Sex Education and Work

Sex Education, the 2019 British teen comedy series, seems to have an ironic title. It is, after all, entertainment, not education. In fact, Sex Education does both entertainment and education very effectively.

Nothing to laugh about

In schools, for good reason, we are exceedingly cautious about directly engaging with children and young people’s sexual emotions. Sex is discussed rationally – it’s nothing to laugh about. Sex is a challenging subject because we want children to be able to stand back and manage their emotions, but at the same time, we want them to be in touch with those emotions.

Sex Education takes every important syllabus point and weaves it into a human drama that gives it meaning. Issues that in the classroom can seem awkward or remote become vital and demanding of our attention. The dramatic design allows us to bring our emotional selves into the subject and to explore. Our own feelings soak into the scenarios as we imagine ourselves in the shoes of the characters. This works for adults as well teenagers. The show is a great focus for educational discussion. Everyone who watches it has their own emotional relationship with the characters and issues and feel comfortable and safe discussing an episode.

Emotions at work

Now think about workplace learning. We spend a large proportion of our lives working. Often the largest part. We bring our emotions to work. They matter. But the management-staff relationship is a formal one where emotions must be handled with care. Emotions are nothing to laugh about.

On the contrary, emotions can’t be ignored. They are in play in the increasing demand for people to bring their whole selves to work. To be gay, to be autistic, to be… interesting. Emotions are a significant factor in any behavioural or cultural issue. And let’s not forget that any compliance problem very likely has a behavioural problem at its root.

The function of drama

Video drama provides a perfect medium for management to discuss emotional matters with staff. A drama can take any workplace issue and present it as a human story that management and staff alike can pour their own emotions into and find greater understanding of the challenges of the other. Drama distils an issue into something objective which is easy to talk about.

Dramatic design

Returning to Sex Education – how do they make it so engaging? The design, as with any good drama, is based on a series of choices for the characters that escalate in difficulty. Should Otis become an unlicenced sex therapist with Maeve as his agent? It takes him away from his best friend Eric, and makes him an outlaw in the school. Can Otis bring himself to confess to Maeve of his sexual attraction to her? When Jackson wants to make his casual relationship with Maeve a serious one he asks Otis for advice. Otis chooses to break his therapeutic code to sabotage Jackson by giving poor advice. Which all backfires when Maeve accepts Jackson’s advances.?

Drama is formed from conflict and it is articulated around decision-making. This is another reason that it is so useful for workplace communications. Our duty at work is to make continual decisions as an agent of the organisation. But we are not machines and our emotions are continually challenged by the demands of duty. Drama is one of the most powerful aides for facilitating productive conversation about the emotional elements of work.

What TV show have you enjoyed that pertained to your workplace experience?