Taking Everyone Along in your EDI Approach

By Sara Bell

If you work in or are interested in Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI), you’ll see the value in EDI initiatives that create a more equitable and fair workplace. Unfortunately, as advances are made by some, often backlash erodes the gains for all. I would argue therefore that it’s essential to find, establish and maintain an approach to EDI that takes everyone along, rather than creating dividing lines or feelings of anyone being side-lined.

Specifically, I consider the interconnected nature of multiple, overlapping identities or intersectionality as the key concept driving why it’s now more important than ever to take everyone along. Intersectionality means some people are more likely to experience unique and greater forms of exclusion, discrimination and marginalisation. This term was created because of a legal case which examined how a group of workers who were made redundant ended up worse off, not because they were women and not because they were Black, but because they were Black women. So Diversity initiatives that focus on gender or ethnicity alone are unlikely to create a culture of Inclusion for everyone.

I would like to share some strategies for establishing and maintaining an EDI approach that benefits all employees, avoids dividing lines and feelings of being side-lined, and takes everyone along on the journey.

1. Avoiding Dividing Lines
Diagnose the status of your diverse representation using data to ensure you are talking about the real situation in your organisation. By understanding where there are gaps in representation (e.g., the hiring of disabled employees in mid-level sales, promotion of Black women to senior manager positions in technology, retention and engagement of LGBTQIA+ staff in line management positions in finance), you can be specific and factual about where interventions are needed. Focusing on one aspect only will most likely disenfranchise other employees.

Client Example
I recently worked with a tech organisation that had a hiring target for women in engineering. Many of the line managers were disillusioned with EDI and what felt to them like an equation for EDI with a focus on just hiring women. When we looked at the detailed data, women were clustered in one department and there was a lack of Black men as well as women in line management and leadership. I facilitated a data-led workshop with the extended leadership team, for them to determine the targets for hiring as well as retention. The main focus was a detailed heat-map showing the demographics in each team. By looking at more aspects of Diversity and setting more specific targets for areas of the business, the leaders engaged with the process in a way they would any other business issue. The inclusive workshop process helped to include white male hiring managers in the conversation and they started to look beyond the different aspects of Diversity in hiring, and focused on inclusion of all in the engagement and retention of their people. The data and process engaged and included them and removed the binary male or female hiring focus which had caused a backlash.

2. Include those who are feeling side-lined
Oftentimes white educated men in organisations feel excluded from Equity, Diversity and Inclusion efforts, yet they hold significant influence over the culture and practices in organisations. We have spoken about true allyship and the role of all leaders in creating Inclusion. Along with a focus on diverse representation and inclusive culture, your EDI approach will be more impactful if you are deliberately including the white majority in your organisation (read here about the Global Majority). Reframing narratives and identities can be unsettling, so why would you not support those you are asking to share power, identity and established ways of working? Support those in positions of privilege to do the work to create Inclusion for everyone. Some examples of ways to do this include coaching and training of senior leadership teams as well as facilitated reverse mentoring programmes for leaders to understand the lived experience of others in their company.

3. Take everyone along on the EDI journey
Genuinely taking everyone along recognises that every person and organisation is at a very different starting point. So the action for the EDI approach is to think about how agile, empowered, viral changes can be part of meeting everyone where they are, and encouraging everyone to move in the same direction of Inclusion. In addition to top-down approaches, bring your employee body onboard and empower employees and supervisors to amplify their voice and experience. One way to do this is to create safe or brave spaces for employees to engage in real discussion, for example in employee forums or network groups. Facilitating experience sharing and telling these stories more broadly in the organisation can help others to understand the impact of their language and behaviour on colleagues with different lived experiences, and they will want to act differently rather than being told to.

We have been speaking this year about the EDI journey, how there are phases to maturity that organisations go through to benefit fully from the creative genius of each and every employee. It requires concerted effort from everyone in the organisation to get there. Wherever you are on that journey, I am sure your EDI strategy can take everyone along. You can progress by ensuring you are using data and listening to everyone’s voices where everyone is taking action each day for a more inclusive culture. You know this creates a more positive and productive workplace that benefits all employees, and helps to promote greater equity and fairness in the broader community beyond your business. Taking everyone along is not just the right thing to do, it is also the safest way to ensure that EDI strategies are implemented successfully.

How has your organisation managed to bring everyone along?

Discouraging Bias, Encouraging Inclusion

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

In my first blog of this month, I spoke about starting to build a foundation for a company-wide culture that reaps the benefits of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI).  I also posited that, once you get to this coveted stage of the journey, you won’t need to invest as much in EDI resources as previously, because EDI at this stage is becoming a part of everyday business.

There are, however, a couple of EDI interventions that need to be continued on a long-term basis.  Luckily, they are not cost-intensive and, with time, become part of the usual checks and balances included in the running of organisations.

Bias Monitors
We know that being human also means being biased.  Acknowledging this is the first step to making more meritocratic decisions, free of (or at least less burdened with) bias.  The obvious challenge with bias is of course that most of it is unconscious.   So, subconsciously, we assume an idea is not worth listening to or that someone is less capable, even though we have no evidence to support this. Without thinking, we ask the usual suspects to serve coffee at a meeting or take notes. We make jokes or share sweeping generalisations about entire cultures without realising the impact on others.

A Bias Monitor can help us keep bias at bay.  A bias monitor is a volunteer (or someone who is asked to be one) who takes the role – usually in meetings – of drawing attention to bias, as and when it arises.  When the bias monitor sees or hears an assumption or rash judgment or a statement that conveys a hidden bias, they draw attention to it by simply stating what they see.  In this way, everyone becomes more aware of biases, and the team can work together in  addressing them.  Having a dedicated bias monitor also takes the pressure off those who tend to experience bias – usually members of an underrepresented group at work – and makes it easier for everyone to take the comments more seriously, seeing them in a neutral, well-intentioned light.

Appreciation Monitors
Just as we want to minimise biased behaviour in the workplace, we also want to encourage inclusive behaviour.  Statements such as ‘Please challenge my viewpoint’, ‘What do others think?’ or ‘Isn’t this what you were trying to say before as well, Joanne?’ are all examples of behaviours that aim to include others’ views and perspectives.  These types of behaviours may go unnoticed, so it is helpful to have an Appreciation Monitor who looks out for them and points them out, so that others might copy them.  In a similar way to the Bias Monitor, the Appreciation Monitor keeps their eyes and ears open for inclusive behaviours and draws attention to them as and when they appear.

Continuing to remind ourselves of what bias looks like and what inclusion feels like reinforces a culture that’s mindful of EDI long after we have stopped thinking about it.  Monitors ensure that EDI doesn’t dissipate and that organisations that have invested time and resources into creating a strong EDI foundation maintain the value and rewards of their investments.  After all, we are all human, and sliding back to familiar territory can be easier than we think.

Setting Diversity Targets: The Good, the Bad and the Impactful

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

Targets are controversial.  Those in favour of them often say what gets measured gets done, while others might say that setting targets skirts the issue of creating greater diversity and inclusion by focusing on the numbers rather than inclusive leadership, inclusive behaviours and genuinely impactful initiatives.

We agree with all of the above.

Confused? Let me explain.

We think that setting targets can be tremendously helpful if we use them as a measure of our progress to become more inclusive.  In other words, when targets are linked to an impactful initiative, they provide a useful measure by which we can gauge the success of our EDI efforts. But we also know that there is little or no value in setting targets without attaching them to a purposeful set of actions designed to improve Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion.

How to set impactful Diversity targets
Read on for some suggestions for setting sensible, realistic targets that measure how inclusive your organisation is becoming. These are targets set on a big Diversity dimension, such as female graduate candidates or the percentage of women at leadership level.  They are the targets that you would encounter most often in company’s press releases about their commitment to Diversity and Inclusion.

To set these targets in a meaningful way requires some due diligence, which might begin with the two questions below. What is required then is identifying which specific initiatives to put in place, with appropriate and achievable targets.

1. Which is the most underrepresented group in your company?

This might be women if you are in a STEM environment.  It might, however, be ethnicity if you are in the Third or Public Sectors.

Identifying the biggest underrepresented group in your organisation can also be a useful exercise in understanding your target market. How different are your clients, customers, or users from your employee population? Where is this gap the biggest?

Alternatively, if you are looking at growing your market share, you may wish to look beyond the representation of your current customers to those you wish to attract. What is the biggest gap between the representation of the additional market opportunity and your employee population?

2. Where in your career ladder is the underrepresented group missing or dropping off?

Once you’ve identified which underrepresented group you wish to attract or retain, it’s time to identify where the biggest hole is for this group in your employee life cycle.  Is it in attracting candidates from this group?  Perhaps it’s in the actual hiring process?  Or are you managing quite well in hiring people from the underrepresented group, but failing to keep them over a certain period of time? Or is your company unable to progress them beyond a certain level?

Finding the process that creates the biggest obstacle to building the desired level of representation will help you identify the right measures to turn things around.

3. Employ impactful measures to address the challenge. 

As stated above, targets are most impactful when they measure the success of a specific initiative.  So, having identified the specific challenge you face, it is time to develop an initiative that addresses it.  Here are two examples of companies who generated their own ideas and solutions to their individual challenges:

One client, having identified that they were unsuccessful at attracting female engineering graduates to their company, started partnering with women’s engineering networks at several learning institutions.  They started sending female representatives to university fairs and sending ambassadors to talk about their company’s efforts to improve the representation of female graduates, clearly stating their reasons for doing so.  It worked.

Another client, having recognised that women were not being promoted beyond a certain level of seniority, introduced a sponsorship programme which pairs many of its senior leaders with emerging female leaders to ensure they get the visibility and opportunities that might typically be reserved (inadvertently) for male colleagues. This has also been highly effective.

4. Identify the right target.

Once the specific measure is instituted, care must be taken to set realistic expectations for the impact the measure will have. By what percentage does the company expect the targeted underrepresented group to grow in the identified area? (This will depend on the usual percentage of the target group in the identified area, as well as the impact of external market forces.) What is the usual percentage of female graduates in your pool? What is the sector average for this measure? What is the lowest and the highest percentage of this range?

Having taken the answers to all these questions into account, it becomes easier to set a more realistic target to measure the success of the relevant initiative. Even then, targets may need to be periodically revisited – based on their success or failure – and adjusted accordingly.

When it comes to setting big targets, doing a bit of thinking and planning in advance will always yield more meaningful results.

There are, of course, other types of targets to consider, including so called ‘no more than’ targets for specific teams where, instead of identifying a target percentage for a specific type of person (for instance, women), the emphasis shifts to having no more than a certain percentage of a specific type of person (for instance, men).

Finally, you will also want to consider how widely to set the targets. Is one common target appropriate for the entire company globally, region by region, office by office or even department by department? We know that, although average figures might make certain targets look favourable, when looking more closely, Diversity might not have really been achieved in areas where it would be more difficult (e.g., technical vs administrative, front office vs back office).

Whatever you decide to do about targets, following Nancy Kline’s advice (included above as our quote for the week) will ensure successful implementation.

How To Make Sure You’re Heard At Work

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

Being Heard in a Challenging Exchange
In an Harvard Business Review paper entitled How To Make Sure You’re Heard In a Difficult Conversation, Amy Gallo suggests we focus on what matters to us and express things that way.

It’s easy to point fingers and lay blame at others’ feet.  The trouble is, no-one likes to be at the receiving end of criticism, so if they think that you’re criticising them, they won’t be in listening mode.  If you can, however, voice what niggles you about the situation, people will be much more inclined to hear and even take responsibility for their action.  So, instead of saying ‘Since I’ve been here, you’ve promoted only white men’ try saying ‘I feel like I’m being passed up for promotion for my colleagues who appear to be doing exactly the same as I do’.

As part of any difficult exchange, it’s important to maintain one’s composure and focus on getting to a constructive solution.  So, once you’ve identified what you want out of the situation, think about what words will take you off-track and what kind of communication will convey the opposite of what you want to achieve.  Is your body language betraying your true feelings about what you hear and hence steering you off course?  Is the pitch of your voice giving away heightened emotions that would not be conducive to the desired outcome?

Keeping your eye on the prize makes it easier to ensure you use the right words and gestures.  Using phrases that gently swipe away any derailing attempts will make it easier to stay on course.  Gallo suggests using phrases like these to avoid escalation:

  • “You may be right, but I’d like to understand more.”
  • “I have a completely different perspective, but clearly you think this is unfair, so how can we fix this?”
  • “I’m not sure how this connects to what we’ve been talking about. Can you help me make the connection?”
  • “I’d like to give my reaction to what you’ve said so far, and see what you think.”
  • “This may be more my perception than yours, but when you said ‘X,’ I felt . . .”
  • “Is there anything I can say or do that might convince you to consider other options here?”

Being Heard in a Meeting
One thing we often do, when it’s our time to present ideas or provide an update, is talk too quickly. We sometimes feel the need to fill every space we get with words. Yet, if you take a look around and observe how people with influence speak, you will probably notice that they speak slowly. And clearly. They pause a lot, giving their audience a chance to catch up with their words.

Speaking without haste doesn’t just give people the chance to properly understand what you’re saying, it also gives the speaker an air of confidence and gravitas. It makes the content of what is being said more persuasive.

We also tend to speed up when we’re nervous, so if we intentionally slow ourselves down, we will come across more confidently – and that will impact how what we say is heard.

Another thing we tend to do, particularly when slightly nervous, is to either use no physical gestures or exaggerate them. Gestures are important as they emphasize our points for us quite neatly – but only if they’re consistent with what we’re saying. They’re particularly useful when we finish one point and go onto another, if we transition through a ‘neutral’ state when our body is quite still and at ease, before moving on to the next point that might introduce more gestures.

Finally, it’s helpful to give the listeners a structure, so they know exactly where they are at all times.

  • Start by introducing the topic. (I’m going to talk you through our launch of an internal comms campaign to introduce our new values.)
  • Tell them what you’ll be discussing. (I’ll be covering 3 different ways in which we plan to do this: First, …)
  • When you’ve finished the first point, take a short pause, then conclude before moving to the next point.  (So this is point 1. The second way is….).
  • Once you’ve covered everything you wanted to say, summarise. (So, to summarise, we will be launching in 3 ways, 1…2… and 3…).
  • Now signal that you’ve finished and open it up to whatever should come next. (I’m happy to take any questions, comments or observations.)

In short, bearing in mind how what we’re saying is being heard will vastly improve our chance of being listened to.

Inclusive Progression: How Empathy Can Help

By Inge Woudstra

Who makes up the senior team in your organisation?

Many organisations have noticed that the homogeneity of their people becomes particularly stark in more senior roles. The existence of a Gender Pay Gap across many sectors in the UK is a clear example of this lack of diversity.

When working with our clients on addressing this situation, we come across the common perception that they are working within a truly meritocratic system: You do your job well, receive a positive performance evaluation and then you are asked to take on a more senior role or larger project.

Yet in focus groups, another picture emerges. Some people recognise the process as described. Many, however, tell us that progression seems completely subjective. They tell us that, in order to progress in their organisation, it’s important to be visible, know the right people and be the ‘right sort of person’. Not only do these factors tend to be more decisive than performance, they also skew perception of what good performance entails.

So how can we solve this and ensure that it’s not just the dominant group – the group that tends to be better connected and informed – that is the beneficiary of this ‘meritocracy’?

How do we make the system more equitable by giving everyone a fairer chance of advancement?

How Empathy can help make progression more equitable

Let’s apply the first of our 8 Inclusive Behaviours℠ – Empathy – to help with the answer.

To do this, we must put ourselves in the shoes of those who find it harder to be visible, bond with the ‘right’ people or be ‘the right sort of person’.  We must ask ourselves: what can we do to make it easier for them to progress without the need to be ‘part of the club’?

Here are 5 ideas that have worked for a number of our clients:

  1. Make the progression process more transparent.

Many employees report that they don’t know exactly what it takes to progress in their organisation and that the process is opaque at best! Empathetic managers will realise that this can be discouraging and daunting for team members who would like to progress but don’t know how. In this case, we recommended companies set out clearly what experience, skills and capabilities are required to progress. One example of this would be to design career progression maps that show various pathways to more senior roles. Another example is to list the requisite capabilities, skills and experiences required for the various levels of seniority.  In this way, every employee knows what experience and skills they need to amass and demonstrate in order to progress.

  1. Find ways to allocate work more equitably.

This is especially important for projects that offer greater visibility or vital experience. For instance, consider ways that high profile projects can be rotated so everyone has a chance to work on them. The aim is to encourage everyone to step up, whilst understanding that not everyone is comfortable putting themselves forward. When that happens, the more coveted projects are no longer only available to those who have asked for them.

  1. Publish job roles widely.

When job roles are visible to all, the chance to apply is there for everyone. It becomes less important if someone is tipped off about a job opening and gives equal opportunity to those who don’t know ‘the right people’.

  1. Formalise (parts of) the progression process.

When the process is more formal, it’s less subjective, meaning that the contribution of those who are less visible will be more easily seen. For instance, consider publishing clear performance criteria that are measured objectively and communicated widely. Ideally use ways to assess skills that do not rely on interviews alone. For example, use role plays with real life scenarios or ask the candidate to do a particular task that is required for the role, such as a client presentation, working out a financial business case or designing an image for a computer game. Another example of formalising the progression process would be to set up a formal sponsorship system where senior leaders get actively involved in the progression of a minority staff member.

  1. Reduce the risk of failing in the next role.

People from underrepresented groups might be particularly reluctant to take a chance on a more senior role in case they don’t succeed in it. Organisations that are empathetic to this found that it helps to reduce the risk of a new step. One such company, for example, offers shadowing opportunities ahead of progression. Another offers a six-month trial period in a new role, after which the person can choose to return to their previous role and salary.

Empathy Training and Coaching

We recommend that you accompany these process changes with training for managers. Process changes are susceptible to sabotage if there isn’t a genuine understanding of the reasons for the change, and empathy for those that will benefit from it, but this can all be addressed with training. Once the premise is accepted and the changes adhered to, they help reinforce more empathetic, inclusive behaviour by managers and colleagues.

If you think your organisation’s progression process is not as inclusive as it should be, why not schedule a 30 minute call to talk to Inge about it?

Our TABLE Has Five Legs

We’re living in exceptional times. Our world was already changing at a pace that was difficult to maintain, but since the onset of Covid19, traditional thinking and working has been uprooted and deposited as a new challenge. But this also presents us with an opportunity: an opportunity to test our resolve, our systems and processes. It is also a chance to discard convention that is inconsistent with the future direction of society’s travel and calibrate organisational culture with purpose.

Our new destination is to make companies more agile, reactive to societal changes, with a beacon of leadership that proposes a more inclusive future for all stakeholders.

I’m talking about evolving our organisations into TABLE organisations, reshaping relationships with customers, staff and other stakeholders.

A TABLE is one that exhibits the following characteristics: T – THINKING with reflection A – ACTING with purpose B – BEHAVING inclusively L – LOOKING diverse E – EXPRESSING EMOTION

T=Thinking With Reflection

A TABLE organisation is one that allows time for thinking and reflection. It has a culture that welcomes a coaching-style approach to leadership and encourages everyone involved to take individual responsibility for their actions. At the same time, it is led with the benefit of experience and reflection, as well as an appetite for thinking and learning. The Black Lives Matter movement, for instance, has given us an excellent opportunity to pause, reflect and institute impactful changes that address the persisting challenges around racism.

A=Acting with Purpose

In the words of Simon Sinek, a TABLE organisation starts with “why”. The “why” is the purpose.

A purpose that is specific to the particular organisation can act as a litmus test for all organisational activity, constantly asking the question: is this consistent with our purpose or are we straying away from it?

During lockdown, the overriding purpose of most companies has been to ensure both staff and customers are coping well, are connected to each other and are safe. With such a narrow focus and purpose, many leaders were surprised at how quickly they could set up channels of communication, how much empathy colleagues and bosses displayed, how dedicated and motivated everyone was and, in the end, how well everyone coped.

An organisation that unites behind a clear and stated purpose is better equipped to motivate and pull in the same direction. And that became crystal clear during the lockdown.

B=Behaving Inclusively

Most of us think of ourselves as being inclusive. And for the most part we are, so long as it doesn’t require much effort.  We encourage and support, we extend rules and policies and we welcome a few token individuals that make our circle more diverse.

But rarely are these efforts enough.

When I talk about “behaving inclusively”, I mean going the extra mile to understand what we don’t know or see and then another mile to develop new habits that allow us to better understand and cater to people from vastly different backgrounds.

L= Looking Diverse

Diversity is the reward for inclusion. An inclusive culture is able to attract, retain and promote a diverse population.

Diversity increases the level of creativity and innovation, begets new ideas and offers previously unnoticed experiences and opinions. It is the gateway to a more complete set of data.

The more diverse and inclusive an organisation, the more information it has to utilise for the fulfilment of its purpose. Lack of diversity at the top therefore, limits what we can achieve.

E= Expressing Emotion

An organisation that is in touch with its feelings, that is unafraid of expressing decisions and motivations in terms of emotions will be better equipped to attract the talent of tomorrow. Emotional and psychological safety is a large part of today’s and tomorrow’s well-oiled, well-functioning organisation. Creating and demonstrating safe space conversations that allow colleagues to express how they feel are valuable tools for leaders who want to attract bright talent. An organisation that speaks from the heart and the mind will be better equipped to deliver on its purpose for more of its stakeholders.

Does your organisation have 5 legs?

To find out which of the 5 legs of your TABLE organisation are more stable and which require more support, get in touch with me.

Meanwhile, in the rest of the world… Let’s Steer a Course Towards Accelerating Gender Parity

You’ve seen these figures before: 100 years to close the overall gender gap, 257 to close the economic gender gap. It’s beyond our lifetime and too long to wait. What can be done to accelerate the closing of these gaps – or rather, chasms – by us, our companies and our governments?

Many countries, including the UK, are well placed to reap the benefits of their investment in female education and harness the gender balance opportunities made possible by the changing nature of work. So far, they – and we – have failed to do so.

But if the pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that we can do things differently! We can work from home without disrupting the flow of business, we can reverse the signs of environmental damage to our planet, we can slow down, look up and ‘smell the roses’ once in a while. And, yes, we can accelerate the closing of these unspeakable gaps.

The World Economic Forum (WEF) has already launched a programme with a number of countries to do just that. Suitably named the Closing the Gender Gap Accelerator, the programme is designed to pull together global and national public and private action that narrows these gaps. To date, the WEF has managed to secure commitment from nine governments around the world to join the Accelerator programme (its goal is 15 by the end of this year). Only one of the nine is a G20 country – and it is not the UK.

My point is that the tools and solutions to help accelerate the closing of these gaps are available to us, but for some reason, we are not taking the necessary steps to implement them – either on a national or more local front.

One of my worries is that the lessons we have and are continuing to learn from the pandemic will not be captured by our society. I worry that we will all return to work and life in the same way we did before Covid-19. This would be a lost opportunity; to reset our values, our priorities and our trajectories and to look at our lives from a different perspective and to realise that they could be different.

In April, I wrote about the fact that the new way in which we have started to interact with each other as a result of having to work and live from/at home has made us more empathetic, more accepting and more kind. We have reverted to what it means to be human and have injected that humanity into our work. We have become more tolerant of the daily disruptions in our work from children and pets; our “offices” show glimpses of who we are as people; we’re reconnecting with nature and with ourselves – our emotions and philosophies – as much as with distant friends and family. In other words, we’re bringing more of ourselves to work and are accepting of who that is, of us as well as our colleagues. Our managers are learning to lead with humour and be more comfortable with being less serious all the time. We care about the emotional and physical state of our colleagues and bend over backwards to help them cope.

I classify all this as inclusive behaviours. And, while we may feel that it’s not within our powers (query as to whether this is true) to persuade our CEOs and MPs to join the WEF’s commitment to accelerate the closing of gender parity gaps, what we most certainly can do is preserve how we interact with and treat each other when we go back to our desks in the office, and continue to nurture those inclusive behaviours that we have started to develop.

Inclusion leads to greater appreciation of diversity which makes programmes like the WEF’s Closing the Gender Parity Accelerators feasible and impactful.

 

Learn more about the WEF Accelerator programme and how your company can get involved.

Watch a short WEF video on the gender parity gap.

How do men benefit from women at work?

parisI recently had a conversation with a male colleague whose wife gave up her very lucrative professional job to look after their children and, when she decided to return to the work force, she went to work in an environment in which she could never match her previous earning potential or career aspirations.  Digging a bit deeper, my colleague explained that, when they first got married, his wife was an up-and-coming professional, working for a prestigious financial institution, with aspirations for her own career progression and growth.  Then, when she fell pregnant with their first child, she felt ostracised and actively (albeit inconspicuously) squeezed out of her team and her job.  This evidenced itself by assuming she had neither interest nor energy to work on high-profile projects, regarding her as not pulling her weight in the team, and changing behaviour towards her to such an extent that she no longer felt welcome in the team and the organisation.  No-one in the company stood up for her and other than to confront the situation through formal means, the only sensible solution to her was to leave the work force.  The wife’s confidence was shattered to such an extent that when she decided to resume her career, a career in the financial sector – or any other corporate environment – was no longer an attractive proposition.

My colleague told me this story when I shared with him what I had heard about another young colleague in our company who was expecting her first child and facing unprecedented difficulties and challenges from her previously supportive line manager.   My colleague was dismayed by this behaviour and stated that, not only is this appalling behaviour towards the women in question, it is detrimental to the company, and most of all, detrimental to marriages.  My colleague wanted very much to share the financial burden of having a family in London with his once equally capable wife, but has wound up in a situation where he is the sole bread winner, fearing to compromise his job, given financial family burdens.  The colleague felt resentful towards his wife’s old manager who pulled the rug from under her feet and the company that let it happen.  The colleague was now in a position where he could no longer pursue his passions, share in the upbringing of their children, or – being the main breadwinner of the family – hope for any kind of work-life balance.

This story opened my eyes to the exponential impact that corporate treatment of women might have on society.  I realised that it’s not only women who might aspire to a reasonable work-life balance; more and more men recognise the value of sharing a home life with their spouse a more fulfilling proposition than dedicating their entire existence to the corporate beast.  The generation behind me is certainly looking for this kind of balance, as other male colleagues have and continue to demonstrate.  Yet corporate culture doesn’t recognise the fact that the kind of things that women are traditionally known to fight for – flexible yet meaningful work so that they can attend to more than just one priority – are also secret aspirations of today’s professional males. Unfortunately, as things stand, it wouldn’t do for a professional man to admit this to his line manager or even another male colleague as he would instantly be deemed uncommitted to his career and company.  But I have no doubt that these conversations do take place among friends and families.

I therefore strongly believe that all the changes that we, professional women, are fighting for in the corporate world, will eventually benefit not only our own gender but also our male friends and colleagues.  And the sooner the old-fashioned corporate thinking changes, the sooner will companies be able to start building a work place and work force that is equipped for the future.