On the occasion of International Women’s Day on March 8, IABC/Toronto hosted a webinar with five experts to explore various ways for communications professionals to break the bias in the workplace.
Michael Blackburn, Executive Vice President, IABC/Toronto, introduced the session, which was moderated by Mark John Stewart, Managing Director, Wentworth Strategy Group and Instructor, Strategic Management, McMaster-Syracuse Master of Communications Management Program. Panelists included:
- Krista Henry, Communications Specialist at University of Waterloo and Chair of IABC/Toronto’s IDEA Committee.
- Loretta Lam, President of Focus Communications Inc. and Director of Advocacy & Collaboration for IABC/Toronto’s IDEA Committee.
- Pamela Bishop-Byers, Regional Communications Manager – Indigenous, Nuclear Waste Management Organization and member of IABC/Toronto’s IDEA Committee.
- Matisse Hamel-Nelis, Vice President Communications at AbleDocs and Director of Communications of IABC/Toronto’s IDEA Committee.
Approaching intersectionality
- The fight for equity is often multi-layered. An intersectional approach shows how people’s identities can overlap, creating different experiences of discrimination. For women, there are varying levels based not only on gender but also race, disabilities, poverty, sexual orientation and class.
- True equity means recognizing and meeting women’s diverse needs. We need to listen, learn and hold spaces for all women to use their voices.
- Provide mentorship and leadership opportunities and create Employee Resource Groups for women.
- Increase awareness of generalizations about women. The better our understanding of issues being faced, the better we can offer support and be an ally.
- Using inclusive language is something we can understand as communicators. Ensure our organizations are not using outdated, discriminatory terms. Consider that people have multiple identities.
Success stories as an outcome of best practices in diversity and inclusion as an area of focus in the communications profession
- Canada is a nation of immigrants and will continue to be so. Unconscious bias is a significant barrier to career growth for racial and cultural minorities, especially immigrants.
- Organizations are starting to embrace immigrants into their workforce effectively and efficiently. More women are taking up leadership roles, but there is a lot of work to be done to achieve diversity at the C-Suite level.
- Organizations with diverse leaders perform better in a diverse and inclusive environment. As a result, they become better informed and more competitive. For example, Pepsi Co hired Indra Nooyi, an immigrant woman of colour in 2006, which was a bold move as a woman’s perspective was brought to the board room.
Roles and responsibilities of organizations, leaders and communications professionals with regards to Truth and Reconciliation with First Nations
- September 30, 2021, marked the first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, which was proposed by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission as one of its 94 Calls to Action in 2015.
- Reconciliation is about addressing the impacts of colonization. This includes acknowledging the Canadian human rights crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women.
- Though Indigenous girls and women constitute less than 5% of the Canadian female population, they represent over 16% of all female homicides in Canada. This statistic does not address those missing Indigenous women and girls.
- Indigenous women and girls have been publicly devalued or ignored. Harmful colonial stereotypes have shaped people’s general perceptions. As communicators, we are encouraged to take the #BreakTheBias pledge to support, forge positive visibility of Indigenous women and girls and raise awareness of this so that more people step forward and resources become available to help end this international crisis.
- Some suggested first steps to action are: recognizing Red Dress Day on May 5 and familiarizing oneself with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s final report’s (2015) 94 calls to action. Specifically, Call to Action #92, directed at the private/corporate sector.
- Facilitating conversations and identifying ways to work with Indigenous women to make their voices heard.
Advancing accessibility
- Accessibility tends to be an afterthought in the conversation on diversity, equity and inclusion, and when we do it, we tend to forget about the needs of people with disabilities.
- From a corporate standpoint, not enough of the budget is allocated towards enhancing accessibility. People who use assistive technology don’t feel welcomed from a social responsibility standpoint.
- Access to information is not a nice-to-have but a human right. Women with disabilities have more barriers to entering the workforce and growing their careers because they don’t have access to information.
- Accessibility must be a part of everyday life, especially in the digital world by doing simple things such as using hashtags in camel case, reader-friendly screen text, etc.
- You can’t have accessibility without inclusion, and you can’t have inclusion without accessibility. As communicators, it’s important to educate people about accessibility.
Solutions to address pay equity
- According to Statistics Canada, 76.8 cents on average are earned by full-time working women in Canada for every dollar men make. The gap is wider for women who are Indigenous (65 cents to a dollar), living with a disability (54 cents to a dollar), racialized (67 cents to a dollar) or newcomers (71 cents to a dollar).
- This is a substantial barrier because it would take over 100 years for women to receive pay equity in Canada.
- The solution comes down to policy work to level the playing field. In 2018, Iceland was the first country to have companies with more than 25 employees prove that they pay men and women equally.
- Some countries are making parental leave equal for both men and women, giving women the opportunity to return to work if they choose to do so.
- Some industries have more men than women, for example, STEM and manufacturing, and we need to encourage more women to enter these fields.