About Us

With over thirty years’ experience across both the creative and corporate sectors, we bring a rich and versatile skill set that spans consulting, business development, workshop facilitation, training design, sponsorship sales, mediation, grievance assessment, marketing, PR, producing, writing, performing, and directing. Our journey has included serving as Head Trainer and Business Director at one of the UK’s leading anti-racism organisations, where we delivered training, consultancy, and more to creative organisations in theatre, visual arts, museums, dance, television, and music across every region of the UK. Over the decades, we have also built a trusted network of experienced associates, enabling us to offer truly bespoke solutions tailored to each organisation we work with.

Our Story

We founded RCA in response to the need for genuinely supportive and constructive advocacy spaces within the creative and corporate sectors after the murder of George Floyd in 2020.

With decades of experience in consultancy and change management, we recognised the cyclical pattern of diversity and inclusion efforts, and understood that although organisations often come forward with a genuine desire for change, the greater systems and structures within our societies can silently work against them, leading to fatigue, frustration and an eventual return to the status quo.

This pattern is not the fault of organisations, but it hinders your ability to acheive real, lasting change that doesnt end in burnout, confusion and a feeling of defeat. That's why we created a framework that supports you at every stage of your journey, providing systems and mechanisms to keep you moving forward, even when things feel tough.

RCA understands the very real difficulties faced by organisations across sectors, and is dedicated to providing accountable and non-judgemental advice, support and resources, so that whatever your goals and challeneges, you have experts on hand, and actionable steps to follow.

Meet The Team

Carol Russell

Founder & Lead Trainer/Consultant

Carol Russell (she/her) is a consultant, screenwriter, actress, teacher and founder of Fresh Voices UK, a network which amplifies the work of ethnically diverse screenwriters in the television industry. For over 20 years she has worked in the field of organisational change; designing and delivering workshops in Knowledge Management, Change Management and ED&I for consultancies such as Sparknow, Trans4mation and The Scenic Route.

As a screenwriter she has written for award-winning drama Soon Gone: Windrush Chronicles (BBC), the BAFTA-nominated Story of Tracy Beaker, House of Usher (short film for BBC), and two seasons of Comin' Atcha, a series based on the lives of English girl group Cleopatra. She recently co-wrote the book Invisible to Invaluable with author and advertising professional Jane Evans. She also founded Fresh Voices UK - an organisation promoting Global Majority writers to the top levels of the UK's theatre and television industries.

As a consultant, she has worked with a number of organisations such as Royal Mail, British Airways, several international pharmaceutical companies, British government agencies such as HMRC and DEFRA, and international development banks including ADB (Asian Development Bank) and CDB (Caribbean Development Bank). She has also been one of a group of pioneers using story to increase knowledge transfer within organisations, and managing change by sharing lessons, bringing strategies to life and getting messages out across organisations. She is also an experienced external grievance investigator.

Julie Clare

Founder & Trainer/Consultant

Julie Clare (she/her) trained at Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and has worked as an actress, writer and producer for television and theatre for over thirty years. She is a recipient of the Stage One Bursary and has produced/associate produced Olivier Award-winning West End shows such as Showstopper! The Improvised Musical, In The Heights and Baby Reindeer.

Other shows include: The Snow Queen, Peter Pan and Chinglish (Park Theatre), Yes Queens, the West End's first female led comedy improvisation night launched at the new Boulevard Theatre in 2019. She produced Julie Madly Deeply (written and performed by Sarah-Louise Young) in New York and London (Brits Off Broadway season at 59E59 Theaters/Park Theatre) and was associate producer, in partnership with Francesca Moody Productions, on two shows: Do Our Best and Baby Reindeer, which won an Edinburgh Fringe First prior to its sold-out run at the Bush. Previous projects as associate producer include the Number One tour of Strangers On A Train, Sideshow (Southwark Playhouse) and multiple Olivier Award-winning In The Heights by Lin Manuel Miranda.

Since the 1990’s, Julie has had a parallel career in event management, PR, marketing, Business Development and Sponsorship Sales. Since 2015 she has worked with Lewisham Children's Charity, Montage Theatre Arts as Funding Director, since 2020 as fundraiser for Inc Arts Minds and since 2021 as Business Director for Inc Arts. Julie is a member of UK Theatre and the League of Independent Producers.

(www.julieclare.co.uk)

Helen Foster

Trainer and Company Administrator

Helen Foster (she/her) is an actor, improviser and producer with a background in cabaret, hosting and clown. She has extensive experience deliving roleplay services for multinational organisations and has worked in corporate and public sector training contexts since 2010, performing workshop facilitation through a range of training and delivery styles.

Helen began working as an administrator for EDI and anti-racism organisations in 2020, as a way to engage meaningfully and support the expansion of equity and inclusion in the creative sector and beyond.

She has been with RCA from the beginning and is committed to supporting your organisation every step of the way, whether you have questions, need help accessing resources, or need to book sessions and services.

Feel free to say hello: info@ruscla.com

Jide Fado

Trainer & Consultant

Jide Fado (he/him) is a coach, trainer & facilitator, working across the UK and internationally with participants ranging from graduates to the board room, topics include Diversity & Inclusion, personal impact & courageous conversationsHis strength as a coach is to really listen in order to help his clients forge a path through the challenges they face and the change they seek in their lives. Helping them be their authentic selves in order to create the impact they wish.Jide loves developing training programmes. His design work for a top magic circle law firm won the HR in Law award. He is interested in blending different formats for maximum effectiveness and apply an innovative approach to bringing learning to life so it sticks. He has developed content for companies including Allen & Ovary, Nestle and TATA Consultancy.

Judith Byan

Trainer & Consultant

Judith Bryan (she/her) is a writer, playwright and scholar. Her first novel Bernard and the Cloth Monkey  won the 1997 Saga Prize and was republished by Penguin in February 2021 for the inaugural Black Britain: Writing Back series, curated and with a new introduction by Booker-prize winner Bernardine Evaristo. Judith holds an MA in Writing for Performance from Goldsmith’s College. Her play, Keeping Mum, was shortlisted for the Alfred Fagon Award. Her short fiction and non-fiction appear in various anthologies including  IC3: The Penguin Book of New Black Writing in Britain (2000, re-issued 2021), Gas and Air: Tales of Pregnancy, Birth and Beyond (Bloomsbury 2002), Closure: Contemporary Black British Stories (Peepal Tree Press 2015) and Glimpse: An Anthology Of Black British Speculative Fiction (forthcoming, Peepal Tree Press 2022). Judith is a qualified social worker with experience in Fostering and Adoption, young women’s Independence Training and special needs housing (vulnerable adults). Additionally, she has extensive experience as an educator, having devised community arts workshops for children and families, and taught creative writing for over twenty years in a variety of settings, including fifteen years as a University Lecturer where she convened the MA Creative Writing programmes. She is the recipient of a Betty Trask Grant, an Arts Council Award, a London Arts Board Award and a Hawthornden Fellowship. Judith is completing her second novel.

Akshita Brahma

Trainer

Akshita (she/her) is an award-winning Artistic Changemaker working across a range of creative expressions to advance social justice. Her fluid, curiosity-driven practice embraces leadership, theatre and live art experimentation, creative producing, advocacy and activism, form-free writing, governance, community facilitation, filmmaking, and virtual reality engagement.Radical authenticity and joy empowerment are central to her work, which seeks to activate space, dialogue, and proactivity - whether internal or structural - rooted in care-based methodologies and a commitment to sustainable transformation. In a time where overwhelm often suppresses movement, she works to create conditions where initiative can thrive, grounded in courage, compassion, and collective joy. She is guided by a strong love for people and the worlds that exist within that; a philosophy of ‘prevention over cure’ - and where that isn’t possible, a deep calling to nurture healing. Akshita is particularly drawn to reimagining approaches to interpersonal connection, education and organisational systems through artistic rigour, generosity and actionable creative thinking.Her contributions span several collectives and venues including Artsadmin, Battersea Arts Centre, Theatre Deli London, House of Annetta, Elevate East, Comparte, Woven Ink, Laugh in the Face of Extinction, The Clapham Grand, Built on Blood, Hidden Keileon, The Glitch, Bridge House Theatre, Rose Bruford College, and the Royal College of Psychiatrists.Akshita’s recognitions include the Old Vic’s Lilian Baylis Award, Rose Bruford College’s Peer-Nominated Changemaker Award for Inclusion, and awards for community service, business enterprise, and theatre. These accolades reflect her determination and ability to bridge art with nuanced social impact.

Joy Tan

Trainer

Joy Tan (they/them) is a Singaporean-Chinese, nonbinary and neurodivergent performer/artist. They are deeply interested in the intersectionality inherent in the practice of musical theatre and how that can be enhanced by diversity in its actors and industry leaders. Joy strives to conduct professional and personal practice through an anti-racist, equity-focused lens, and believes any type of art can be powerfully utilised to encourage positive societal change.

They graduated from Mountview’s MA Performance (Musical Theatre) programme in 2020 and has since been professionally based in the UK. Selected credits include George Takei’s Allegiance (Charing Cross Theatre), The Crucible (National Theatre and Gielgud Theatre), Showstopper! The Improvised Musical (UK Tour) and A-Typical Rainbow (Charing Cross), the playtext of which included their publishing debut. Joy is currently developing an academic chapter for a text due to be published by Routledge in 2027. They firmly stand for a free Palestine.

I definitely feel better equipped than before, and feel more supported as we’ve all done the training - so we know we can work as a team to tackle racism

Workshop Participant