Raising Daughters
Last week to celebrate International Women’s Day a number of panels were organised during the day at work discussing various topics on the subject of women in society and the workplace. Clearly being a ‘digital doll’ (😉) I was asked to be on the one discussing how we can get more women into tech. Naturally it ebbed and flowed and I’m delighted that our panel comprised of two women and a man so we had some diversity. We are fortunate to have some amazing role models in the diversity and inclusion space at the John Lewis Partnership who encourage, inspire and challenge us as leaders to grow in this space. There were also a few men in the audience too which was a very welcome sight. However in order to navigate our way to why there are less women in tech we all started sharing our stories about raising daughters.
So I thought I’d share my anecdotal reflections on this subject. One of them was that despite raising two daughters and a son in what I feel and see as a very equal household in terms of work, division of labour, social & sport participation etc… on discussing a new marketing director at work my 15 year old daughter said ‘what’s he like Mum?’ to which I replied ‘he is a SHE!’
It made me think about Sheryl Sandberg’s belief in her book ‘Lean in’ that from a very early age we raise boys to be leaders and girls not to — outrageous, I hear you say, what evidence do we have etc…? I think it is probably unconscious and is a nurture rather than nature piece driven by what they see, how they play, their toys and the diversity or not of role models around them. The school gates, let’s be honest, are still dominated by females albeit this has significantly moved on since I first stood there 18 years ago! I am also guilty too, embarrassingly finding myself recently asking a friend, who had been to see her GP, what did HE say? (Why did I do that???!!!). I was then both delighted, but also depressed, to see my 15 year old standing up to the catering team at an away hockey match recently when they said the match tea of ‘sausage beans & chips’ was for the boys playing football and there were flapjacks for the girls playing hockey! If our education establishments in 2018 can discriminate so bluntly what hope do we have to raise our girls to believe that they have equal access to all the possibilities in life and in all that they can achieve.
Back to the panel and a final reflection on the side of gender equality that doesn’t always get as much coverage. A member of the audience shared a story about a male friend who was taking two weeks paternity leave on the birth of his new baby. When asked why he wasn’t taking a longer time i.e 3 months he replied that he felt it would impact his career prospects and wouldn’t be looked on as progressive. How depressing that, having spent decades breaking down the barriers and overturning discrimination to make it easier for working Mum’s to have a work life balance, we could spend the next few decades discriminating against men who want to do the same. What we really need are some senior male role models for this subject to gain momentum and encouragement for this to be as big an area of development for men as it is for women. Perhaps some male CEOs who will lead by example and take the full paternity leave thereby leading the way for this to be the norm. We need progress in this area to avoid us sitting on a panel in 20 years time celebrating ‘International Men’s Day’ and of course to provide the all important role models that our kids can be raised around — Go the Dads!!
