The Brain Doesn’t Do Tick Boxes

Georgina Brown (hershe)
Jul 15
2 min read

Why Compliance Culture Kills Inclusion — and What Real Accountability Looks Like

If I had a pound for every time a client said, “We’ve ticked all the boxes, but nothing’s really changed,” I’d be fully funded for my neuroscience PhD by now.

Let’s be honest — tick-box culture is the comfort food of inclusion work. It feels satisfying, it’s easy to microwave, and it looks good on the plate. But it rarely nourishes anything that matters.

The truth? The brain doesn’t do tick boxes. And neither should your inclusion strategy.

Comfort food is a tick box culture

Brains Run on Patterns, Not Paperwork

We like to believe that once we’ve carried out an audit, created an action plan, written a policy, run a webinar, or launched a shiny new initiative, we’ve “done” inclusion.

But behaviour change doesn’t happen because a PDF exists, or we've ticked off an action on our plan, it happens because the brain has had time, space, and safety to rewire.

The human brain doesn’t scan policy documents looking for meaning. It scans the environment for:

Threat or safety
Power or disempowerment
Familiarity or uncertainty
Trust or risk

So if your inclusion efforts don’t change how someone feels in a room, in a meeting, in a moment of challenge — then it’s still a box on a form, not a signal to the nervous system.

Compliance Doesn’t Create Culture

Let’s call it: most compliance-based EDI activity is performative at best, harmful at worst.

It promotes the illusion of progress without the messy, human, iterative work of actual change.

It tells leaders: “As long as you’ve got a policy, you’re covered.” It tells staff: “You matter… but mostly to our legal team.” It tells underrepresented groups: “We care, but only if you fit into the way we’ve already structured things.”

And most dangerously, it tells the brain:“Don’t change. Just hide it better.”

Real Accountability is Behavioural

At BARDO, we work with organisations ready to move from policy to practice, from intention to impact, from compliance to culture.

That means:

Coaching leaders to recognise and regulate bias in real time
Designing systems that reward inclusive behaviours, not just inclusive branding
Giving teams tools to build psychological safety, not just run workshops on it
Measuring what matters: trust, belonging, emotional labour, risk-taking, and retention

We use the Neuro-Inclusive Maturity Model (NIMM) because it’s not about optics. It’s about creating real psychological oxygen — creating liveable environments where the brain can relax, relate, and rethink.

Inclusion That Sticks Feels Different

People don’t stay in inclusive cultures because of a poster. They stay because someone said, “I’ve got you,” Because they felt seen and heard in a meeting, Because they messed up — and weren’t shamed for it, Because the leader owned their bias out loud.

That’s what real accountability looks like. Not box-ticking. But behaviour-tracking. Culture-shifting. Brain-rewiring.