'Double Lives'
We spend on average around a third of our lives asleep. Then, we spend around a fifth of our life at work. Together, that’s about half our total time. Of that time, you might wonder, how much is spent speculating and fretting? It seems reasonable then for us also to place a particular onus on the other half of our time focused on ‘being our real selves’. It’s the relatable conundrum we all inherit from the world of work where we weigh up how best to balance our time.
Katrina’s story, produced by DRPG for HS2 Ltd is an award-winning piece that, at its core, tries to circle this overwhelmingly common square. Although the to-camera inserts with Katrina deal mainly with the emotive pre-transition angst of living a double life and anxiety over how she might go about re-entering the world of construction - acknowledging as we do its historically close-minded and male-dominated reputation - this film works so well because Katrina’s transition feels almost incidental. These are worries she relays to us that we all experience continually throughout our lives. I too have meditated on how I am perceived and then labelled by others, particularly after a change. But then no doubt so too has my neighbour. I have considered what people expect of me versus what is delivered and worry over the unknown, like Katrina.
What DRPG have worked to capture here are the most efficient(and easiest) two techniques of combating the slings and arrows of prejudice and presumption that often tend to effortlessly replenish in uncertainty’s quiver: knowledge and understanding. If we know the end result, if we understand that there is nothing underhanded being said about us in an unlearned language, then we remove any negative power, as easily as a pair of shoes. The result is a brand film not only intelligent in its messaging simplicity, but one that manages to align Katrina’s especially specific apprehensions with those of the more common.
Films like HS2 Stories: Katrina work hard to prop open doors of conversation to workplace attitudes on inclusion and diversity, but their burden is a heavy and slowly shifted one. But, thankfully, videos like this are on the rise. And just like the dramatic change of physical landscape at Long Itchington where Katrina once worked, time moves more effectively if we manage it correctly. Starting with advocating for the self and bringing that person to work with us.
