International Women's Day March 8

International Women's Day (March 8) is a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women.  

Many would be surprised that IBM hired their first woman back in 1889.   I am so lucky to be working for a company which celebrates diversity in our employee workforce.

I know that a diverse team brings different view points and ideas which only serve to make the overall productivity and success a of team stronger. 

It is quite easy for each of use to know explicitly when we are treating diverse people differently.   However, we all have implicit bias which is much harder to recognize and change.

According to a Sept 15, 2015 report on Implicit Bias by Jo Handelsman and Natasha Sakraney,

"Explicit bias involves consciously held, self-reported attitudes that shape how people evaluate or behave toward members of a particular group. Explicit bias is accessible –it can be measured with straightforward questions in surveys, such as “do you agree or disagree with the statement that boys are better than girls at math. It can also be combated with logic and discussion because it is acknowledged by the person expressing the bias. Implicit bias, in contrast,is activated automatically and unintentionally, functioning primarily outside of a person’s conscious awareness"

The study goes on to say Implicit bias has not changed significantly over the last several years which is something we all need to continue to work on. 

Over my career in IBM I have had a chance to work with some extremely talented people of which many are diverse from me in many ways.   I continue to work on supporting diversity and I serve as a coach to up and coming talent including women.

I certainly will never fully understand a women's point of view but thank goodness I get to work with many very talented women who improve the teams I am a part of because they are willing to provide their point of view.

Let's all celebrate International Women's Day March 8 and continue to work on removing implicit bias and celebrating diversity.