IWD: Fake or Fortune?
#Week10 saw Innesco celebrate and recognise International Women’s Day (IWD?8th March) – taking the opportunity to champion the fantastic women on our team and this year’s slogan ‘Embrace Equity’. IWD's goal of is not only to recognise women’s social, economic, cultural and political achievements, but also more crucially, to bring gender equality issues to the forefront of the agenda.
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Companies are rightly placing growing importance on gender diversity and pay equality, and the real estate sector is no exception. ?Today’s edition of EG includes an insightful piece comprised of letters written from senior women in real estate to their future counterparts – these showcase not only the central role women play in the sector, but also highlight the increased opportunities the industry is creating. Especially impressive as EG’s editor Sam McClary is cycling from London to Cannes for MIPIM next week!
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However, there is still much progress to be made in what has traditionally been seen as a male dominated industry, and where stated ambitions aren’t always matched by tangible efforts. As a result, attention is increasingly turning to the issue of organisations exploiting IWD as a marketing and comms opportunity, without substantive work to back up their pro-equality theme.
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The catalyst for all this was a vigilante twitter bot, tasked with weeding out gender equality-based hypocrisy. The bot, created by Francesca Lawson and Ali Fensome in 2021, calls out companies who post virtue signalling IWD posts whilst doing little to narrow significant gender pay gaps. The automated Twitter account has the ability to pick out IWD tweets from companies listed on the government’s?gender pay gap service website. Once it links a company’s tweet with its available data, it will reply to the tweet with the business’ gender pay gap information, often with illuminating results!
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As the app’s creator aptly says “…the [IWD] day is often treated as a marketing opportunity, yet there’s seemingly no accountability for any of the bad stuff,” she explained. “Everyone wants to declare how much they support women and they want to prove themselves to be inclusive and welcoming. But the reality doesn’t often tally with that.”
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The bot’s revelations speak to a wider truth in today’s communications space: it isn’t good enough to simply make the right noises – around ESG for example – true reputation is underpinned by positive action and behaviour. In a culture where we expect increasing transparency and integrity, companies can no longer expect to escape accountability for incongruent words and actions. To gain and maintain trust, there must be an honest correlation between the public narrative and company values, policies and results. As ever, actions speak louder than words - and MIPIM next week is great opportunity to show how the sector is embracing this vital shift.
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Reason to Smile
Among the many treasures in British culture, one that has a true place in our heart has to be the beloved Greggs sausage roll. Whether an early morning bite, or an afternoon snack, Greggs can be found on most corners in towns and cities across the country. With only one store outside the UK, the humble and affordable pastry shop connects the regions of our nation with good food.?
So what better news than to see that Greggs will be trialing a selection of 24 hour drive thrus across the UK, in addition to stretching the opening times of some stores to past 9pm. Coming hot on the heels of a similar announcement from Popeye's, it will be fascinating to see if this innovation is embraced by customers, and what further brands see mileage in the drive-thru concept.?
Events coming up
Innesco is the leading independent authority on purposeful real estate marketing and message - unlocking significant growth and transformation. We are experts within the global real estate sector and the built environment. Established in 2009 and headquartered in London, we are a truly global organisation with affiliate offices in Spain, France, Sweden, Germany, Abu Dhabi, Dubai and South Africa.
For more information visit?our website.
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