Claire is an independent equality, diversity and inclusion consultant and manages Advancing EDI. She has experience as a trainer, a qualitative researcher, and in strategy and policy development.

Claire previously worked at Advance HE where she was responsible for developing and launching the Race Equality Charter for UK higher education institutions and moderating Athena Swan applications.

As a trainer, Claire developed and delivered a national unconscious bias training package for UK higher education. She was also involved in developing and delivering the Advance HE Leading Race Equality training and has delivered sessions on allyship and privilege. More recently, she has been working with two organisations to re-develop their mandatory introduction to equity, diversity, and inclusion.

Claire has been both the commissioner and the commissioned on research projects. As a researcher, she undertook a review of the experiences of Black and Minority Ethnic staff in further education, using mixed methods, along with wider EDI research looking at the experiences of disabled students in further education. She also researched and wrote the Advance HE report ‘Improving The Experiences of International Staff in Higher Education‘ and commissioned, managed, and edited the Advance HE report ‘Academic Flight: How to Encourage Black and Minority Ethnic Academics to Stay in UK Higher Education‘ and the literature review ‘Unconscious Bias in Higher Education‘.

More recently, Claire has completed a rapid literature review into the EDI implications of talent management frameworks within organisations and has conducted staff listening exercises for a variety of organisations, exploring the lived experiences of staff and students through interviews and focus groups.

Having a research and policy background provides a holistic approach to the development of EDI strategies, ensuring they are evidence-based, strategic, and effective. This knowledge also transfers to the training environment where discussions and examples used are informed by real-life situations and practice.