At SalesChoice our mission is to help our customers See More to Win More.
However, data insights is not the only driver for growth insights.
Human DNA is critical to advance/grow businesses forward and the right balance in gender DNA is critical.
This year’s International Women’s Day theme is ‘breaking the bias‘ and it’s about working towards a world free of stereotypes and discrimination that is diverse, equitable and inclusive.
Canada’s gender balance in the workplace has improved but still lags behind other developed countries.
● Gender Research Firm, Equi-leap, released a report recently and reviewed nearly4,000 public companies – each with a minimum market cap of $2B, across 23 countries.
● Canada in this report is closely tied to the USA in performance, but has consistently underperformed in comparison to leading countries – like Britain or Australia for example.
● We are seeing some marginal improvements in Canada but they are painfully slow.
● Canada, for example, is leading in publishing anti-sexual harassment policies and year over year has more companies taking firm positions in this area.
● Disappointing areas however in Canada are in reporting gender based pay information. We only have 17% of companies doing so, while in Britain, they have over three quarters of their publicly traded companies reporting on employee wage statistics.
● In 2021, Canada did pass a new Pay Equity Act, requiring federally regulated workplaces to disclose wage pay data for women. However, this only applies to Federally regulated sectors.
We are making progress as we are starting to measure the gaps in diversity and inclusivenessin Canada — and this is a positive start.
To accelerate these gap closure requirements, we will require more opportunities to educate small businesses on Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) – helping them identify their gaps and measure their progress.
This is why SalesChoice has expanded its AI and Analytics skill expertise to support Dr. Wendy Cukier, the President and Founder of The Ryerson Diversity Institute, and partnered with her to help develop new D&I toolkits.
At SalesChoice, we hold diversity and inclusiveness close to our core values and we have a balanced workforce with women in senior leadership roles as well as recruiting female engineers. We are working with leaders of indigenous heritage to respect our roots and have learned that diversity and inclusiveness enable a far more productive work environment and increased innovation agility.
As I look ahead to our future generations of women advancing in the workforce, my High 5 coaching points to “breaking the bias” are for YOU to:
a.) Join companies that have diversity and inclusiveness as a core company value or have these leadership behaviors clearly communicated in performance and succession planning reviews.
b.) Look around the employee structure, do you see females in senior leadership roles? If not, know the change will be even slower than you think, and find ways to rally more changes. Evenjust a few people can change system outcomes – you have a voice – make it count.
c.) Ensure the company you are working for has training programs that help educate employees on the importance of diversity and inclusiveness – if not, find sources to close the gap.
d.) Subscribe to the Ryerson Diversity Institute Newsletter and follow Dr. Wendy Cukier’s leading research in advancing D&I to mitigate gender bias in our workplace(s). The more educated you are, the stronger your voice will be heard.
e.) Be a Leader in every role you have – as you can make a difference and ensure that you are recruiting, developing and retaining talent that reflect D&I in all your interactions.
We know D&I is good for business and enables faster growth and success. Evidence abounds on this point. There is ample evidence that diverse and inclusive companies are more likely to make better, bolder decisions—a critical capability in the crisis. For example, diverse teams have been shown to be better able to radically innovate and anticipate shifts in consumer needs and consumption patterns. In addition, more D&I in leadership teams drives increased profitability, over 25% from leading researchers like McKinsey, etc.
Bottom line –
● Want to grow your business faster, ensure you have more D&I in your company
operations.
● We have much more work to do and we owe it to our children and future generations
to get this right. I have a daughter and I hope one day she has a daughter and I can
look back proudly and say we made a difference. It will take all of our great men and
our great women to work together to get this right.
● What we cannot accept is incremental improvements – Waiting to be on par some
experts say will take over 25 years — I say rubbish — we are stronger and better than
this.
● If we want a stronger Canadian Economy – then making D&I a strategic priority to
support your business goals is a leadership responsibility and a governance
accountability matter.
● I encourage you to Step Up and Do More.
Regards,
Dr. Cindy Gordon
CEO, SalesChoice
