Why Women’s Progress Will Stall Without Attention To Workplace Intersectionality
essidsolutions
McKinsey & Company and Lean In’s sixth report on Women in the Workplace reveals the challenges women face at work, particularly Black women. We discuss why addressing gender diversity as a whole is not enough and why acknowledging workplace intersectionality is critical to embracing real diversity.
In its sixth edition, McKinsey and Lean In’s Women in the WorkplaceOpens a new window report brings to light some harsh realities women are facing today. The COVID-19 pandemic has undone a lot of the hard work that went into getting women seen and heard in the workplace.
In data collected between May to August 2020 from 317 companies and over 40,000 professionals, the report found that one in four women were contemplating downshifting their careers or quitting the workforce, says the report.
Half of these women were primarily from the 35–44 age group. And that’s another thing the report warned about. That women in leadership positions were likely to become scarcer as 2 million women consider leaving the workforce.
Already women’s participation in the workforce is low, and according to a U.N. studyOpens a new window , the needle has not moved in this area for the last 25 years.
In addition, COVID-19 has negatively affected the gender wage gap, and it has been especially hard on women of color. Black women have reported being twice as likely to have been laid off or furloughed as an effect of the pandemic.
All this highlights why addressing intersectionality – the overlap of various forms of discrimination such as racism, sexism, and classism – in the workplace is crucial to meaningfully enable workplace diversity.
Workplace Intersectionality and How Women Experience It
At any given time, a woman is not just a woman – several factors define her. She could be a woman of color, a woman with a disability, an LGBTQ+ woman/individual. That means she is likely to face discrimination not just for being a woman but perhaps for belonging to a specific race, having a disability, or both.
So the intersectionality of a woman’s experiences cannot be discounted. Women belonging to multiple underrepresented groups require distinct initiatives because they face distinct challenges.
For instance, McKinsey and LeanIn’s report finds that 29% of mothers indicated discomfort in sharing their work-life challenges with their seniors compared to 19% of fathers. 13% of women showed discomfort in sharing their status as a parent compared to 5% of fathers.
Dig deeper, and we find that Latina mothers are 1.6 times more likely than white mothers to be responsible for childcare and housework, and Black mothers are twice as likely to be in this position.
The report also finds that 39% of women at senior levels are burnt out than 29% of men.
But go further, and the report says that women with disability are more likely to feel “stressed, burnt out, and exhausted,†compared to other groups of women. “They are almost twice as likely as women overall to be uncomfortable sharing the challenges they’re facing with their teammates or managers and more than twice as likely to be uncomfortable talking about their health at work,†says the report.
Black women have lesser representation in leadership, face daily microaggressions (as seen in this accountOpens a new window of six black women in leadership), and tend to have fewer mentorship opportunities. The McKinsey and LeanIn.Org research finds that their senior leaders don’t advocate for them enough. Only 75% of Black women feel supported by their managers, compared to 84% of white women.
A reportOpens a new window by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR) report and JPMorgan Chase identified that women are at a greater risk of job loss from automation – particularly women of color, who already have lower wages than white women. Essentially, it stresses that the future of work must not just account for technological change and potential replacement of human jobs by automation but also account for its impact on gender and race. Black women have the highest labor force participation rate, and they are overrepresented in jobs that can be lost to automation per the report.
In this blunt Huffpost articleOpens a new window , authors Rene Germain and Adesuwa Ajayi write about corporate diversity initiatives announced in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement. “It’s ironic to see companies who have failed to act on racism for so long, suddenly professing to care. Where is the solidarity when you pay us less than our white counterparts? Where is the solidarity when you fail to hire and promote us into senior leadership roles? Where is the solidarity when we report racist incidents and we are told to ignore it?â€
In September 2020, 56 organizations joined the Gender and Diversity KPI Alliance (GDKA). Companies in the alliance will adopt and use key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure gender and diversity in their companies. These KPIs include the percentage of representation on an organization’s board, percentage of representation by employee category, and pay equality or the ratio of compensation by employee category (e.g., equal pay for equal work).
This is a crucial move that may, to some extent, account for workplace intersectionality. Commitment from major organizations such as PwC, Deloitte, EY, Bank of America, and the like is essential because they have the power to initiate real change for gender diversity at work. More importantly, putting a measure of diversity in place ensures that it is not just something organizations hope to “achieve one day.†It places accountability on employers to deliver on these KPIs.
In February 2020, JPMorgan committed $5 million to Advancing Black Pathways (ABP), an initiative it began in 2019. The goal is to address the racial wealth gap between Black Americans and their white counterparts.
But let’s consider how few women of color in leadership positions are in comparison to white women. There are zero Black female CEOsOpens a new window of Fortune 500 companies this year. There have been two on this list since it was first announced 66 years ago.
Though the U.K. investment industry has called for greater inclusion of women in the sector, it is seen that Black women are excluded from this initiative. So, in October 2020, 300 women who make up the Black Women in Asset Management (BWAM) group in the U.K. called on investment firmsOpens a new window to go beyond “solidarity statements†and promote more Black women to senior leadership roles. It also urged the development of “anti-racist investment portfolios.â€
Organizations such as the NHS, Linklaters, and PwC have signed up for the #10000BlackInterns schemeOpens a new window to improve diversity in the U.K.’s professional industries. One may hope that this will give an early and equal start to Black women at work and may address at least some of the challenges they face in the workplace.
How Companies Can Do More to Address Challenges Women Face at Work
As much as companies take measures to address challenges women face at work, it’s essential to see how they follow through and the real impact of these initiatives. In addition to large-scale diversity and inclusion initiatives, companies would benefit from taking smaller, measurable actions to support their employees. For instance, the report recommends training managers to support women of color (especially Black women) by regularly checking in with them and ensuring they foster an inclusive team. Apart from diversity training, providing managers with a platform to discuss their challenges and work on them may also help.
We also collected the thoughts of HR professionals and experts on the findings of the McKinsey report. Here’s what they said.
      Sonja Gittens Ottley
As an HR leader at an organization, if you’re committed to building diverse, inclusive, and therefore more successful teams, one action that you can take is actively leaning into allyship. Deeply learn about the issues that matter to the community, become aware of and “unlearn†your own biases, take steps to uncover biases in your company’s processes, train your leaders to lead inclusively, and encourage them (and yourself) to actively sponsor and develop your Black female talent. That’s one way we can enact real change within the organization.
Women are commonly talked over by men in meetings, and it can be even harder to get a word in when it’s virtual. Employers can set up internal training programs geared toward their female employees that provide recommendations for getting their voice heard in a virtual setting. This training should extend to male employees as well, as male colleagues can support minority voices by amplifying them – when one woman makes a good point, a male colleague can “amplify†it by giving credit to the original speaker.
I agree we are at a crossroads. On the one hand, there is a dangerous path. It is a path that will rapidly undo many of the gender equity gains that have been made in recent years. This is because the “always on†culture of COVID-induced remote working places disproportionate pressures on women as both primary caregivers and professionals. The lapse into gender stereotype threat is real.
On the other hand, there is a path of opportunity. Current remote working and more racially conscious realities could spark a continued empathy revolution. The technological challenge to established hierarchies where junior people can connect with CEOs in their dining rooms offers potential for positive disruption, hitherto only imagined.
One factor that can help in recruiting women and increasing their longevity in companies, is making a conscious effort to change the patterns of communication within the company and allowing for employees to be part of the decision making. Women should have a voice expressing their needs and shaping the culture of their companies.
It is incredibly encouraging to see wide-reaching reports referencing scientific research that underlines the importance of empathy on our journey to gender parity and equity. As the report suggests, ever more companies now recognize a deeper solidarity amongst their teams and a greater fostering of empathy and understanding among employees. This suggests some positive human momentum coming out of a very challenging year. From a bigger picture point of view, we can hope that the Women in The Workplace report provokes the beginning of many further conversations, about women and our role absolutely, but perhaps even more so about how those around us understand us and our role.
What organizations need is a change in culture that acknowledges the experiences of different groups. People experiencing discrimination in the workplace need allies who will support them, check others, and make their experience at work more pleasant. The hope is to see more initiatives taken to address individual needs and elevate women in the workplace.
