Nicola: [00:00:00] Hello, welcome to women at the top of telecoms and tech. And I am your host. I am Cola Buckley. Um, now Cola SCCO recently married, so I’m not always getting the name. Right. Uh, we got married after four different dates and yeah, very happy to have had our day. I’m sure I talk about the wedding in another episode in more detail, but yeah, just to say it was absolutely fabulous.

So Colaco and I helped telecoms and tech organizations. Retain and develop women at the top and also future talent to close the gender pay gap and create more inclusive organizations. So welcome to today’s episode. If you are a new listener. Welcome. Welcome. It’s great to have you here. And if you are someone who’s listened for a while, [00:01:00] I would love you to review the podcast.

So more women can find us. I would love you to share it with a colleague, um, and share a favorite episode. That’s had an impact for you or to rate and review the podcast so that more women can find us. So, however, you’ve come here today. Welcome. I’m very excited that you are here and today we’re gonna be talking all.

Things that men can do to support women in tech and telecoms. And I just wanna start off today by being really, really clear that where we, where we stand at the moment with lack of gender parity and the gender pay gap and that lack of gender equality, we don’t blame that where there’s not to play blame on men or this isn’t a judgment on their position, not at all.

And this is also not about picking battles and. You know, really making it adversarial that difference between men and women at the moment and where they stand in tech and [00:02:00] telecom organizations. This is really just to focus on that’s the state of the nation. This is where we are right now. There are more John as CEOs and there are women, there is 136 year gender pay gap.

There are still numerous complaints around sexual harassment that are still complaints that are made around buyers, and that is still going on. So that’s an acknowledgement that this is going on, but there’s also a recognition. Men need to be part of the solution because women will never achieve equity in the workplace or in life, if they’re the only gender working towards it.

So men need to be part of the solution and really it’s worth noting as well, reminding and, and just prompting to go back to listen to the podcast that talks about the benefits of gender equality for everyone. They are part of the solution and part of the answer, but it’s an answer that’s worth fighting.

When you consider the organizations within tech and telecoms, when there’s more [00:03:00] gender balance companies, they demonstrate more profitability. They demonstrate that they’re more innovative. They have more loyal employees, they perform better financially and the teams stay on schedule and under budget. So it’s a win-win scenario for everyone and really creating that gender parity.

And creating a more diverse workforce yes. Across gender, but across all different minority groups. That’s a win-win snow for every. And it’s gonna become that point of competitive disadvantage. If it’s something that you are not focused on in your organization. So how can men be part of the solution? And there’s a lot of talk around male allies to women in male dominated industries like tech and telecoms.

So this where the female numbers are small, especially as you get to the top of the organization where. It can be obvious that there’s, um, a promotion or a hire that’s made that is, [00:04:00] looks the same as everyone else with very similar experience, it’s gonna have a same, a similar voice and where women are feeling outnumbered, they’re feeling isolated.

They’re feeling like they have to be incredibly resilient to walk in and be the only woman in the room again. And again, and again. So today I wanted to chat you through 10 things. Men can do to support women in the tech and telecoms workplace. And like I said, I wanna be super clear this isn’t adversarial.

This is not laying blame or judgment of where we are at men’s store. Um, and this isn’t about them and us. This is about collectively together, um, men and women working together to make that gender parity, the steps that need to happen, just making them happen. So this is about creating allyship and allyship.

Again, leads into that wider diversity piece of minority groups, feeling safe, feeling comfortable, wanting to join the industry, wanting to stay in the industry, um, and [00:05:00] bring all that richness of thinking in a different experience. So let’s get started. How can men support women in tech and telecom? So number one is just really.

Understanding what privilege is and accept that you have it. So if you are looking around the, the room and you are one of many that look like you, you have a privileged position in that workplace and probably society as a whole. And. Obviously over the last few years, there’s been a lot of talk about privilege, um, white privilege, but there’s also a gender privilege.

So if we go back to what privilege is, privilege is a special right advantage or immunity granted, or available only to a particular person or group and not to others. So in relation to gender, that could be being born male, particularly white and heterosexual. In an industrial nation confers an enormous amount of privilege in comparison to men and women of other ethnicities, [00:06:00] sexual orientation, religions, etcetera.

But it doesn’t mean you haven’t worked hard to achieve what you have. We’re not taking away from your achievements, not at all. So please don’t think we are, it doesn’t invalidate the challenges you face and the things you’ve got through in your life. And it doesn’t make you guilty or wrong of doing anything.

But what it does mean is that as a result of. This structure through there’s no fault of yours before you even start to work towards your goal. You are already ahead of some other people in that same game. So for an interview at very senior position, as a man, as a white man, you might already be ahead of other people that are in that same job and that recruitment process.

It does mean that people who weren’t born with your accidental combination of characteristics have to overcome obviously life obstacles and challenges, but also obstacles that are around those points of difference. So what it means really is that some people have to [00:07:00] work much harder for the same opportunities you automatic are afforded.

So it really means taking responsibility for figuring out. The configuration of the playing field and how it affects everyone. Uh, there’s two videos that we pop in the show notes that really demonstrates the idea of privilege and how it impacts on everyone and how you are kind of your head in that game, in that recruitment process in your career, when you have certain attributes.

So it is recognizing and owning your privilege. So whether you are a man or a woman or a woman of color, it’s understanding your privilege or your lack of privilege and where you sit in that race and what extra obstacles will you need to overcome. So get to where you want to and have that impact at the very top.

Number two, recognizing gender and quality has, is it’s comes up in more than one form. Most women face some form of gender equality at work, not all women face it in the same way. Um, so in [00:08:00] tech organizations and telecom companies, there might be. Different things playing into that. So a white woman, for example, may be discriminated against her gender, but has the advantage of race on her side, a woman of color may be discriminated against because their gender, their ethnicity, or their sexual orientation.

So it’s understanding that depending on where you sit within a different minority groups, you’re gonna have a different lived experience. So supporting women in tech and telecom’s workplace means understanding sexism is sometimes runs across different groups and it requires different levels of awareness and action to address it effectively.

And that includes listening to people and understanding their lived experience across different minority groups. So where are. Really negative scenarios and things that have happened for the discrimination. A woman faces in the [00:09:00] workplace, which overlap with her other identities of race of class, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation.

And what can you do to support them? Uh, number three is around really hiring pay and promotion, and many of the problems women face begin in tech and telecoms begin with hiring practices begin with that, that initial recruitment process. And it might be that the wording is more masculine. It might be that the skills attributed more to men than women.

It might be that there’s no flexible working that comes with a particular role. It’s not mentioned in the, the job advert. So if you’re a position to hire for your company, you can expand your scope of finding suitable women. Female candidates by attending college job fairs or female college, or reaching out to professional organizations that are focused on women like women in.

Like women in telecoms. And in addition, tore the likelihood of [00:10:00] reaching a greater diversity of women. You can also do a similar thing with, uh, a professional organization focused on supporting ethnic minorities, um, and also different sexual orientations. So even if you’re not in a position to hire for your company, you can still influence your company’s hiring by raising awareness.

Of the need to employ a greater diversity of talent to reflect back on your experience, the recruitment process, what was great, what was not great, and you can also research relevant talent pools yourself. And if there’s people within your network that, you know, be great for a job that bring, that have a different, um, or within a minority group, referring them and recommending.

So it’s that higher pay and promoting that whole process. Number four advocate for fair workplace policies. So this is really where a company starts to put in place. Some really practical support for women and other minority groups. So. Getting a diverse of women in the [00:11:00] door is a good start for any tech and talent coms company.

But to keep them there, to retain that very top talent, to create those future leaders, male allies are needed to champion those fair workplace policies. So there was a great example. Recently, I was interviewing someone for the podcast, a great episode. That’s out very soon. And she was saying that it’s not only on women to.

Develop themselves and become more empowered and all those brilliant things it’s also are meant to really demonstrate and show that they’re also using these workplace policies. So she gave the example of someone on the board. Someone very, very senior and their out of office was describing their parental leave.

And it said something along the lines of, I am out of the office between these dates, enjoying my paternity leave from my new baby son and my wife, and just that very. Getting past the mail facts and stating I’m out the office on paternity leave. [00:12:00] But just the fact I’m enjoying that time with my new son and my wife, um, and just demonstrating and role modeling to others that might be looking up to that person that it’s okay to take your share of parental leave.

It’s okay. To spend time with your family. It’s okay to be there to support your wife and your new son and have that connection time, have that bonding. Other important policies to think about fair and equitable, um, salaries by really having some way of being transparent with your salary guidelines. And this drives me mad when I see job advert after job advert on LinkedIn.

Um, I’m always like to know something geeky about who’s hiring. Who’s not, but also just to really for my clients, just to understand. What’s available in the market right now. So I like to have a good nose at different jobs that are available. And as part of that is so often salary guidelines or expectations are not within that job advert.

So this could be a very senior chief marketing officer role, but with an [00:13:00] organization that could be an 80,000 role in another organization, that could be a 280,000 role. So it’s just been really transparent and really honest and really taking out that secrecy. Taking out the need to keep it quiet and really making it transparent.

I’ve never understood why it’s, why it’s such a secret around what someone earns, because I think there is that that shame around it and the judgment and the potential that people will see. They’re not earning the same. As colleagues at the same level and not understanding why. And then the corrections that would need to take place.

Other policies that benefit everyone. Things like hybrid work in flexible hours, being able to work remotely maternity and paternity leave and shared paternity leave as well and encouraging the uptake of that onsite childcare, not just for women, but also for. And just demonstrating the use of those policies, just not just having women using them, but also having men using them and being very, very, just demonstrating the [00:14:00] benefit of it.

Number five, take the parental leave. So I’ve just mentioned that example of that very senior, senior man taking and enjoying his out office saying he was a way enjoying his paternity leave with his new son and his wife. But just really, again, that demonstration that it’s okay. It’s okay. It’s not, it’s more than, okay.

It’s just a brilliant thing to be able to have those workplace policies and be able to be able to use them. And if more men spoke up and insisted on taking that parental leave to share obligations, this would lessen that stigma of women taking the time off for women. Give given birth, but also for men, um, and eradicate that motherhood bias against hiring women since both men and women seen as potentially take time off, if they’re in a long term relationship and they want to have children, number six, offer to mentor or sponsor become an advocate for women around you.

So. I spoke to a potential new client recently. And she was saying part of what [00:15:00] she loves doing is, is picking, picking the ladder down for other women to climb up. And also just, we were talking about how she’s had some incredible mental and sponsors and advocates for her mental and sponsors are really critical for career advancement, especially in the tech world.

Men are 50% more likely to have a mentor sponsor can guide their career path and support them versus women. So it’s really, really important to offer, to be a mentor, offer, to be a sponsor and advocate for women and other minority groups around you. Be the person speaking up and telling other people in the room at those career discussions, how brilliant that person is, what they’ve delivered, what they’ve done, how they’ve made a difference.

And. Giving time to that and giving it focus and making it almost if you’re at that very senior level and you are a, you are a man at that very senior level giving time to your, what I call your job plus. So not just delivering and doing a great job, but also being an advocate, being a sponsor, being an ally [00:16:00] to the women around you and spending time on that committing time.

Speaking on panels, speaking on podcasts, and actually being someone who advocates for fair policies, but also uses. To become a mentor. Um, you can do things like set up time with a junior colleague, uh, meet someone who’s asked to be mentored by you, ask what her challenges are, help coach them through them, speak up for them in career discussions and to become a sponsor.

You can identify women around you who are doing amazing work, um, that could benefit from more visibility with senior leaders and you could look to create, or put them onto a really stretch project to develop their skills more and more to help her gain that visibility and help expand her own perception of what she can do.

And there’s some really practical ways here that you can support women. Number seven, be mindful of harassment. So. Obviously the me too movement the [00:17:00] globe by storm. And that was back in 2017. It seems like I can’t believe it’s that long ago. And it just demonstrate that sexual harassment and assault is rampant in the workplace and that women have had enough and they’re not no longer prepared to suffer in silence.

And if men of good conscience in the tech, in a tech and telecoms industry, a supportive allies to women, uh, it’s not enough to avoid. Harassment like sexual innuendo, sexist joke, or commented on a woman’s appearance. It must also be down to men to highlight a report situation in which that harassment and those sort of languages and those jokes are occurring.

And actually silence is just allowing that behavior to continue. It’s a, it’s accepting it as a norm. Whereas if you stand up and you bravely you become complicit within it. If you’re not, if you’re not speaking up and male allies have to insist on supporting and having that zero tolerance for harassment in the workplace, and really support that with reporting and [00:18:00] procedures about the law, but also strategies for policies and processes for witnesses and victims about how to support.

Number eight, give women credit for their ideas. A term that gain currency through the last few years that I kind of makes me giggles, but I, I see it a lot. So obviously we’ve heard of mansplaining where a man explains something in a certain way to women almost talking down. Um, another term that gained a little bit of popularity was used more in the corporate world over the last few years has been he repeating.

So. This was popularized by astronomer physics, professor hol Gucci Luci, which I hopefully have said that. Right. And she tweeted about he repeating after friends of hers, calling the term, describe the scenario of women, share their idea at work or in a meeting they met, met with silence in a difference then shortly afterwards, the very same idea as pit bull by a man who claims it is own.

Everyone is approves it enthusiastically, and the idea is taken. [00:19:00] And that tweet received 200,000 likes and 65,000 retweets and the strategies that you can be part of and support women with. So there’s a process called a strategy called amplification. That was, um, it’s really to stop this from happening.

So this is where other women in the room listen to and key points made by a female colleague, but you can also obviously do that as a man. Give credit refer back to the woman that came up with the idea. Go back to someone that maybe feel they’ve been talked over, go back to someone and stop the conversation.

Um, for someone that might have a great idea, bring people into the conversation. This is something that male allies can do for women in tech and telecoms and practice themselves. Especially if women in tech are unlikely to have many other female allies in the room. So they’re gonna be one of the, one of just a few women.

So just that amplification, referring back to someone when it’s been their idea. Bringing [00:20:00] someone into a conversation repeating key points that someone’s mentioned. So those are ways that you can really tend to be help women and help to raise their visibility. Number nine don’t interrupt. So women can sometimes have the ideas stolen by male colleagues, but several studies show that when it comes to meetings, women are more likely than men to be interrupted and talked over by their male co.

Uh, this is something that I see a lot with the clients coaching clients and in the leadership programs that I run that women get interrupted. Women get talked over that there’s that he repeating going on. So as women as that happens more and more often, those women become quieter. What’s the point in speaking up, if I’m gonna get talked over, what’s the point in speaking up if I’m not gonna get heard?

So it just means that they become more introverted. They’re not sharing their ideas so much. So be aware of where you might potentially be excited about a subject, have a lot of [00:21:00] knowledge on it, be an expert on it. And then it just leads into you potentially interrupting and talking over someone. It’s just, it’s not a way to become an ally, so just be mindful.

Um, and also if you see others doing it, just give them a nudge and call them out on it as well. Uh, and number 10, speak up. So one of the greatest challenges women encounter in the face of. Sexes in the workplace is silence from men that have this good conscience, but they are too busy or they’re not realizing, or they dunno how to respond.

They dunno what to do about it. They don’t want to rock the boat, but men need to be near when they’re silence, that’s support and complicit of that bad behavior in others of what is not acceptable. They’re allowing it to continue. They’re allowing it to be part of the company culture. They’re allowing it to propagate.

So those times when you might be commenting on a women’s physique, or there might be jokes, sexist jokes going on, just, you know, just speak up, just call it out, just take a stand and just be brave and just know that actually it is so [00:22:00] appreciated. Being an Alli to women means noticing all those forms of injustice that women are exposed to and taking the action to just really call it out and also support the person, the victim.

So just to conclude then women in the workplace, we don’t need male saviors. Uh, we don’t need to be rescued. We don’t need you to come on as a night on a white charger, but we could certainly benefit from supportive allies, um, who are, have that conscious awareness to their behavior that having integrity to call things.

And that are willing to hold themselves and colleagues accountable to create that healthier and more equitable work environment. And simply because not just because it’s the right thing to do, but also knowing that there’s gonna be benefits for you within that, knowing that it’s gonna be benefits for the organization within that.

So I would love to know what you think if you’re a man, listen, this, I would love to know if there’s any other ways that you think you can support [00:23:00] women in tech, in telecoms, or if you’re women or woman in tech, in telecoms. Are there any other things that men could do, please drop me a message and let me know.

And if you are looking to encourage male allyship in organizations, that again is part of the work that I do with organizations. So. Obviously, I focus on working with women to empower them, to develop their skills and their confidence for those women at the very top and future leaders. But also what’s the plan to change the culture.

What’s the plan to change the environment that women work in when they’re one of few or the only women in the room. So that’s it for today. Thank you for listen. If you see something you are struggling with, all my contact details are in the show notes. Do drop me a message to book a meeting with me and yeah.

Hope you’ve enjoyed today’s episode. Thanks so much. Bye.

Hi, is Nick here? I just wanna take a moment just to say thank you for listening. When I’m sat recording a podcast in the deepest steps of Cornal, it’s incredible to think that is reaching women [00:24:00] across the world in 30 different countries. And we have thousands of downloads a month. So thank you so much for being part of that.

And being part of the audience means a world to me, but I do want to grow this audience. I would love you to help me reach more women like you so that we can really drive positive change in the corporate world. So you can do that one of three. First of all, you can subscribe to the podcast. You never miss an episode.

It’s always a new episode. It’s always delivered straight to your inbox. You can review the podcast and leave us of rating. And the more ratings we have, we also go up in the podcast charts. And finally, you can just share a favorite podcast with a peer, with a colleague or on your social media. So I would love you to do that.

Thank you for all your help. Um, I can’t wait for what’s next.