#IWD2022 // 5 Ways To Break Bias Around Women in Business

International Women’s Day (#IWD2022) is days away and this year we are encouraged to Break the Bias.

Whether deliberate or unconscious, bias makes it difficult for women to move ahead. Knowing that bias exists isn’t enough, action is needed to level the playing field.

If you’re a woman running a business, whether as the CEO or the founder well done! You’ve already overcome many biases to get here. But as a society, we’ve got a long way to go. With International Women’s Day looming, here are five ways we need to break the bias and ditch the out of date Gender Code in the world of business

Give more women a seat at the table

While we’re seeing more women take up managerial and board roles and interview for managerial positions, there’s still a huge barrier for women in terms of unconscious and conscious bias in the hiring process.

Diversity and gender targets can help with this, but we need to break the biases and remove any barriers to women taking up STEM.

Break the Bias: Putting forward anonymous applications for jobs that don’t mention name/gender can help, and so can looking at female-only recruitment for roles, in order to level out the playing field. Also, let women have boardroom seats and let them be listened to by their counterparts and not be shut down. This helps build on their confidence

Start early

From an early age, train young girls to try out entrepreneurship. It could be as little as letting them start off a sweet selling business in the estate.

In the book Dear Ijeawele written by Chimamanda Adichie, the story depicts that gender stereotyping starts from birth, with studies revealing toddlers are spoken to differently, based on their gender. 

Boys are typically spoken to about counting and numbers as much as three times more than girls, and another study found that in museums, boys are engaged with 2-3 times more than girls.

By setting these biases and limiting beliefs early, we’re clipping the wings of young girls who might actually love a future working in technology and STEM.

Break the Bias: Babies and children are naturally curious, so encourage their natural curiosity and nurture their unique interests, rather than looking at them through a gender lens. Encourage girls in primary and high school to see tech and science as exciting prospects for jobs and careers, while at the same time encouraging boys to consider more ‘caring’ careers rather than being pigeon-holed into traditionally male roles.

Have more mentors

Mentors in business are quite important as they help us stand on the shoulders of greater people in a particular area of expertise. Mentors help and shape us and having more female business women mentor young women could help break the bias and help this young people pursue entrepreneurship even in sectors that are highly competitive or more male-dominated

Breaking the bias: Get more mentors both male and female alike to mentor young women. This could start as early as in high school. Also set-up mentorship programs or boot camps that are more women centred where young female entrepreneurs can get access to mentors or even funds for their business

Retaining women and developing pathways

Once women get into tech and STEM roles, retention is another big issue, and there are a number of reasons why – imposter syndrome, perceptions, definitions of expertise and how rewards are measured are all factors. Given women are still outnumbered by men in most tech spaces, it’s no wonder they can feel intimidated. One SEO director told me she was recently the only woman in the room at an event, with 23 of her male counterparts!

Unpaid professional labor can also be a barrier to career development – when women are asked and expected to volunteer their time for events, panels, and women’s networking groups, but not rewarded for this overtime.

Break the Bias: For leaders, it’s important to ask questions rather than assume you know what the women on your teams actually want – design and implement policies, practices and programs based on what women need.  Build person by person, team by team to create an inclusive culture where people want to be engaged, loyal and productive.

Build the village at work

We often hear how it takes a village to raise a child, well it also takes a village to build a career. Being a woman in business can be lonely and isolating and self-doubt can play a big part in creating barriers to performing at your best.

Break the Bias: Actively seek the support of other women at your work and more broadly across the industry you are in either one-to-one or in groups – and build a solid network of people who have your back. Help your fellow females to look for evidence of their own success and to celebrate wins to build confidence.