This Isn’t Working

What happens when the workplace becomes a moral battleground, a group therapy session, or a political rally? And how should disruptive employees be dealt with?

In this darkly funny, unsettling, and sharply insightful episode of This Isn’t Working, clinical psychologist and culture critic Jaco van Zyl takes us deep into the psychological underworld of modern workplace activism.

Before empoyers can find solutions to emerging issues with increasingly demanding and unreasonable staff, they must first understand the problem - which Jaco argues has a large psychological component.

From moral grandstanding and identity performance to power, status, and the strange emotional rewards of self-appointed judges of what (and who) is 'good' and 'bad', this is a conversation that goes far beyond people policies, and into the human instincts driving today’s office conflicts.

As co-director of Critical Therapy Antidote, Jaco brings a clinical lens to what happens when ideology, therapy culture, and corporate life collide — and why HR often finds itself stuck playing referee (or 'Mum') in battles it was never trained to fight.

We ask:

- Why has activism become such a powerful source of meaning, belonging, and even excitement at work? Who is drawn to the idea of taking their identity and political views into the professional space, and why?

- Have employers played a part in encouraging bad behaviour - for example, by creating internal staff networks, pandering to demands for speech policing, and embracing flawed ideas like 'bring your whole self to work'?

- What are the psychological payoffs of calling out, cancelling, or 'educating' colleagues — and who really holds the power in these dynamics? What do disruptive colleagues actually want?

- When and how does a drive for 'inclusion' slide into aggression, coercion, and control - and why can't activist employees tell when they've overstepped the line?

- How will problematic employees respond when employers finally push back towards a more grounded, professional working environment? What strategies can they put in place to mitigate explosive reactions from troublemakers who have become accustomed to getting their own way?

By turns disturbing, witty, and uncomfortably familiar, this episode offers a rare psychological look at the hidden motives, emotional currents, and unintended consequences shaping today’s “values-driven” workplace.

Enjoy the episode!

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Critical Therapy Antidote https://criticaltherapyantidote.org/

Freedom in the Arts https://www.freedominthearts.com/

Has the 'vibe shift' reached UK companies - and who's to blame for the 'inclusion' practices that turned out to be such bad business? 

We have brand new insights to share - straight from the mouths of UK employers. At the launch of our new business network 'This Is Working', 50 senior leaders, lawyers, HR professionals, risk experts and business owners gathered for a rare, open conversation. We also heard an exclusive talk by Alex Edmans, finance professor at London Business School, titled: 'Was there ever a business case for DEI?'

What emerged from the evening was striking: the problems employers face today were not created just by activists and HR, but by decisions made across multiple departments — including legal, risk, compliance, recruitment, communications, and senior leadership.

In this candid episode, Tanya de Grunwald is joined by FTSE 100 Chief Strategy Officer Paul Sweeney and architect and business leader Patrik Schumacher (of Zaha Hadid Architects) to unpack why employers are finally ready to admit that everyone played a part in creating the current confusion and mess — and why only cross-functional honesty will get us out of it.

We cover:

IS THIS THE MOMENT PRIVATE-SECTOR EMPLOYERS FINALLY START TALKING TO EACH OTHER? Why did so many senior leaders turn up ready to speak openly — even on taboo topics? And what does it signal that, despite the sensitive themes, not one person opted out of being photographed?

HOW DID HR, LEGAL, RISK AND LEADERSHIP ALL CONTRIBUTE TO THE CURRENT PROBLEMS? From unlawful policies written without legal scrutiny, to risk teams who missed the clear dangers from HR policies, to leaders who dodged difficult conversations — how did so many disciplines independently make decisions that collectively led us here?

WHY WILL FIXING THIS REQUIRE A TEAM EFFORT? Employers now see that these challenges cut across policy, culture, governance and leadership. No single department can repair this alone. We explore why only joint, honest, cross-disciplinary discussions can untangle what’s gone wrong.

CAN WE MOVE FROM GROUPTHINK TO GROWTH? After years of silence, deference and “be kind” culture, organisations are realising how dangerous it is when teams stop challenging each other. What happens when leaders actively encourage disagreement, scrutiny and open debate again?

WHAT DID PROFESSOR ALEX EDMANS REVEAL ABOUT THE ‘BUSINESS CASE’ FOR DEI? We examine his keynote showing that demographic diversity was never the performance driver employers believed it to be — and why firms are now refocusing on cognitive diversity, evidence and commercial realism.

HOW DID WELL-MEANING POLICIES CREATE UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES? From recruitment practices that illegally skew hiring, to training that shut down discussion, to policies that exposed organisations to legal and reputational risks — how did siloed decisions spiral into today’s problems?

WHY HAS DISABILITY BEEN IGNORED — AND WHAT DOES THAT TELL US We revisit powerful contributions about disability being crowded out by more fashionable causes. What can this teach employers about how “inclusion” drifted away from evidence, need and fairness?

WHY TALKING — OPENLY, HONESTLY, AND SOON — IS THE ONLY WAY FORWARD Across the room there was agreement: employers must stop whispering and start talking. Only by sharing what’s gone wrong, and comparing notes across functions and organisations, can we rebuild workplaces that are lawful, functional and genuinely inclusive.

This is a hopeful, energising episode about the start of a new phase for UK employers — one in which leaders finally have the confidence to speak plainly, work collaboratively, and fix the problems created during a strange and turbulent decade of workplace culture change.

* WISH YOU WERE THERE? 

Buy our bundle including the video of Alex's talk, and the anonymised report capturing the audience discussion
https://bit.ly/47ZBokp

(It's free to those who attended on the night - contact Tanya for details)

Who is still pushing 'woke' at work - and why is it so hard to challenge? This entertaining episode (recorded at the Battle of Ideas on 19 October 2025) explores the exasperating power of virtue signaling, lived experience and cancel culture at work. And we ask: what will it take to restore balance and neutrality to the UK's workplaces?

With thanks to Eric Kaufmann - professor of politics at the University of Buckingham, and author of Taboo: How Making Race Sacred Produced a Cultural Revolution - for joining Tanya de Grunwald for this special live episode.

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This Is Working - Tanya's new business network
Launch event - Tuesday 4 November, 6.30pm, Central London
https://thisisntworkingpodcast.co.uk/were-launching/

Can Left-leaning HR teams face the truth – that many of their colleagues support Reform UK? Or will employees with a St George's Cross sticker on their laptop be forced to apologise for the 'harm' it causes to colleagues?

In this episode, Tanya de Grunwald describes her trip to the Reform UK Party Conference in Birmingham – and what Nigel Farage's soaring popularity (and the UK’s rising political temperature) means for employers.

Tanya, Heeral Gudka and Levi Pay discuss the challenges and risks that organisations must grapple with... before it's too late.

Notes :

JOIN US AT THE BATTLE OF IDEAS!
Saturday 18 and Sunday 19 October 2025
Church House, Westminster, London 
https://www.battleofideas.org.uk/battle-of-ideas-festival-tickets-2025/
For 20% off use the code WORKING
*Early Bird tickets end Thursday 18 September* 

This Isn’t Working will be recorded LIVE on Sunday 19 October at 12.45pm
Episode: Who Will Win The War On Woke Workplaces? 
(Ft. Eric Kaufmann: author of Taboo, and Professor of Politics at the University of Buckingham)

Don’t Divide Us: The Equality Act Isn’t Working (report)
https://bit.ly/45Xe2uz

Reform UK member Saba Poursaeedi’s case against Hightown 
https://bit.ly/41MTvXf

Heera Gudka
https://convergentconsulting.org/

Levi Pay
https://www.plinthhouse.com/

Have standards collapsed across HR? Why are so many HR professionals confused about what their job is – and who is to blame for the mess?

Some shocking practice has been exposed recently, raising urgent questions about standards, ethics and legal compliance across the UK’s HR industry.

Are we seeing pockets of incompetence – or do the worst cases (such as Sandie Peggie and the Darlington nurses) point to rot so deep and widespread that it is now the competent HR professionals who are in the minority?

To explore these questions, Tanya de Grunwald is joined by Heeral Gudka, director of the DEI consultancy Convergent, and author of a white paper titled Freedom of Expression and Belief Conflicts are the New EDI Frontier.

Reflecting on their experiences at the UK’s biggest HR conference – the CIPD Festival of Work, in June – Tanya and Heeral conclude that robust debate and high-quality training has vanished, and been replaced by sponsor-driven content designed to generate income for the conference organisers, not to give HR professionals the challenging learning experience they need.

Perhaps most worryingly, Tanya and Heeral recall a shocking panel discussion at the conference about the Equality Act, where a CIPD staff member said the recent Supreme Court ruling (that ‘sex’ means biological sex, according to the law) ‘erodes trans rights,’ and creates confusion for employers. Then he made a flippant comment about ‘policing’ women’s toilets. 

And the lawyer on the panel – representing Lewis Silkin – appeared to express similar confusion and incompetence.

No wonder this industry is in a muddle, if these are the people who have been appointed to set standards…

Enjoy the episode!

Heeral's company:
Convergent https://convergentconsulting.org/

Heeral's white paper: 
Freedom Of Expression and Belief Conflicts Are The New EDI Frontier https://convergentconsulting.org/foe-paper/

CIPD panel discussion: 
What Would A Future Focussed Equality Act Look Like?
Full recording: https://bit.ly/45jVC5A