Out Connect Conference, London, June 2024

It was my first time attending Out Connect, OutBritain*’s annual conference and my expectations were far exceeded.

All the sessions at the conference offered a wealth of insight and information. But since I can’t list them all, I would like to mention just a few of my highlights;

• Laura Schwartz‘s motivational opening speech and her key experience when she asked herself “Who am I?” and “Why am I here?” at university, which took her in a completely different direction
• Adam All, & my AHA moment that there are not just drag queens but a whole lot of great drag kings out there – Adam All was so funny & entertaining, they rocked the whole conference

• NGLCC**’s Co-founder & President, Justin Nelson – one of the approaches he mentioned to get companies to embrace supplier diversity & inclusion: “Inclusion is better received by shareholders than being an arsehole … ”

• Lord Browne of Madingley, the first CEO of a global company to come out while still in business, a great rolemodel as he mentioned that of the Fortune 500 companies, only 4 CEO’s are openly LGBTIQ+ – I wonder with an average of 9% LGBTIQ+ people globally, what is holding the other 40+ back from coming out?
  -> Keep an eye out for a report from OPEN Network on LGBTQ+ business owners.
• MNEK‘s personal story & collaboration with Beyonce and other stars
• London Contemporary Voices, a really lovely start to the afternoon sessions. I got goosebumps listening to them sing

Congratulations to Matt and Patrick and the whole Out Britain team for such an extraordinary conference.

linkedin post; https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7204485447299788800/

*Out Britain is the UK’s first LGBT+ Chamber of Commerce, connecting, supporting and growing the UK LGBT+ Business Community, whilst Uniting it with the rest of The World.
**NGLCC; The National LGBT Chamber of Commerce