Empowering Inclusion
Driving Disability
We strive to empower companies and individuals to create a culture that values and supports disability and neurodivergence.
Our Story
Founded by Allan MacKillop and Ian George, Alliance for Inclusion is committed to empower and support organisations to develop forward thinking strategies to achieve full inclusion for deaf, disabled and neurodivergent (DDN) people.
With 30 years of combined experience and expertise in designing and implementing disability strategy and as passionate advocates for both the social and human rights models of disability, we have seen the vast benefits to businesses when disability is understood and supported correctly.
As experienced disability strategists, we have identified a shift away from the support of disability via specialist inclusion roles to a more generalist-based approach.
We feel this will inadvertently create a skills gap within business, which if not supported, will lead to inconsistent experiences for DDN staff, clients and customers across all sectors.
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Allan MacKillop was recently DEI Manager supporting disability strategy at BT Group.
He had group wide responsibility for helping drive the progression of a series of key strategic initiatives, including talent attraction, staff development, workplace adjustments and the upskilling of staff and managers.
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Allan also provided subject matter leadership expertise to a range of initiatives designed to improve accessibility right across the organization.
These included encouraging the uptake of the staff adjustment passport alongside improving premises access.
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Prior to BT, Allan worked as lead disability strategist at the BBC for 4 years. In this role, he was responsible for developing and driving forward the disability strategy to support both disabled staff and users of BBC services.
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From 2020-2022, Allan serviced as the Disability Access Ambassador (responsible for creative industries) reporting to the then Minister of State for Disabled People, Work and Health.
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Allan has also worked as the Disability Lead and Accessibility Champion at CGI Group for two years. He was responsible for providing an advisory service on accessibility compliance and supporting all disability-related communication.
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Over the last 20 years, Allan has held a number of other roles within the IT industry. He has extensive experience of both Software Development and Change Management.
Ian George is one of the UK's leading disability recruitment specialists, having spent 15 years at the BBC working as a programme and talent manager, specialising in inclusive recruitment and staff development.
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He ran the award winning Extend scheme and also provided consultancy across the BBC Elevate programme, recruiting and developing deaf, disabled and neurodiverse talent across the broadcasting industry, as well as working on Project Diamond for the BBC alongside all major broadcasters and the Creative Diversity Network and sitting on BBC Steering Groups to ensure representation of DDN people and content, both on and off air.
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A trained coach and mentor, he has supported hundreds of deaf, disabled and neurodiverse staff as well as providing management training and support.
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More recently he has worked on high level strategy to design and implement a fully inclusive recruitment solution for DDN people across the organisation.
'Over the past 18 months I have had the pleasure of working with Allan. Since joining the team I personally have learnt so much from him. He has helped to deliver a step change in our DEI agenda using his first class knowledge and experience, along with his amazing network. It is always so special to work with someone who combines such expertise with humility and humour.'
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Wendy James
Leadership, Learning, Talent and Diversity Director, BT
'Some people say that they care about disability inclusion, whilst others do something about it. Ian has done so much for inclusion at the BBC and I owe my career there to him.'
Sean Dilley, Presenter, Correspondent and Senior Journalist, BBC News
Our Services
We provide bespoke packages to support your business.
Please contact us to discuss your requirements.
Do you have a disability strategy?
How we can help:
• Work with you to conduct a full review of relevant policy.
• Meet your staff and managers individually or via focus groups to understand their concerns.
• Draft strategy design highlighting key workplace priorities alongside implementation pathway.
Is your communication accessible?
How we can help:
• Full review of relevant communication strategy and policy.
• Provide guidance around both inclusive language
• Provide guidance around inclusive meetings and events.
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Is your procurement process accessible?
How we can help:
• Full end-to-end review of procurement pipeline, including guidance and policy.
• Provide recommendations and guidance to improve the inclusivity of the process.
Do you encourage disabled applicants through recruitment?
How we can help:
• Full end-to-end review of outreach, recruitment and onboarding pipeline.
• Provide list of key recommendations to enhance effectiveness.
• Provide written guidance and face-to-face sessions to support recruitment staff and hiring managers around inclusive recruitment practices.
How do you provide Workplace Adjustments?
How we can help:
• Full review of workplace adjustment provisioning process.
• Provide written/verbal recommendations to enhance the manager and colleague experience.
• Provide on-going consultancy across Access to Work process both from a business and individual perspective.
Do you upskill your staff and managers about disability?
How we can help:
• Meet your staff and managers to understand skills gaps.
• Scope face-to-face training sessions covering key disability themes.
• Run both face-to-face training and leadership sessions to key stakeholder groups.
• Provide additional written guidance to support sessions as required.
• Run bespoke staff development programmes to support career enhancement and full coaching.