and there’s a space for me there. And I think I just want to celebrate the power of sisterhood and friendship and authenticity and, you know, like, there’s a solidity there that I want to just uplift because, like I said, I’ve heard so much about, well, you know, women can’t be friends and, you know, catty things.

Doyin Atewologun:
Not at all. I see them as my, as my sisters.

Melody Moore:
Do you? Like, I’m now imagining this huge WhatsApp group. Like, is that how you. Oh, my God, I can’t imagine what that’s like.

Doyin Atewologun:
There’s only 14 of us. So it’s. We all know each other very, very well, right? So. And it’s not, it’s not going off all the time. It goes up from time to time. Absolutely, but it’s not. And, you know, and the conversations go from the, you know, quite random, you know, quite, like, trivial to really quite deep ones, depending on what’s, what’s happening. And sometimes some people show up more than others and others don’t.

Doyin Atewologun:
And sometimes we’re like, oh, we haven’t heard from x in a while. That person is in that part of the world. Could someone in that part of the world just reach out and go and go and see? And. Yes. So, yes, we have a WhatsApp group.

Melody Moore:
Amazing. And then let’s talk about another group. I often think of tribes. We’ve got these different tribes in our life, don’t we, in different places. And, you know, if that’s your kind of outside work tribe, you’ve got your inside work tribe at Delta. Tell me about them.

Doyin Atewologun:
I do. So just to do a quick catch up in terms of the career journey. So I continued doing my PhD, as I was saying, working at OPP. And then when I finished doing my PhD, I started working in academia and did independent consulting on the side, and that just continued. And it got to a point where I was still kind of working at, you know, working in academic roles. So various universities and I got more and more work the consultancy work and needed to start employing people. And so in essence, Delta has been, you know, like my quote unquote, side hustle for about nine, nine years. And only this year did I start working at Delta full time.

Doyin Atewologun:
Now I say that because I want to again, kind of acknowledge and uplift the team that has built a, the business or supported me in building the business even when I wasn’t there full time. And so when I became full time at the business, I settled into a group of people who were smart, curious, exceptionally, exceptionally so committed to their expertise, whether that expertise is around people or projects or coaching or research and who are proud of the work that we do. And so it was so easy for me to, in many ways, to settle or to take on leadership in a more consistent way because the team was already there and was already taking care of business, so to speak, even when I wasn’t always able to be there. And it’s beautifully diverse. So there’s a core group, there’s about eight of us, but then we work with an associate team of another of about five or six people and we’re diverse in terms of, again, nationality, culture, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion and a number of other dimensions, but so united in our commitment to problem solve for our clients. And, you know, when you talked a little about the different hats I wear, but, you know, sometimes when I kind of go into a hat of like, you know, business lead or, you know, business owner, sometimes it can get quite tough. You know, like it could feel a little lonely. It could feel that, you know, there’s like everything is on you.

Doyin Atewologun:
You could like internalise setbacks and challenges. But my team is fun, great at prospective taking, really helping me, prospective take celebrating and reminding me of the work that we do, the work that we’re here to do, the work that we do quite well because we have so many people who come back to us and that centres me. And so I am again, feel very lucky to have the team at Delta.

Melody Moore:
And I’m going to take you back slightly because I don’t want to skip over one of your key roles that you had at Oxford. So again, for people that don’t know to tell us a little bit about that role because it just, you know, incredible.

Doyin Atewologun:
Indeed, indeed. So let me kind of backtrack a little. So you, you know, when you’re in academia, you can go into like a pure, like academic role. So you go from lecturer to senior lecturer to reader, and reader is just before professor. So my last academic, pure academic role was I was reader and director of the gender leadership and inclusion centre at Grenfield, where I. Where many years before I had done my PhD. Now, one of the things I had this opportunity come to me when I was working at Cranfield and just, I want to say to everyone, I’m just going to do a little bit of a segue now. And just one thing that I would want to highlight is that at the point I was making a decision about whether to move on from my role at Cranfield to the next job, this was front of mind.

Doyin Atewologun:
So, in the UK, just to give you some data, there’s about 25,000 professors in the UK. Less than half of them were female, so theres about 12,000. Right. Just under 12,000 of that. Roughly 12,000. How many of them would you think are black? As of the time I was making these decisions, there were fewer than 50 professors who were black female in the UK. So I say this because I had the opportunity to step out of academia, or I had the opportunity to step out of the academic role into a senior leadership role at Oxford. And I had to make a decision about reducing.

Doyin Atewologun:
About whether I was comfortable reducing the numbers of people in the talent pipeline of black female professors in the UK, because I was one of those about to enter potentially into the professoriate. And I think that is so important because it’s important for all of us to think that we want to get to a world where do Ian’s decision about making her next, about her next job move should not be reliant or influenced by whether she’s going to change that decision is going to change the UK landscape of black female professors. But I had to step out of that role because I had a wonderful opportunity to be dean of the Rhodes Scholars at Oxford University. Now, the Rhodes scholarship is one of the preeminent scholarship, many of us say it’s one of the oldest or the oldest scholarships in the world, and it is a fully funded scholarship for exceptional young people to do postgraduate studies in the UK from across the world. And I had the opportunity to work with them to oversee their experience in Oxford, which meant a range. So me and my team did a range of different things, including making sure they settled into Oxford from an academic perspective, making sure they were doing okay with regards to their studies, making sure that they were making the right decisions, making sure they were settling okay with regards to their colleges, and making sure that they had the opportunities that were available, aware of the opportunities available to them, but also helping build a community of future leaders, really helping them see who they were individually, independently, but also think about the power of the collective. So we. I oversaw another number of leadership retreats, kind of designing them, working with facilitators from across the world to really think through what are the ways in which we can create spaces for these Rhodes scholars to reflect on issues like authenticity, but also injustice in the world and find themselves a position, their position in that, individually and collectively.

Melody Moore:
I just. Honestly, I don’t know if I’ve got anything to say. I just listened to you talk for hours, which is rare for me to have nothing to say. Curious that you went from there to Delta then full time, is that right? That’s when you made that move. And I guess the question in my head is, would you go back to academia?

Doyin Atewologun:
Yeah, it was such a tough decision. It was such a tough decision. But ultimately. So I was just under four years with the trust, was it four and a half? Yeah, it was about four years with the trust, with the Rhodes Trust. And I ultimately made the decision that the work that we did at Delta was very much my calling. That really helping organisations and senior leaders to think, what is the work that we need to do to get the best out of different types of talent. And I had a skill and aptitude. People were, you know, people were asking us to do this work for them and with them.

Doyin Atewologun:
And I thought, I thought I was doing, you know, and I had a number of red skulls who were like, but your work is here. You’re doing great work here. And I did have to make that tough decision. I am grateful in that I continue to be affiliated with. With the university. I’m an honorary fellow at Trinity College. I remain in kind of an advisory capacity with the Rhodes Trust. So I still am part, in many ways, part of that community.

Doyin Atewologun:
And from an academic perspective, I also continue. So just this morning, I was. I had a meeting with three, two co authors, and we’ve just done a final revision of a manuscript that’s gone into a real top journal. You know, it’s a. It’s another round of revisions. We’re hopeful about it. It is based on research that we did with one of the organisations I work with. And so I’m still finding ways in which I can blend these different facets of my life because I think this is one of the things I can offer to the world.

Doyin Atewologun:
It is that. It is that blend. And I hope to be able to continue with that blend in many different ways.

Melody Moore:
Beautiful, right? I’m going to. Actually. No, I have. Before I ask you, my quickfire questions I’m going to ask you the how do you do it question, which I’m sure you get asked. You know, you wear these many hats. How do you balance your time and also have a life?

Doyin Atewologun:
So one answer to that is to be very aware of the need to do that. So I find myself, I do find myself wearing many hats, like you said, academic consultant, leader, entrepreneur. And one of the things that is very important to me and very important, and I convey this importance to the rest of the business is the need to pay attention to you because you are your buddy’s custodian. Like I fully, I so believe, I believe that firmly that the only person responsible for your body on the entire planet and in history is you. And that is your primary goal, to take care of your body like nobody else is going to take care of your body. Right. So in order for you to do the work that, to, to bring the best of who you are to the world, you need to take care of you. And so I remember that I remind myself of this and I, you know, if needed, I take some time off.

Doyin Atewologun:
I hang out with my little godserve. We play dinosaurs, we draw when I do. And I’m very intentional. I’m good to, you know, I’m going to hang out with my little godson today, for example. But the other thing that I think also helps as I think about these different hats is I’m learning more and more to be actually be very intentional and clear and be definitive about which hat I’m wearing when. And that also helps me make it provides more clarity with regards to which decisions when I’m trying to make sense, when I’m trying to navigate complex decisions, knowing, all right, my goal here is to build a strong business. My goal here is to evaluate the top quality research and make it accessible. And that clarity helps kind of lighten any sense of, you know, kind of confusion or that does help kind of.

Melody Moore:
Yes, I do actually have a vision of you with different hats now.

Doyin Atewologun:
I love it.

Melody Moore:
Yeah. I think you could have your academic hat with your, what’s it called? Mortarboard. Is that thing the black hat with the tassels? I can’t remember.

Doyin Atewologun:
Indeed.

Melody Moore:
You’re consulting. I’m now imagining I could draw them all for you. So let’s go to the quickfire question. So what is next? What is next for you? What is next for Delta?

Doyin Atewologun:
So we are going to be ten years next year, which is awesome. And what we’re doing is we are curating various ideas for how we’re going to celebrate that. So we want to tell the world that we are, well, tell more of the world that we are here, that we exist. We provide, like I said, kind of leadership and inclusion solutions through research, through workshops, through programmes, through strategic guidance. And in some ways, we may be like one of the, I don’t know, quote unquote, world’s best kept secrets. And what we want to do is kind of celebrate and stand out and tell the world that we are here and we can provide solutions to some of the complex problems that many kind of global businesses are grappling with. So we want to help more businesses be fit for the future and really get the best out of difference. And we want to tell the world that story.

Doyin Atewologun:
We will be doing that in a number of ways, particularly in the coming year, to celebrate the ten years of Delta.

Melody Moore:
Nice. And what about for you? What does that mean for you personally?

Doyin Atewologun:
Indeed. So what it means for me is stepping out some more, telling that story so I have this opportunity to be in conversation with you, for me, is another kind of blessing and privilege, because I think sometimes you can get so stuck in the work that you forget that sometimes your story can be powerful, inspiring, could get people thinking, and I’ve probably been too busy or underestimated the value of telling some of that story. And so I want to be able to tell the story about Delta, but also maybe be a little bit more, share a little bit more in terms of my own challenges and struggles and. But also, you know, kind of successes. So, you know, people can get what they take, what, take what is helpful from that.

Melody Moore:
My heart did a little kind of swell. When you were talking about people getting to know you. What about advice to your younger self?

Doyin Atewologun:
This one was a hard one, but it is something along the lines of girl, be you. It is something along those lines. Cause I think I know I did say that I grew up and I had a beautiful childhood. I was loved and admired and cared for, et cetera. But I also know that I spent a lot of time worrying about that. Yeah. Worrying about whether people liked me enough, worrying about whether I was popular enough, worrying whether I was pretty enough. Actually, I wore braces.

Doyin Atewologun:
I was chubby. Well, I say I was chubby. And then you look at photos and.

Melody Moore:
You’Re like, no.

Doyin Atewologun:
This is the other thing. You were regular.

Melody Moore:
Yeah, yeah, right, yeah.

Doyin Atewologun:
And then. And then. Yeah. And then you grow up or you try to get a stronger, clearer sense of who you are and what you bring to the world, what you uniquely bring to the world and so I would just say, you know, you are. We know this, but I think it’s worth reminding our younger selves, you are the only you that will ever be right. So let the world benefit from that.

Melody Moore:
So beautiful. What about. I mean, you’re an academic. You’ve probably got about 5 million books you could recommend to me, but if I was to say just one or two, what would you recommend?

Doyin Atewologun:
Indeed? Oh, no, I have the one book that I would recommend.

Melody Moore:
Lovely.

Doyin Atewologun:
It’s actually a play. It’s a historical play that I think everybody should read. So it is. The name of the play is Avon Ramwen Nogwaisi, and we will put it in the show notes.

Melody Moore:
Please do.

Doyin Atewologun:
Yes, it is. It’s a book. It’s a very short. Like, you will finish it for, you know, people who are reasonable, who are even, like, average readers. You should read it. Be done in, like, a couple of hours max. Like one sitting. It’s written by Olarutami and it’s an old play.

Doyin Atewologun:
It’s an old book, old play. But it tells the story of the obba of Benin and the period around when the Benin Empire and the British Empire were at war and when the British Empire ransacked the Obez palace. So the Oba is the title of the king. And what it does is it tells in very straightforward and, like a little short story, captures so many things, captures history, conflict, perspective, assumptions, in grouping out, grouping. And I think too many people are unaware of how some of these. Many of these kind of scenes from history played out in different ways to reflect our current situation. And so, for example, a lot of the material, a lot of the works that were taken from the Benin Empire are right now in the British Museum in London. Some of them have been returned.

Doyin Atewologun:
But it’s such a simple story. Well, when I say simple, it’s such an easy to read story that I think it’s one way in which many, many more people can be like, oh, this happened, and help us connect better to history, as well as understand the ways in which. Some of the ways in which the world works. Today.

Melody Moore:
I will most definitely be reading that.

Doyin Atewologun:
I would love.

Melody Moore:
Once you’ve spelled out the name for.

Doyin Atewologun:
Me, I would love your reaction.

Melody Moore:
That sounds amazing.

Doyin Atewologun:
It’s sort of my favourite plays. Brilliant.

Melody Moore:
Thank you. Right, last question. What title would you give to your story? This is the hardest question.

Doyin Atewologun:
It’s the hardest. What title would I give to my story? It would be something along the lines of chapters written and yet to be written. Chapters written and yet to be written because I think for me there is something about making sense of your life to a point, but also acknowledging that while having some sense of what is again, your contribution to the world, what is your goal, what are your values that kind of guides you in the future. But it’s also important to be a little loose with that. Just see what emerges. Chapters written and yet to be written.

Melody Moore:
I love that. So I just want to finish off by saying thank you so much. I honestly, my heart is full. I love that so much. Such a great conversation, and I’m sure people are going to love hearing your story because it’s just fabulous and so multifaceted. So thank you for coming on my podcast, Melody.

Doyin Atewologun:
Such a pleasure to be in conversation with you. I thank you. I felt, you know, a little skip in my heart when you said, when he invited me to be on your podcast, I’ve enjoyed it very much.

Melody Moore:
You’re very welcome. This podcast is brought to you by Liberare consulting. If you enjoyed today’s show, why not click on the subscribe button? So you are among the first to hear about new episodes and we would love for you to do as a over and click on the share button and share this episode with one of your friends.