Lean In Belong: Connecting women at work
Since launching in 2014, ‘Lean In Circles’ have become a place for ambitious women to connect, creating an open environment to voice their dreams, learn new skills and to help like-minded women become the best versions of themselves.
Irrespective of their background, career or goal, women are encouraged to take part and join a ‘Lean In Circle’, typically consisting of eight to 12 women (or less). These groups meet up on a monthly basis to encourage each other and to collaboratively work towards their goals.
The women of Belong hosted their second ‘Lean in Circles’ event in November, with discussion centered around Sheryl Sandberg’s book, ‘Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead’. The book explores the challenge of balancing work and family life, and the activities on the day were reflecting this, with plans to educate, inspire and empower women to become leaders.
Natalie’s leading knowledge
Belong’s Digital and Technology Lead, Natalie Field, was inspired to create an environment for women to bring each other up. It’s a space where women are urged to come forward and share their achievements and not feel the need to undermine their success. With the hope that maybe one day, our male counterparts will join us.
But for now, we can’t avoid and disregard the biases and stereotypes effecting women in workplaces. Sometimes, it’s the little things that just happen to women, as Natalie mentioned.
A fresh start for Sally
Natalie introduced our next speaker, Sally Bateman, a relatively new employee at Belong. Despite being just she’s two months into her journey with Belong, she feels very settled, and comfortable. Her leadership voyage began in accounting, with several stops along the way.
In these roles, Sally found that her values aligned with the company’s, with the heartbeat of team’s culture from peer to leader, she eventually found herself as Finance Director of Nike. As she travelled a lot for work, her husband stayed at home with the kids. After eighteen years of leadership roles at Nike, Sally searched for her next challenge, while dedicating her leadership to her family.
Getting acquainted
As we sat and snacked, we delved into thought provoking activities led by User-Experience Designer, Berlin Liew. We merged into groups amid the women of Belong cohort to discuss our leadership stories.
My group went a little bit rogue and found ourselves discussing admirable traits of leaders. We also acknowledged ways in which leaders have disappointed us and displayed power, rather than guidance. We also recognised the different types of leaders, especially for women, as we’d like to see ourselves as comrades to support more women in management roles.
As we conversed in our private circles, we didn’t know, but moments later another journey that was flagged ironically mirrored our views, expectations, and experiences. The circle opened up for everyone to share their thoughts and interpretations of the activity, this is where Product Owner for the Entice Project, Julie Christakis briefly shed on some light on her experience.
Julie shared her conflict as a young manager, leading a team that had been working there since she was in nappies. After being intimidated and threatened by a work-place bully, Julie put her career on the line for the justice and well-being of her team mates. Unconsciously embodying the philosophy of a servant leader, teaching her what values she aligns with as a forerunner.
Bias in the workplace
The next activity was about uncovering bias in the workplace, Part of Lean In’s ’50 Ways to Fight Bias’ — a seven part video series. The videos are very short but are powerful and extremely effective. Seeing these everyday biases was a genuine shock to the system. I, myself feel that I’ve been a product of these biases, sometimes to my benefit and others to my disadvantage.
We discussed the subtle ways that gender bias can be seen, including through the advantage points of likability, unconscious prejudice or performances. However, more visible biases such as affinity or maternal put women in a more difficult position to fight the biases against them.
The videos are a great source of education for breaking down the barriers of unrecognised bias. Although the statistics in the videos are heavily U.S skewed, the messages were quite confronting and resonated with me, and the other women in the room.
My ‘Lean In’ experience
Once things wrapped up, we began to open up about our own experiences. Without even realising, we uncovered the truth in many past situations, based primarily around bias and discrimination. It was a relief to be able to relay this internalized conflict that I’d experienced without feeling judged.
Other women opened up for the first time about their injustices in the workplace, something that is never easy to hear. We explored ways to support one another, suggest conflict resolution methods, deeply listen, and give equal opportunity to talk amongst ourselves. Having kept previous uncomfortable experiences to myself, almost like little secrets, it felt like a weight had been lifted off my chest as my circle embraced me.
The ‘Lean In Circle’ became a space that I didn’t want to leave. A space to be able to share your uncomfortable experiences and not hear any justification towards other’s behavior. A space to also share your success without feeling that you have to belittle your achievements based on others.
It is a space I want every woman to feel in her workplace.
