EMPOWERING WOMEN OR JUST TALKING ABOUT IT?

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Gender disparity in the workplace is a widely recognized issue. Women have fought for their right to be present in the workplace and heard in many industries across the centuries. In many countries, women weren’t allowed to work until relatively recently, and in some countries, they are still denied access to jobs. Even as recently as the early 20 th  century in the US, only around 20% of women worked outside the home, and that dropped to around 5% after marriage. Figures have improved in recent years, with around 47% of all US employees being female in 2024, and 45% of all Chinese employees being female in 2023.

That’s obviously excellent news for the empowerment and equality of women. However, such dramatic change in such a short space of time has inevitably led to problems with workplace inequality. Pay gaps are a common issue, with women in the UK being paid 13% less than men for the same jobs when they work full-time. Hiring discrimination, especially for high-ranking positions, is another major problem.

These issues are underpinned and increased by problems like lack of respect and acceptance in the workplace, unfair expectations, and lack of development opportunities. Many people have noted that women are more likely to be asked to perform tasks such as note-taking, supply-ordering, setting up meetings, or making hot drinks than men, even if their job duties are totally unrelated. These place an undue burden on women and reduce female equality.

So, what can be done to improve our workplace gender equality in the 21st century? Well, as Emma Watson said, gender equality is your issue too. Creating better gender equality helps men, women, and gender-non-conforming people in a myriad of ways, making our workplaces stronger and more diverse environments. Inequality in the workplace serves no one. With that in mind, let’s look at ways that workplaces can increase women’s empowerment in the 21st century.

Create a committee on women’s rights and gender equality

Creating a committee that is solely focused on gender equality issues is an excellent starting point for organizations. This committee can be tasked with identifying gender issues in the workplace and dealing with problems that are raised. They can focus on eliminating both large problems and seemingly small ones that contribute to gender inequality in subtle ways.

Committees are a tried-and-tested method for improving workplaces, and they are valuable because they remove hierarchies and directly engage workers in a collaborative space. They also help to increase the focus on problem-solving. However, to be successful, make sure your committee is not exclusively made up of women – that’s a recipe for increasing women’s inequality in the workplace!

Having women staff the whole committee may sound good on the surface, but it invites many problems. First, it requires women to do the brunt of the problem-solving work, placing an unfair burden on them. Second, it increases divisions between genders and can leave people who don’t identify as female feeling alienated. Third, it creates the perception that only women benefit from gender equality efforts. It also risks alienating non-conforming individuals or outing transgender individuals.

For this reason, the committee should be made up of as many diverse members as possible in terms of gender, race, hierarchical position, and more. Gender equality efforts are more successful when everyone has a voice!

Reduce hiring biases

Hiring is one of the areas where women particularly suffer from biases. Although now a little outdated, a 2019 study suggested a woman was 30% less likely to be called for an interview. Women also suffer from discrimination in terms of pregnancy and marriage. Many companies will choose not to hire young women if they think they are likely to go on maternity leave in the near future.

There are many ways that companies can reduce this problem. The first involves acknowledging that a lot of bias is subconscious and difficult to address. The next lies in anonymizing data as much as possible so that hires are looked at in terms of qualifications and experience, at least in the initial round. Conducting phone interviews may further eliminate subconscious bias because candidates aren’t visible.

Training hiring managers to reduce bias is also an important step. However, it can be hard to counter subconscious bias. It’s therefore important for organizations to work with highly-qualified training providers, which will help them effectively counteract bias.

Offer scheduling flexibility

One of the best ways that workplaces can empower everybody, but especially women, is to offer increased flexibility. Women are disproportionately caregivers of both children and elderly relatives; up to 81% of all caregivers identify as female. Care provision is notoriously unpredictable and often doesn’t mesh well with a restrictive working schedule. This has led to many women dropping out of the workforce, as we saw during the COVID-19 pandemic, when 1.8 million women in America left their jobs, mostly due to childcare or other care requirements. Although many of these have returned to work, the situation has highlighted just how critical flexibility is. When women aren’t given it, they simply have to leave.

This is therefore a particularly concrete and straightforward way that organizations can improve working conditions for women, and indeed for all workers. Increased flexibility is practical and can often be implemented quickly, and it benefits all parties.

While we can hope that the unequal care burden will be addressed at the societal level at some point in the near future, one of the best and fastest ways that organizations can empower women and keep them in the workforce right now is to recognize their other commitments and provide as many accommodations as possible!

Redefining work to empower women

By using these three strategies to identify and address some of the commonest problems that women face, organizations can do a great deal to improve the gender balance in the workplace and empower women. This, in turn, makes organizations stronger and more resilient, and benefits all genders in a multitude of ways.

As a final thought, it is also worth considering whether we should be looking to redefine our definition of the word “work.” To say that women haven’t worked much until recent history is to erase and undermine the enormous effort and energy that women have put into keeping homes, raising children, and nurturing families. Learning to value this form of work as much as the work that drives capitalist systems is another step in the right direction for workplaces and workers themselves!

Time to get hands-on!

Blind CV practices are a powerful tool for promoting gender equality in hiring. By anonymizing personal details such as names, gender, and other identifying information, these practices ensure that hiring decisions are based solely on candidates' qualifications, skills, and experiences. This approach reduces the impact of unconscious biases that frequently disadvantage women in the hiring process, giving them a fairer opportunity to showcase their abilities and compete on an equal footing with male candidates.