Hello, I'm Sarah Ellis and this is the Squiggly Careers podcast.

This episode is one of our special series of short conversations that we've had with this

year's LinkedIn change makers, which we're also really proud to be included in.

Each of these people is pioneering, really important change in the world of work, making an incredible difference

across areas including equality, mental health and sustainability. And we're looking forward to

learning so much about how they've made change happen, their hopes for the future and also how we

can all get involved. Today you'll be hearing my conversation with Sonia Barlow.

Sonia is champion change across inclusivity and really is just a general, I think, champion of change across all of the work that she does. But what I particularly appreciated in our

conversation is just how honest Sonia is about all the stuff below the surface. What hasn't gone to plan?

What's been really hard and the challenges that she's had that have really spurred her on

to make changes. And also it was so nice to hear her talk about her role models and learn a bit

about her family and how that's really helped and supported her with where she is today.

I hope you'll enjoy listening to our conversation and I'll be back at the end to let you know

how you can learn more and also who else you can hear from in this series.

So Sonia, thank you so much for joining us today on this special Squiggly Careers podcast episode.

Thank you for having me. I'm very excited to be on here, especially because I've been listening for so long that it just feels like one of those things that you tick off your own individual professional bucket list.

Oh, that's so nice. I didn't know you that you were a listener until you just told me right now.

So let's start. I would love you to just share with our listeners who might be new to you and to the work that you do and you do so many interesting things. I was kind of going, it's really hard to know where to start because simultaneously there's about six or eight things I'd love to talk to you about. But let's really focus on change, because that's what we're here to talk about today. So what is the change that you're

really passionate about making and that you've been pioneering over the past couple of years

and longer than that, really? Yeah, thank you. So I guess my change is changing people's

perceptions of themselves and most importantly what their journey,

their life, their career means to them. For me, it's about providing confidence to those

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