Why disability representation in ads is still stuck at 3% (with Frank Starling from LIONS)

Only 3 percent of ads tested feature someone with a visible or invisible disability — and that number has barely moved in years. Frank Starling, chief DEI officer at LIONS (the organization behind Cannes Lions) joins Nathan Friedman to unpack the state of inclusion work in advertising and marketing and what it will take to close existing gaps.

Frank discusses findings from a joint report with LIONS, Understood.org, the Unstereotype Alliance, and Shift 20 on disability and neurodiversity in marketing. Frank also shares why co-design with underrepresented communities is essential to authentic storytelling, and why brands should narrow their DEI focus in order to drive real commercial and cultural impact.

Check out the report: Shifting the Narrative on Disability and Neurodiversity Inclusion in Marketing

Nathan Friedman: Welcome to "Minds at Work," the podcast for leaders who embrace neurodiversity in business. I'm your host, Nathan Friedman, co-president and chief marketing officer of Understood.org, the leading nonprofit focused on helping those who learn and think differently thrive. Each week, we're here exploring how neurodiversity sparks innovation and how we as leaders across industries can create a more inclusive future for all.

Today I'm excited to be talking with Frank Starling. Frank is the chief diversity, equity, and inclusion officer at Lions. Lions is the organization behind "Cannes Lions" International Festival of Creativity and other global programs that connect creativity to business performance. Frank, great to see you again and welcome to "Minds at Work."

Frank Starling: Likewise. Thanks for having me, Nathan. Great to be here.

Nathan: For those who don't know you or the Lions organization, why don't you just give us a little bit of background? We'll start there.

Frank: Of course. Yeah. So Frank Starling, I'm the chief DEI officer, as you mentioned, at Lions. Joined the business three years ago now — just over three years ago. Those three years have gone incredibly quickly. And Lions is an organization that brings together many years of evidence, insights, and tools that basically connect creativity and effectiveness to commercial performance.

So we're most well — known for "Cannes Lions," the "Cannes Lions" festival, which is a festival that happens in June in the south of France. We have typically over 13,000 delegates attend that festival and about 97 different markets represented as well.

Prior to that, I was a consultant for just over four years. I worked with close to 30 organizations on DEI work from across the globe. Brands including organizations like H&M, Carwow certainly in the UK, many councils in the UK as well. And my focus there was looking at strategy, training, frameworks, really looking at how those organizations could narrow their focus and create impact in a particular swim lane.

Nathan: And how did you transition to Lions? What drew you to the organization?

Frank: A number of things. I mean, I am truly passionate about creativity. I think that's one of the amazing things that Lions stands for. For me personally, I've always just loved the ability to come up with ideas and be able to bring those ideas to life.

And from a broader Lions perspective and how that intersects with DEI, I think it was an opportunity to look at, well, what can we do to use our platform to drive change in the industry? Of course, I think we're most well — known for being conveners of so many different communities, but I think our brand is held to a very high standard, as it should, across the industry.

So I think the combination of those two things — of this particular role being quite unique for Lions, my passion for creativity, but also how I can move from working from company to company across various different projects as a consultant to more looking at, well, how do we use our platform to drive industry impact — was definitely a really exciting opportunity for me. And yeah, it's been so far so good after three years. There's honestly so much ground to cover, Nathan. And year on year, we've got to think about where we spend our energy, our resource, and our time.

(03:32) Navigating a complex world and the importance of active solidarity over quiet statements.

Nathan: From a DEI and B perspective, where have you seen things shift from last year to this year, particularly at "Cannes Lions"?

Frank: Look, I think the biggest shift right now is companies are trying to navigate a very complex world. We often use that acronym VUCA, and I think now we're seeing that.

Nathan: And for those who don't know that acronym, can you share that with the listeners?

Frank: Yeah, absolutely. VUCA stands for Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity. And it often describes a situation which is just difficult to judge, difficult to guess. And I think what we are seeing now is the realization of that acronym, because there's just a lot of division across the globe, right?

We've seen this when we take the acronym DEI and diversity work as a whole. It's been very difficult for many colleagues out there. So I think right now, organizations are trying to navigate that. They're trying to ensure that they put their best foot forward, that they are being respectful to communities without getting things wrong. I think we've seen a lot of brands who are trying to navigate the complexity of that right now.

And what I've seen personally in the conversations I've had is there's still a really strong sense of quiet solidarity. Quiet solidarity isn't always the most effective way, I think, to show up for communities. But as I've probably said in the past certainly over the course of this year, actions are more important. What are those organizations doing to support either their colleagues or the community or customers that they serve?

So I think that quiet solidarity still exists. And I think the biggest shift that we've seen over the course of this year is just the vernacular and the language has obviously moved away from words like diversity to inclusion. Certainly, we're seeing more words like impact being used as well. I use impact fairly often. And I think sometimes that's because that can often be tied to affirmative action, positive action, but the misunderstanding of what those things are.

Nathan: Yeah, there's a ton of misunderstanding, particularly around this area, but also Understood.org focuses on neurodiversity. And neurodiversity for a long time wasn't really embedded into the DEI and I conversation. Have you heard more about neurodiversity or neurodivergence in these conversations with leaders?

Frank: I think there has been a greater want and need to co — design. But I think there's still a gap in understanding of what is the lived experience. Like, how does that actually play out in the day-to-day?

So I think brands are wanting to — just take the creator economy as an example. That's obviously exploding; it's going to be huge over the next few years. There is such a tremendous opportunity to really think about, okay, how do we co — design with those communities if we're trying to represent them? How do we bring them in right at the beginning at that phase where we are ideating to ensure that messages are authentic?

And dare I say, if you extend that — it's not just the authenticity of the message — it's how do we become a positive force? How do we become restorative to that community? Acknowledging that today, even in 2026, we still are seeing huge systemic barriers that exist for many communities, of course.

Nathan: So Frank, where or how does neurodivergence show up in your own life or at work?

Frank: In my own life, probably my significant example is having a parent that's got a long-term mental health condition and just navigating that over the years. I think first and foremost, seeing how society acts in certain moments, right?

Sometimes there are instances where you'd want for a more inclusive society. But as I've seen play out over the years, sometimes our first foot forward can be a kind of reaction of fear or exclusion just by what someone may say or how they may react to something. And I think that's been particularly interesting and eye-opening for me — not just as a carer looking after someone like that, but also just seeing how society needs to continue to evolve to be inclusive of all communities.

And whether you're neurodivergent or neurotypical, you should be able to navigate life, the workplace, friendships, relationships in a way that feels inclusive to your lived experience. And that's probably the most significant example, which is always ongoing and has also been a significant learning curve for me throughout my entire life as well.

Nathan: Thank you for sharing that, Frank. I know everybody has a different journey and a different life experience, and it's helping share stories like this help others see themselves in different types of people who thrive at work, home, and in life.

Frank: Definitely. And I think it's important that we do feel more comfortable with sharing those stories. Specifically around how neurodivergence shows up, I think that storytelling aspect can sometimes be missing in society, but certainly in the workplace as well.

(09:12) The transition from making statements to taking consistent action in DEI and the need for accountability and long-term commitment.

Nathan: Another one of the changes I think I saw this year is really about how things have moved from what you actually referred to as acronyms to actions. What does that shift look like in your mind?

Frank: I think the biggest shift is, how do we avoid those statements where it's very likely there won't necessarily be a follow-through? A good example is after the murder of George Floyd. I think many organizations came out to say, well, this is what we are going to do to support either supplier diversity or what we are going to do to support DEI programs — or not necessarily affirmative action, but support diverse suppliers or minority suppliers.

And some companies have followed through on that; some haven't. I guess there's been a slow but consistent rollback from many organizations out there. So I think, how do we avoid those moments where we are just making statements in maybe perceived solidarity to just being consistent year on year?

Whether that is thinking about your workplace and what kind of environment you are making for your workplace. How are you training your managers to lead inclusively? All the way through to again the customers or the communities that you serve — what are they expecting?

Rightly so, we've got a workplace which has become incredibly more complex — four or five generations in the workforce. When you layer on to that intersectionality and how your lived experiences are compounded in the day-to-day, there's a lot to think about.

So I think brands now can just keep it simple. They can narrow their focus. I don't think any person right now is expecting one particular brand or a collection of brands to "save the world." It's more, how do we move forward in solidarity? How do we become brands that are restorative, regenerative to communities, create access, drive impact?

I think these things can exist alongside the commercial case. But I think there's just generally been a reset across organizations where they've had to go back to those early conversations of what is the business case and then build back from there — which again makes it more difficult if you don't have someone internally who's driving that narrative, who's championing change. Then of course that just means that there's an additional barrier to overcome. It's the hearts and minds barrier that you've got to start off with, making sure that it's actually on the agenda, it's in this part of the conversation, and hopefully it's been aligned to the business strategy as it should.

Nathan: Yeah. And I think one other point that you were making earlier is super important, right? With as many generations in the workforce as there are today, one of those generations has never worked in a pre-COVID environment. If you take Gen Z, they joined the workforce either a lot of them during COVID.

But something else we've noticed is there's a lot of not only generational difference in the workplace, but there's expectation difference in different categories or different types of companies have different types of thinking about how they can get the most out of their workers — whether it be training managers more effectively and efficiently or understanding who is actually working within their walls.

And something that we shared with you as well as the listeners of this podcast is Understood.org's research on some of these topics. One of the research reports that we developed revealed about half the people working in the U.S. creative industry identify as neurodivergent. When you heard that stat, what came to your mind? Did that surprise you or was it something that you expected to hear?

(14:35) The high prevalence of neurodivergence in the creative industry and the need for neuro-inclusive workplaces and management.

Frank: Certainly both. I think surprising when you always when you see the evidence. I think it can always be surprising. But I think there's where we are always wrong to assume about the makeup of the organization or the workforce that we are part of, whereas it's easily done. We often default to a more general understanding as opposed to trying to find data to look for evidence to uncover actually what is the makeup of our workforce.

And I think what's interesting about that stat is, if we just take the structure of a workplace, are we building in neuro-inclusion? Anything from how the office is laid out — the importance of having quiet spaces and spaces where you can just kind of switch off and not experience sensory overload — all the way through to how managers are trained.

There's no supplement for good management. It's easy, and I said this recently in a training session: it's fantastic to have high standards as a manager or as a leader, but that has to be coupled with inclusive leadership. Good management is, in my opinion, inclusive leadership. And that's taking into account all the different personalities and lived experiences that you're working with, and being curious to what their experiences are like in the workplace and trying to solve for and remove the barriers that those individuals may face.

So I think it's a really interesting stat, but hopefully should open up some ears and eyes of people across the industry to recognize actually the colleague to your left and your colleague to your right, one or two of them being neurodivergent is a big deal.

Nathan: And we've also seen in this report and others that integrating neurodivergent thinking into the workflows produces higher quality work — more complex problems are solved more easily and more rapidly, more creativity — and that's just to name a few.

We actually partnered with Lions and a few other organizations to launch a joint report entitled "Shifting the Narrative: On Disability and Neurodiversity Inclusion in Marketing." You brought this group of organizations together and were really the driving force behind the initiative. Why is this so important to you and why now?

Frank: Well, first and foremost, I think the title says it all: "Shifting the Narrative." We have seen a really negative and targeted narrative towards not just work of inclusion and DEI, but I think anything that stands for equality and equity and leveling the playing field and making sure that people have access. I think we've seen such a negative narrative surround that over the last couple of years.

And what the outcome of that is, in many organizations, it's created this sense of kind of palpable fear of what do we do next and how do we ensure that we get it right and how do we avoid getting it wrong.

So in my belief, organizations need to feel confident in terms of how they are making these types of decisions. And it really starts with leaders. And the convening of Understood.org, Shift 20, the Unstereotype Alliance — the thinking behind that was really, well, what can we do again to help to platform and amplify some amazing work that's happening across the globe from organizations like these?

And really put in front of people the case studies that they need to either have that conversation in the boardroom or to ensure that they're making more inclusive decisions. Going back to that point of co-design, this report really demonstrates the importance of that: putting community at the center of how those decisions are being made and how that can lead to both successful outcomes for the community that you're serving in terms of the integrity and the authenticity of message, but also the commercial side of things as well.

They live in the same house on different floors. So I think there's — we definitely have a lesser part of that convening, but I'm just really proud to be able to say that driving that and championing that was just such an important thing to do and the right thing to do.

(19:34) Advice to brand leaders on narrowing their focus for impact and the power of inclusive values

Nathan: Frank, and we thank you for all the effort and championing of this cause. I think a couple other stats in there were super interesting to me as well. One eye-opener was from the UN Unstereotype Alliance that only 3% of ads tested featured someone with a disability. And that's 3%, and obviously that's most likely with a visible disability. But that number has barely moved in the past six, seven years. Do you have any theories on why that is?

Frank: I think it could be for a number of reasons. You know, we've partnered with the Geena Davis Institute, and they measure representation in film and film craft and they've seen a shift in gender representation, certainly in people of color — maybe not so much in the last kind of year or so. I think we've seen a slight regression by a couple of points certainly from a gender perspective.

I think more broadly, when we take a look at representation for disabled communities, we're just way off in terms of, is that conversation really integrated into the fabric of how that organization is working? Is it part of their infrastructure? Very likely it isn't. And I think that's why we are seeing such low representation, because I think it's really easy to sideline things that aren't necessarily your day-to-day.

And if they are, then how do we ensure that we are representing what is 20 to 25% of the globe? I think we — it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because I think if some teams aren't centering those conversations in the design process, they're not co-designing with communities to understand, well, what barriers are they facing and how would they like to be represented, then over time I think that's where we see a compound effect happening where the low representation just never really gets — no one really stops and says, "Actually, look, well, how do we shift this and how do we change that?"

When in actual fact, that is happening from organizations like the Unstereotype, like Understood.org, like Shift 20 — organizations that have been doing this work for many, many years now. So it's, how do we translate a lot of that best practice and ensure that brands are trying to find the right partners to shift that narrative forward? To get that 3% considerably higher over the next half decade.

Nathan: Yeah. And for the brand leaders that are listening, if you would give them advice, what are two or three things you would have them do to help that immediately and to change that perception and also that data fact?

Frank: Yeah, look, I think the first thing is to narrow the focus. So impact over volume is really important. It's easy to say we want to focus on every single thing all at the same time. Realistically, there's only so much you can do. So narrowing your focus, I think, really helps to think about, well, where do you have expertise and how can you drive impact within that particular swim lane?

I think the second thing I would say is, if you don't have that expertise in — house, then ensure that you're partnering with the right organization, right? If you partner with the right organization that has that expertise that can bring — that can either be a critical friend or they can bring really useful resources or case studies or upskill your people or give you the data that you need to build the business case. Whatever the case may be, partnering with the right organization can really lead to that change.

The third thing I would say is it's got to be important to the leaders within that company — the most senior leaders within that organization. We should be putting that challenge to them if it isn't already on the agenda.

I mean, a good example is when we talk about inclusivity is e.l.f. Beauty. Their values are literally positivity, inclusivity, and accessibility. It's something that their external narrative has been those things for quite some time now. And it's no surprise that they're growing at four times the rate of their industry peers. That's no doubt one of the drivers of that.

So I think it's important that it feels personally relevant to the leadership of any brand right now. If we're going to just say that our brand's working in line with their values, let's not think about what we're trying to do first and foremost — like, what are your values as an organization? And then as leaders, how do we take responsibility and accountability for just driving that through and shifting these stats? We don't have to be a society where we are constantly looking at what's going wrong. We can start to create solutions and drive forward that change ourselves.

Legislation, of course, can be a really significant catalyst for that. But at the same time, I feel like brands and organizations that really think about the resource that they have or the platform that they may have to create change can do it. It just, like I said, it takes time, it takes the right partnership, and it takes the leaders internally to decide it's important to them.

(22:35) The business benefits of inclusivity and current industry trends, including the divergence between organizations increasing and decreasing DEI efforts.

Nathan: Were there any other stats or any other points in the research that you found particularly interesting or surprising?

Frank: Yeah, absolutely. I think there was a stat on inclusive organizations are 75% more likely to see ideas become productized and 87% more likely to see that — to say that they make better decisions. And more likely to recognize higher revenues derived from innovation.

So for me, that is a prime example of how these two worlds collide — where we can be inclusive and still drive commercial outcomes. And I do think there's still quite a significant gap with those points truly being understood.

We've seen a lot of research from the likes of, like, Catalyst, advancing DEI initiative, that talk about the risk of retreat, that talk about why organizations should continue to work in DEI or at least focus on some sort of kind of variation of universal design, which I think is really good. But I do still think there's a gap between understanding how both the commercial case and the case for inclusion really work effectively together. And I think that's the reason why we're seeing an example of the stat of low representation. I think that's one of the prime examples of that.

Nathan: You look at a lot of data and a lot of reports over the course of the year. Are there any key metrics that you're looking at and hoping that shift or move on an annualized basis?

Frank: I think one of the metrics which kind of sits outside the industry from — I mentioned earlier, the Meltzer Center for Advancing DEI — was just really looking at the composition of brands that had pulled back. So there's a stat there from one of their recent reports which is, most organizations have made changes to their DEI approaches over the last three years. But 52% have ramped up their efforts and 51% have pulled back — especially those who are specifically those who are federal contractors.

So we're starting to see a fork in the road. And you asked me that question of how do you tell whether an organization is effectively showing up or not. And I think we'll start to see that play out over the next couple of years. I think the organizations that have ramped up their efforts are going to benefit from that diversity of thought, that authenticity in terms of how they are connecting with their communities — of course, if they're focusing on the right actions.

I think the organizations that have pulled back are going to have to navigate that complexity. How do they explain that to both their colleagues and their consumers? You know, there's something called job hugging in the workplace, which is when you are essentially staying in a job, but you're doing so where you are disengaged. You don't necessarily want to be there.

Nathan: Oh yeah. Quiet quitting.

Frank: Exactly. It's kind of an evolution, I guess, of quiet quitting. And you essentially feel unfulfilled and disengaged, but you're just kind of staying in your role and you're just ticking the boxes.

And in an organization that decides to pull back from efforts around inclusion, again, if you have a global workforce, it's a very likely outcome that you're going to see a high percentage of disengaged colleagues. And that should be worrying at a time where there is a lot of uncertainty and volatility out there. You need people to be engaged, you need people to be psychologically safe, you need them to have a sense of belonging.

And therefore, those are the, I think, data points that are really important — that obviously play out in "Cannes Lions" because we want to be able to see not just a cross-section of communities that come to the festival every year. We want it to be representative of the global community that we serve. It's why we've launched many programs to create access. But I think that has to be extended to how organizations are working today, how agencies are working today. If they're centering representation, if they're centering co-design, then we will start to see that reflected in obviously a lot of the amazing work that's submitted every year as well.

Nathan: You know, we talked a little bit about this year's "Cannes Lions." What would you want brand leaders or agency leaders to do differently or think about as we look ahead to 2027 and next year's festival?

Frank: I think one of the biggest shifts can be just a greater focus on representation. It doesn't need to be a scary thing. I think ever since we've — when we saw affirmative action being repealed in the US, that's of course created a ripple effect, and I think in — for companies in Europe, they've now started to consider their own positive action policies.

Whereas positive action is a way to, like I said, remove barriers for marginalized or underrepresented groups, and that's a good thing. So we can still and we should still think about representation both in the makeup of our teams — like I said, how we are co-designing — and in relation to neurodivergent, neuro-inclusion, baking that into the process, I think, is really important.

And we don't have to be scared of the word representation or equity. All it fundamentally means is broadening, widening our base of who we are working with and being fair and equal. I mean, that's — these are things that we can all subscribe to.

Nathan: Well, Frank, thank you so much for joining us today all the way from London. And really appreciate you taking the time to have this thoughtful discussion.

Frank: Thank you, Nathan. Thank you so much for having me. And kudos to all the work that Understood.org is doing to drive neuro-inclusion. And it's been amazing to be able to partner with you on both the research paper but also the convening at the Lions Impact Hub this year at "Cannes Lions."

Nathan: Yes. And thank you for all your support as well to the Lions for platforming this important work and driving change.

Thanks for tuning into "Minds at Work." I hope today's conversation inspired you to think differently about how to harness the power of neurodiversity in business. If you want to know more about our guest today or the work we're doing here at Understood.org, please check out the show notes. For those looking for resources to better advocate for themselves and others, please visit u.org/work.

"Minds at Work" is brought to you by Understood.org, the leading nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering people with learning and thinking differences like ADHD and dyslexia. To help us continue and expand our work, please donate at u.org/give. That's understood.org/give.

The show is produced by Julie Subrin, Alison Hochlander, Max McKenzie, and me, Nathan Friedman. Mixing is by Justin D. Wright. Briana Berry is our production director and Laura Key is our executive director. And I'm your host, Nathan Friedman. Please join us next time when we'll continue exploring how difference can spark connection and shape a more inclusive and creative future of business.