Whether you are a colleague, manager, human resource professional, or even the chief executive officer, it is important to ensure biases of any form do not exist at work. This is especially true of gender disparities that can often get overlooked if proactive measures are not taken to keep them in check. In this blog, we will share with you some effective ways to support and champion women in the workplace.
1. Build an environment that allows her to thrive
When you seek to champion women, start by creating an environment that catalyses that. Some steps you can take are:
→ Make her working environment safe.
Draft policies to prevent abuse or harassment and communicate it with all employees so they know their rights. Create processes that allow her to voice her concerns and ensure measures are taken to address them.
Creating a gender-diverse internal committee can be a good start towards ensuring proper investigation of complaints and the right action towards addressing them.
→ Accept her multiple roles
Women often juggle multiple roles and responsibilities across personal and professional spheres, acknowledge them, and curate a working space that accommodates them.
This can mean hybrid or remote working arrangements, nursing stations and play areas at workplaces, flexible work timings, parental leaves, and a non-judgemental approach if her personal responsibilities call during her professional time.
The first step towards accepting something is educating oneself about it. Connexus Global Ventures are here to help organizations like yours with DEIB Initiatives to embed diversity and inclusion into the very fabric of work environments.
→ Accept that she is different
Women are built differently. Accept the differences and work to reduce the biases that stem from them to promote a more efficient and inclusive working space.
Consulting female employees during policy development is an essential step but you can start by providing menstrual leaves, personalised work timings, wellness stations, and menstrual cups, pads, and tampons dispensers among others.
2. Create designated spaces for her
You have created a conducive workplace built with her in mind; the next step is to make space for her there.
→ Recognise and monitor bias
Challenge the double standards that women face at work and address the unconscious internal bias; we can all develop them unknowingly, so confront them with minimum judgment.
Train your employees to identify and work against biased thoughts, comments, and actions. This can be done by organising employee training camps or workshops.
Interested to learn more about such workshops? Check out our LeadHER® Workshops.
→ Promote diverse views
Different perspectives fuel better innovations, keep this in mind while forming teams. Provide women with a stage to share their perspectives openly. This will help your organisation foster a culture of collaboration and free creativity while making women confident in their voices.
→ Set the stage for her
When allocating responsibilities or opportunities, allow her roles that promote her growth and development. Giving your female employees ownership of projects can boost their self-confidence and pave the way for taking up leadership positions in the future.
3. Compensate her fairly
When the work is equal, the compensation should be too. Accept that, however passion-driven a career, it all boils down to being a job.
Acknowledge her progress and celebrate her achievements to motivate her to perform better and grow. Provide equal opportunities for career progression for both genders, and make sure to prevent any internal bias during appraisals and promotions.
4. Establish support systems for her
Women are best championed when they have strong support to fall back on. Some ways to create them are:
→ Female mentorship programs and groups
Create platforms that allow female employees to interact with other experienced female professionals who can mentor them. Create a space where they can network and seek advice, share experiences, and find solutions to their challenges.
→ Provide developmental feedback
Provide your female employees with detailed and specific feedback on areas that can be developed. A personalised employee feedback system aimed at skill development can help her identify solutions to accelerate her growth.
5. Create room for breaks
Yes, she can do it all, but even the best suffer failures, and even the most resilient need to rest. When you seek to support women in the workplace also make sure that they know that rest is necessary.
Train managers to identify signs of burnout and promote adequate rest. Carefully planned wellness retreats or vacation time offs can help ensure recharge. You can also ensure that work is planned in a way that allows for ample breaks; this will help reduce fatigue and boost her efficiency.
So here is how you support women in the workplace in a proactive way. The core of all that we have mentioned is this – to support women is to listen to their needs and accommodate what they want. The steps in this blog will help give you a jumpstart but you will support her in the workplace best when you listen to her on a human level, with empathy.
