As organisations work to create more inclusive workplaces, some aspects of diversity receive more attention than others. Being able to express religious beliefs at work is an area that often remains unexplored despite its significance to many employees. In this episode of HR Coffee Time, host Fay Wallis is joined by Professor Binna Kandola, senior partner and co-founder of Pearn Kandola, to explore why religious expression matters to the people in your workplace and how organisations can better support this.

Binna shares insights from his firm's comprehensive research into religion at work, including findings from their largest-ever survey response. He explains the various aspects of religious expression, discusses both challenges and positive developments in workplace inclusion, and offers practical guidance for HR professionals looking to create more inclusive environments.

Chapters from This Episode

[00:00] Introduction and Overview

[02:02] Meet the Expert: Professor Binna Kandola

[04:19] Defining Religious Expression at Work

[10:03] Why Religious Expression Matters

[18:36] Benefits to Organizations

[21:01] Key Research Findings

[26:49] Examples of Good Practice

[31:23] Book Recommendation

[33:28] Conclusion and Resources

Useful Links

• Connect with Fay on LinkedIn
• Fay’s website: Bright Sky Career Coaching
• Connect with Binna Kandola on LinkedIn
• Binna’s website: Pearn Kandola
• Pearn Kandola’s, “Religion at Work Report”
• Binna’s podcast, Making the World Fairer (on Apple Podcasts)
• Binna’s podcast, Making the World Fairer (on Spotify)

Other Relevant HR Coffee Time Episodes

Create an Equitable, Diverse & Inclusive Workplace – Podcast Playlist (on the Bright Sky website)

Create an Equitable, Diverse & Inclusive Workplace – Podcast Playlist (on Spotify)

Book Recommendation From the Episode

(Disclosure: book links are affiliate links which means Fay will earn a small commission from Amazon if you make a purchase through them)

‘World Religions: The Great Faiths Explored and Explained’ by John Bowker

Looking For the Transcript?

You can find the transcript on this page of the Bright Sky Career Coaching website.

Rate and Review the Podcast

If you found this episode of HR Coffee Time helpful, please rate and review it on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. This video shows you how to rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts (because it isn’t very intuitive). If you're kind enough to leave a review, let Fay know so she can say thank you. You can always reach her at: fay@brightskycareercoaching.co.uk.

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Hello and welcome back to HR Coffee Time. It's wonderful to have you listening today. I'm your host, Fay Wallis, a career and executive coach with a background in HR, and I've made HR Coffee Time especially for you to help you have a successful and fulfilling HR or people career.

Before we dive into the main part of the show, I just want to take a quick moment to say a huge thank you to Mark for leaving HR Coffee Time a lovely rating and review on Apple Podcasts.

He wrote, I recently came across HR Coffee Time while preparing for a job interview and listening to episode 50, How to Impress in a Competency Based Interview. Fay explained everything so articulately and made answering the star structure easy and relatable. After many failed interview attempts in the past, the pod really helped me understand where I was falling short, and now I've been offered the job.

Thanks, Fay! I can't tell you how much it meant to me to read that review. It's wonderful to know that the episode is having an impact in helping people get their next roles.

So, thank you, Mark. I hope you're going to absolutely love your new job. Coming back to the main part of the show today, we're focusing on a topic that I've wanted to cover for a long time, and that is how we can be inclusive and respectful at work for our colleagues who are religious.

Whether you have faith yourself, know a lot about religious beliefs, or only have a little knowledge, I really hope that you'll find this episode interesting and helpful. I know that you probably care a lot about making sure your workplace is an inclusive one, but I also know that for many of us, religion can feel like an uncomfortable topic, and you may be feeling a little unsure about how to be respectful and inclusive when it comes to expressing religious beliefs at work.

So I'm incredibly grateful to Professor Binna Kandola for agreeing to join me as a guest for this episode. Binna is the senior partner and co founder of Pearn Kandola, a practice of business psychologists. He specialises in equity, diversity and inclusion and over the past 40 years he has worked with a range of organisations in the UK and across the world.

He's also an award winning author with nine books already written and another three in the works. Over the years he has conducted research into a wide range of important topics and in the past year this has included weight discrimination in the workplace, religious expression at work, the experiences of neuro divergent employees, and Islamophobia and anti Semitism in the workplace since October the 7th.

He has also recently launched a new podcast series on Religion at Work, which features global guests from different faiths and industries. I'll make sure that I link to it in the show notes for you and I'd highly recommend listening to it after you've finished listening to this episode.

Binna is a visiting professor at Leeds University Business School, and he was awarded an OBE in 2008 for his services to diversity and disadvantaged people. His firm produced a religion at work report from the results of a huge survey they did to explore the experiences of people who have a faith in their workplaces.

It was eye opening to read the report, and I feel so lucky that Binna is here for this episode, ready to share his insights with all of us. Let's go ahead and meet him now.

Welcome to the show Binna. It is so lovely to have you here.

That's a great pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me.

Oh, you're very, very welcome. I'm just so happy that we were able to find a time that works, especially because I know how busy you are writing three books in one year. I just can't quite believe it. It's so inspiring. But rather than talking about one of your books today, we're actually going to be talking about something that you published in a report in September.

The report talks about the importance of allowing for religious expression at work and for people to be able to express their religious beliefs. I always think it's helpful to start with a definition or definitions so that we're all clear on exactly what it is that we're talking about, because I know that phrases can be interpreted in different ways.

So it would just be fantastic. If we could start our conversation off with me asking you to define what you mean by religious expression and what you mean by someone being able to express their religious beliefs.

Yeah, in general terms, what I mean by religious expression is the extent to which people can share their faith with people in the workplace because that, you know, we're a firm of business psychologists. So, you know, we are talking about the workplace and there are a number of components to religious expression.

One part of it is just like the symbolic expression actually. The clothes that people wear, the accessories, the hijabs, turbans, yamahas crosses, that sort of thing. And a part of that symbolism is actually the extent to which people can put items on their desks that around their workplace, which kind of show their adherence to a faith.

The other part of it is verbal expression, the extent to which people feel they are able to talk about their faith with their colleagues in a very respectful and kind of mindful way. So it's sharing information and not proselytizing.

There's the aspect which is about observing religious practices and that's something which has changed over a lot over the years actually, that, uh, you know, people may need time during the day to pray. They meet the, the kind of the observance of religious holidays, so they won't be available at certain times of the year.

And, uh, the dietary restrictions as well, which accompanies some faiths. There's the kind of participation in religious activities in the workplace. It doesn't happen that often, but there may be workplace prayer groups, for example, but also, people may need time off, you know, leave work early or at certain times in order to observe their faith.

A kind of more subtle than all of that, actually, is the aspect which is about ethical and moral decisions. So actually people are able to say, I understand why you're saying that, but actually, according to my faith, I can't go along with that decision. So actually being able to share their faith in, that way with their, with their colleagues.

It's so incredibly helpful to have it broken down like that. Thank you for taking us through all of those different aspects. And I think that's one of the reasons that I really loved your report so much. It explains these different things so clearly. Because I think it's easy to just think about religion in general terms.

And especially if we don't necessarily have in depth experience of different religions as well. Or you're not someone who has faith yourself, you're not religious yourself. It's easy to overlook all of these different aspects and actually just how incredibly important they are. And I've always felt it's really important to be respectful of other people's faiths and to try and learn about them.

My first degree is actually in theology and religious studies, which people are always really surprised about. Um, especially because I'm not someone who's religious, but for me, I think even when I was relatively young, when I did my degree, It, I just realized what an important part of people's lives religion actually is and I've always been fascinated by people and I thought well if I'm able to learn more about different religions and religious practices and and what they mean then I can understand people more, hopefully, and, um, be able to be respectful or, or be interested.

And yeah, I just think it's absolutely fascinating and so important,

but, did it help you? Did it help in that regard?

um, I think in some respects, yes, but over the years, I think I became a bit nervous of talking about religion or talking to people about their religions because I'd worry about Saying the wrong thing, or I'd worry in case there was a, a sensitivity around it.

And in fact, I felt quite nervous about us doing this podcast interview as well, because I know how important people's faiths are. I do sometimes think like, who am I to, be talking about this, when I'm not someone who, has a particular faith or adheres to a particular faith. And because there is so, so many awful things that happen in the world where people are awful to each other, when it comes to being disrespectful about other people's religions.

I think it's all those things in a mix make me nervous about it, but I still very much believe it's important. So I'm so grateful to you for doing this interview and for writing this fantastic report and that we're doing it because I don't want to shy away from topics that I do think are important just because I'm nervous about talking about them.

yeah. I think it's a great point you're making actually. And, and given that you've studied theology and religion, actually to hear you say that I feel nervous talking about is actually quite significant because we're not, I'm not talking about religions. I'm talking about faith and religion, so I'm not talking, I'm not going to give you any information about any faith because I'm not an expert in any faith, actually, I'm just talking about people who have a faith and their experiences of having a faith in the workplace.

So I'm not a theologian like yourself, but I'm not going to comment on religions. I'm just talking about the experiences of people who have a faith in the workplace.

I really think saying I'm a theologian feels like taking a step too, step too far. I'd love to be able to claim that, but gosh, it was a long time ago, that I did the study. But anyway, thank you for clarifying that. I think that's a really, really good point. And after you've just heard me talk about why I think it's important, we're talking about this.

I'd love to ask you why you think it's so important that people feel they can express their religious beliefs at work.

Yeah there's a, there's a bigger kind of, question here, which it's, uh, or, or a bigger issue, actually. It's just like, what, what do we mean by inclusion and diversity in the workplace? And, as you know, we do a lot of research and, um, but when you look at what organizations focus on, when they talk about diversity and inclusion, they talk about gender, which is important.

Kind of increasingly they're talking about race, but they don't really talk about much else. They kind of talk about disability, but if you talk to people who have a disability, kind of, they, we don't really engage with that. You know, the, we talk about accommodations for, for disability, which is a good thing, but we don't really get underneath why there are so negative attitudes towards people with a disability, which then means people who have a disability are reluctant to kind of make their colleagues know about their disability.

We kind of talk about neurodiversity. We did some research last year about weight discrimination. We got an enormous response from that actually, people saying actually nobody ever talks about this. We've done research on the experience of refugees in the workplace. I've got research coming out in December about age discrimination because, and it's kind of part of that bigger landscape.

We talk about gender, we talk about race. Do we talk about anything else? Not really. And one of the things that we definitely never talk about, so people are, if you bring the topic of disability up, people will talk about it. If you bring the topic of weight discrimination, people will talk about it. If you bring the topic of religion up, people go, yeah, yeah, it's all fine.

The, the, they won't go there. Uh, and it was kind of that that made me think actually this, the, why don't we talk about this and what is the experience of having a faith in the workplace? So it's part of that bigger picture actually just to broaden out our understanding about what diversity means and does inclusion for these different constituencies mean the same thing for each of them or lack of inclusion?

I think you perfectly demonstrate that, just how complex this whole concept of inclusion is and makes me realize as well why it can feel, hard sometimes to feel like, are you doing a good enough job in the workplace when you are an HR professional, because it can start to feel a bit daunting as well, I think.

Thinking of the person who might be listening today, there are all of these different things that are so important to consider, aren't there?

Yeah, I had a call with a group of people yesterday. And there was one, in one organization, there was about 15 people and they were all white and there were men and women, but, and they were all white. I think, no, there's one, one Asian guy. So you could look at that group and say, well, yeah, they're not diverse at all.

But a couple of people said they were neurodiverse. Um, there, there was a guy on there who said he was gay. There was a woman on there who said that she was lesbian. Uh, there was somebody else who, whose, whose husband had been very, he was just very ill, and the organization had helped her take time off.

There was somebody else. Who had other caring responsibilities in the organization. Somebody else had mental health issues. So you could look at this group and say, Hmm, that's not very diverse. And yet it was incredibly diverse. And when you talk to them about inclusion in the organization, they were saying, I find this organization very inclusive because when I went through my mental health issues, the organization helped me.

When I needed time off, the organization helped me. When I needed to care for my neurodiverse child. Anyway, you, we can get hung up on the visual aspect of diversity and the organization knows they need to do better on race. But we can get hung up on the visual things and we forget that there are many other aspects of diversity, which we can't see, but which are never, nevertheless, very important.

And organizations can underestimate the good they're doing by focusing on just the visual aspects. And religion is one of those areas where often, you won't know the faith of the individual. And if you could have a guess at it, you may not know whether they are adherent or not. And for many people, it's one of those things that we choose not to talk about.

And by not talking about it, we miss out on an opportunity to look at further ways of becoming inclusive.

That ties in so perfectly to what I was thinking of asking you next. So I read through your report and been given lots of thought as to what questions I thought I could ask you that would be as helpful for everyone listening as possible. And I suppose it's the most obvious question, but the one that I do need to ask you, which, which is why you think it is that it is so important that people feel they can express their religious beliefs at work.

The basic answer, the fundamental answer to that is that it's really important to them. And, you know, we, when we talk about inclusion, there's that lovely expression. I really do like it, actually, that you bring, you know, inclusion about bringing your whole self to work. Other people have modified it and said it's bringing your best self to work, whatever it is anyway, but it's about being more authentic in the workplace, whoever you are.

And when I've spoken to people who have a faith, I've spoken to many people who have a faith. They actually say the most important thing to me is my faith. And yet it's the one thing I cannot talk about in the workplace. In fact, not only can I not talk about it, I have to hide it. And so whilst we have this, wonderful kind of intention, To enable people to bring their whole selves to work when it comes to faith. But yeah, I know we meant that, but not that bit. You kind of have to keep it to yourself and I've met, I have met a chief executive of an organization of a major organization who says on a Monday, when he gets to work and people start asking, you know, around the water cooler, you know, what were you up to the weekend, he always tells them what he did on Saturday. He doesn't tell them that he went to church twice on a Sunday.

And I've met other people who have said the same thing, actually. They're just concerned about the view that many people have about people who have a faith. And he's Christian. that they will be stereotyped and seen more negatively because they have a faith.

Yeah, it's incredible to think that. I know that when you put the survey out into the world, you had the highest number of responses than you've had for any other survey that you've ever run when it comes to inclusion, didn't you? Which just, again, I think goes to show how important this is to people, what an important topic it is.

Yeah, we had two surveys in total, something like 7000 people, close to 7000 people participated, and that's in the US and the UK. And, um, we were overwhelmed. We kind of thought, ah, this is, even before we've analyzed the data, this is telling us something that, that there's people here who want to share their experiences.

And the more we delve into it, we kind of found, uh, you know, people saying to me and my colleagues actually saying, I'm really glad you did this because nobody's ever asked me before.

That all makes it so clear to me why it's so important to be thinking about this for workplaces and recognizing how important it is to the people who work with us and work within the organizations that we're in. Just from a human perspective, a person centered perspective, if I'm going to work, I don't want to feel like I have to completely hide aspects of myself.

And you used that quote where you said about how people should be able to bring their whole self to work. So, That leads me to want to ask you about really what is the benefit to organizations in focusing on this and making sure that people do think that they can express their religion and talk about their faith when they're at work?

So the consequences of not talking about faith, I realize I'm not answering your question, was that people kind of felt that they were hiding an aspect of themselves, hiding the most important aspect of themselves. And they also kind of feared that if they kind of talked about what an adherent they were to a particular faith, people would view them negatively.

There were occasions, however, when people shared their faith with other people in the workplace and there was a very positive outcome. And the sorts of things that people were telling us was that, that their colleagues responded in a very kind of interested way. And they wanted to learn more about the person's faith and what it meant to them in their, in their daily lives and what it meant to them in the workplace.

So they want, there was, there was increased understanding, there was increased cooperation amongst the team members, but also they felt like the team bonded more because they just understood one another better than they had before. And those are the benefits that come about this, actually. If we responded in an open minded way to somebody sharing something quite personal with us, it will help the team in terms of the relationships they have, the trust they have with one another. And also understanding where a person's coming from on important issues, but those perspectives may help in terms of tackling workplace problems.

I guess it comes back to the whole reasoning behind why on earth any of this is important at all when we talk about diversity and inclusion, doesn't it?

Yeah.

And what I love what you shared there is the positive stories that you encountered through the survey. So I feel bad I'm going to ask you about a negative thing now.

Because I like to focus on the positive, but I know that it's important to talk about the negatives as well. And that is when you were looking at your research findings, which results did you think were the most concerning? And I promise we'll get to talk about positive things as well in a minute.

Well actually, in broad terms, the thing that, uh, surprised me, was, uh, the experience of the people who had a faith. And we had six faiths. Uh, there was, in alphabetical order. It was Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Sikhism. So we had those, we had over a thousand people in each of those six faiths who participated.

I kind of, it didn't shape the, the, the questions you were asking, but I kind of expected, that Christians would have an easier time than people of the other faiths. And we didn't find that. Uh, we actually found that if you have a faith, in terms of your experiences in the workplace, you share things in common with people of other faiths.

It's having the faith. It's, it's people who have a faith and people who don't have a faith. That was the biggest distinction. that kind of occurs. So that was one of the things that surprised me. But there were all sorts of other things that happened and you actually find that, you know, something like, this is the average across all of the faiths, um, but there's something like one in five people said they, they, they couldn't take time off for religious festivals.

It was lowest for Christians, of course, because there are holidays, which, it's part of the holiday framework that we have in the United Kingdom. Apart from that question, all of the other questions kind of applied more or less to every single person who had a faith. And so very few, Christians have had time off refused for holidays. So the 19 percent overall meant that people of other faiths was much higher, but something like over a third of people felt that their line manager was not happy with them.

taking time off. So even though it's part of the religious expression, people are experiencing difficulty in just taking time off. I mean, this is like taking a holiday off for these things. Christians, at times when it wasn't either Easter or Christmas, obviously, but there were other times where Christians kind of said they found it difficult to take time off.

There were times on Sundays, for example, where Christians need to take time off, but you know, we're expected to work. So there's all sorts of kind of things which bind all of the religions together. Nearly half of our sample That's, uh, was 47 percent for the precise number, said that they felt uncomfortable talking about their religion and religious festivals in the workplace. So we talked about symbols, but we also talked about, you know, verbal expression. So half of the people actually feel uncomfortable sharing, you know, that verbal expression is actually very difficult for people.

And the stuff about the visual expression, symbols and dress and that sort of thing. Half of our sample would wear symbols and dress associated with their faith outside of work. All right, so, so half of the people didn't. Of that half, only a quarter chose to do so in the workplace. So now you have this big divide actually between, so just concentrating on the people who wear religious clothing and symbols outside of work.

We now find a fraction of those actually choose to do so in the workplace. There's a, there's a wonderful book called The Khan, K H A N, by Simon Mears, it's a thriller. It's a bit like a British version of The Godfather. I actually think it's better than The Godfather.

Controversial statement there, Binna, I'm sure.

I love the, I love the movie.

No, I like The Godfather book. And I love the movies. In the khan, there's a character she's a barrister, and she's Asian Muslim, and she goes to her wardrobe, and her wardrobe is in two, one half of the wardrobe is her professional dress, and the other one is kinda, is her, her the kind of out of work dress. And I always thought when you're half of the this this quarter of people who wear religious clothing and symbols outside of work, they've got two parts of their wardrobe and they have to be very careful about which clothes they wear, when.

Um, and then of the quarter of people who were wearing clothing and symbols associated with the religion at work, only a sixth of them felt comfortable doing so. So you've got discomfort talking about religion and you've got extreme discomfort when you're wearing symbols or clothing associated with your religion.

Uh, and so I found that really interesting and, you know, in contrast to this. By way of kind of background to this, we have legislation which says that religious discrimination in the workplace is unlawful. And organizations who say we have inclusive policies. Over 90 percent of organizations according to a CIPD survey consider themselves to be inclusive when it comes to religion. It's all very well saying that, but nobody's really asked people who have a faith, actually, what's your experience? And the experience of, um, you know, these policies is that they, they, they don't, it doesn't reflect the practices of organizations. Sorry it's a very long answer, Fay

it's a brilliant answer. It doesn't matter at all if it was long or short. Thank you for sharing it with us. And I said what are the things that concerned you, but I promised that I would also make sure that we have a positive focus as well, because I think the positive stuff is really important to hear.

So, on the flip side of the things that you found that were interesting and that were affecting people negatively. , it was great to be able to see that you uncovered lots of examples where people felt their organizations were doing a good job of helping them feel like they could express their religious beliefs. And very handily for everyone who reads the report, you broke these down into four key areas, which were inclusive policies, culture, accommodations for religious observance, and improved awareness and understanding.

Would you be happy to just maybe laser in on a couple of those for us now, and just talk us through what are the things that organizations are doing really well when it comes to this?

Well, this is a massive, this is a big change that's happened is that the, you know, when I started my career, people really didn't talk about diversity and inclusion, nevermind religion, but you kind of look at the organizations now who kind of think a bit more carefully about allowing people time off for religious holidays and festivals.

The interest that there is. For Ramadan, for example, the whole country knows what is going on, and people take an interest in the workplace. People know that there's fasting, that's part, part of the requirement for it. And all of that is really positive. Uh, and, um, a massive change from, you know, from the 1980s, when these sorts of things were considered bizarre and unusual, and why do we have to bother with these things?

It's a, it's a huge change in, in attitudes. People are far more careful, generally speaking, people are much more aware about dietary restrictions. Uh, so what should we be serving? You know, having something at work, or it's a work event actually, what type of food that should we be serving?

I think as a consequence of that, there's much, much more vegetarian food being served up actually, because there are so many kind of, um, restrictions, that people have that, eating delicious vegetarian food is. It's an easy and tasty solution, to that particular issue, but also where an organization was generally taking diversity and inclusion seriously, that was often cited as a reason why individuals felt more comfortable in those organizations talking about their faith.

And so it fits into this kind of broader picture about creating an environment where people can feel they can be themselves. And then in that type of environment, it won't feel unusual for people to be talking about their faith. And it probably happens a little less often, but people will feel more confident asking people about their faith and what that means in practice.

I know everyone listening wants to do a brilliant job and they're just so dedicated to making sure that we have got inclusive work environments and they want to make sure that that's really true for their colleagues. But I also know how daunting it can feel. It can be hard to figure out what some of the practical steps are.

So, It's so helpful to have you share just some of those things that are making a difference right now. And I'd really encourage everyone listening to go ahead and read your report to get even more of an in depth feel for some of the things that could be happening in organizations when it comes to, expressing religious beliefs at work.

But sadly we are reaching the end of our time together today Binna and I feel like I could talk to you about this all day long. In fact, as well as the report that I just mentioned, Binna has also got a podcast season of his own podcast which completely focuses on this topic and he goes into real detail with a variety of different guest experts about all sorts of different aspects of religion at work.

So if like me, this is something you're really interested in and you think is something really important to learn more about, then I'd really encourage you to listen to that series as well. So as always, I will pop links in the show notes to everything that Binna and I have been talking about today. And one of those links is going to be for his book recommendation.

So you've already mentioned. At least one book while we were chatting today Binna, I'd love to ask you, have you got a book recommendation for us today? Well actually, I just remembered I have changed this question slightly. I used to always say do you have a non fiction book you'd like to recommend or do you have a confidence building tip?

I actually decided to tweak it recently so it may be that I haven't got a link to put in the show notes to a book. Let's see what you're going to say. Would you like to share a non fiction book recommendation with us today? Or, what is the one piece of career advice you'd like to give everyone listening today?

Yeah, I'm going to share a book recommendation. Uh, I am a huge fan of, uh, Dorling Kindersley books. They're kind of like, they're kind of an updated way of doing an encyclopedia, aren't they? On specific topics. And the book I would recommend, because I find this really valuable.

As I said, I don't know much about faiths. You know, I'm a psychologist. I'm looking at the experience of people who have a faith in the workplace. But if I want to find out the kind of, uh, the essentials of a, of a faith, my starting point is always this book, this Dorling Kindersley book called World Religions, The Great Faiths Explored And Explained.

And the author is John Bowker. And it's like a typical Dorling Kindersley, but it's beautifully illustrated, just wonderfully presented. The ideas you get, you get the background. You get the history, the fundamental, kind of the pillars of the faith, what it means in practice, what some of the key symbols are, the key places.

It's just brilliant. It's just a great place to start. You could finish there, but it also gives you an opportunity to kind of jump off and start conversations with people.

That sounds like such a great recommendation. Thank you. And another book I will be adding to my bookshelf. I actually realized yesterday I have to buy a new bookshelf and figure out where I'm gonna put it because I'm so spoilt for choice now. There have been so many great recommendations on the show. So all that leaves me to say Binna is, a huge thank you for your time today.

I know how incredibly busy you are, so it's incredibly kind of you to give up your time to talk to us all about this really important topic. And for anyone who's been listening and wants to learn more about you and the work that you do, what is the best way of them doing that?

Uh, well, I'm on LinkedIn. I'm kind of, that's the only social media I use now. I'm not on any other social media, but I will respond to people on, um, on that, but also, via the Pern Kandola website. I'd be delighted to hear from people.

Great. Well, of course, I will pop the links to those in the show notes as well. And so all that leaves me to say is goodbye. Thank you so much Binna.

Thank you. Thank you so much yourself.

That brings us to the end of today's episode. I'm really aware that this is such a big topic. And so I feel like I've probably only scratched the surface of it with this interview. So I hope you found it a useful way of starting to think about and to explore inclusion at work from the perspective of religion and faith. I'd love to encourage you to take an even deeper dive into it by reading the full religion at work report and listening to Binna's latest podcast series. His podcast is called making the world fairer.

And it is season nine where he explores the topic of religion at work. I binge listened to all of the episodes in two days, they are really good. And I'm sure that you're going to enjoy them too. As always I'll make sure that I put links that were mentioned in the episode into the show notes for you.

You can either find them by scrolling down in the app you're listening to this in, or by going to my website, bright sky career coaching, clicking on that HR coffee time tab, and then selecting this episode, episode 139. If you've been enjoying the show and finding it helpful, I would be incredibly grateful if you could rate and review it on apple podcasts or Spotify for me, because ratings and reviews make such a difference in helping encourage other people to give HR coffee time or try if they haven't come across it before.

And I would love to help as many HR and people professionals as I can with this free show. Thank you so much. And I'm looking forward to being back again with the next episode for you soon. I'll be making a big announcement about a change to the show soon. I'm a bit nervous and excited about it at the same time.

So it's going to be great to be able to share it with you and hear what you think about it.