This week I am presenting at a wonderful conference- Linkage Women in Leadership. This event is held in San Francisco each year. It is a high energy event for women in all stages of career development. The event draws very powerful keynote speakers and excellent breakout presenters. Many many years ago I came to this conference to learn about the advancement of women . The … [Read more...]
Getting Beyond Unconscious Bias
We are all guilty of bias. It is part of being human. One of the issues facing women in business is continued stereotyping , unconscious bias and the unintended consequences that result. This is one of the most difficult issues organizations face when they are working on culture shifts that must take place if women are to participate on an even playing field. The most … [Read more...]
What You Dont Know Can Hurt You
Many times when working with organizations on strategies to increase gender diversity in the leadership ranks the leaders will say " lets just get all the women together and ask them what they want". While this is noble and certainly talking with the women in the organization to understand how they experience the culture is critical it is not "the answer" . One of the most … [Read more...]
The Business Case for Building a Flexible Work Culture- Part III
In the Part I and II of this series we talked about the opportunity to support our need for flexible work cultures with a solid business case. We outlined the fact that the majority of our employees require flexibility at some point in their careers. Research increasingly points to flexibility as one of the most important career considerations of staff, emerging leaders and … [Read more...]
The Business Case for Building Flexible Work Cultures- Series Part II
In the Part I of this series we talked about the opportunity to support our need for flexible work cultures with a solid business case. We outlined the fact that the majority of our employees require flexibility at some point in their careers. Research increasingly points to flexibility as one of the most important career considerations of staff, emerging leaders and even our … [Read more...]
The Business Case for Building a Flexible Work Culture- Series Part I
Why do organizations offer flexibility? Business - Business- Business. Successful accomplishment of business strategy is the primary reason for building a flexible work culture. The majority of our employees require flexibility at some point in their careers. Research increasingly points to flexibility as one of the most important career considerations of staff, emerging … [Read more...]
The Aspirations of Women
"Women simply do not have the aspiration to pursue C Suite roles which is why we do not see equal numbers of men and women in leadership positions." I have had this conversation more times then I wish to remember when working with organizations on increasing gender diversity in the leadership ranks. The aspirations of women can be a very perplexing yet popular topic of … [Read more...]
The Most Talked About Barrier- Work/Life Balance
This is the fourth post in a series about the barriers impacting the lack of advancement of women in business. We have discussed the background regarding women's lack of advancement and also covered the first two barriers- Lack of Career Advocacy and Lack of Visible Role Models. This final post in the series is about the most talked about barrier regarding women's lack of … [Read more...]
Visibility of Female Leaders
In the past two posts we have been talking about why we do not see more progress in the advancement of women in business , community and politics. In the first post we covered an overview of what is happening to slow down our progress. Much of what happens is subtle and not well understood. (Post May 24) In the second post we talked about the first barrier in more detail- … [Read more...]
Advancement of Women – the Barriers
Last weeks post introduced the barriers to the advancement of women. This week we concentrate on the lack of access to career development and advocacy. This issue is not very well understood in many organizations. It is however one of the most important if we care about diversity in our leadership ranks and advancement of all top talent. The issue of advocacy is often subtle … [Read more...]