The Real Root of Unconscious Bias

Again this morning, I see an article flagging up another report on bias against women. "Women's Careers Held Back By Men", then yesterday it was "People Didn't Believe My CV," says [woman of colour] board director.

Each time something like this comes out, people's reactions are the same.?“It’s appalling.”?“Must try harder”?and variations on this theme.

And then the next report comes out and the next and the next…

Here’s the thing.?The solution isn’t about pointing fingers in this way (although of course it is necessary to increase awareness).?If this were the solution, the problem would be solved by now.

No, the solution lies in understanding how the mind works, instead of blanketing everything under the convenient label of ‘unconscious bias’.

But what if we uncovered what's really down there? Knowledge is power, so let’s take a little dive into that subconscious world to understand what is really happening.?

THE SUBCONSCIOUS OPERATING SYSTEM

Our subconscious mind will make a decision on something in an instant - before our conscious mind has time to come in and moderate. When we are confronted with a situation, or a person, the subconscious looks at its reference points, and decides whether the correct boxes are being ticked.?It then serves our brain with a knee-jerk reaction.?

All clear so far.

Here’s the problem.?Our subconscious minds are not up to date with the 21st century world, and is just not using the same benchmarks as we are consciously.

Imagine trying to run the latest software on a computer with an operating system from the 1970's! This is what we are dealing with. Our subtle operating system is woefully out of date.

Result - mismatch! The system is full of bugs and crashes all the time. Welcome to the world!

So, let’s have a look at exactly what is undermining women out in the professions…

THE ICEBERG OF YOUR MIND

Think of your mind like an iceberg. The part above the surface of the sea is your conscious mind.?This contains all your conscious beliefs about yourself, your rights, and the world.?

However, the much larger part, under the surface of the water, is the subconscious mind.?This part contains al the reference points of history, heritage and the past.?

Having spent 20 years analysing exactly what is contained in this part using kinesiology methodologies, I can tell you that this part has absolutely no idea that we are living in the 21st century.?Far from it.?This part is holding the patterns of the past with all the biases and prejudices of our heritage.

Let me emphasise here...

We have no idea that these obsolete programmes are held within us. None whatsoever!

They have nothing to do with our conscious beliefs, or how enlightened and decent we are as an individual.?In fact, more often than not, they completely contradict what we consciously believe.

Think of it like a forgotten attic - it’s full of old books, dust and spiders, that have no use in our lives, yet they are still sitting there and haven’t been cleared away.

So, we can be going through our lives believing we are doing our best, but each time the subconscious looks at its benchmarks and tick boxes, our modern world does not agree with what it thinks.

Right then, let’s get into the details here and look specifically at how this affects women.

The world we live in was built for men by men, to suit?men, in the days before women had freedom and opportunity.?That’s a fact. It’s what we’ve inherited.?

QUESTION:?How does a woman in the workplace fit into the subconscious operating system?

Well - she doesn’t! Not even slightly.

Which leads us to the key concept here.

THE POWER FOUNDATION - the beast that’s responsible for the unconscious bias and more.

Let me introduce you to my concept of the power foundation.

Whether someone feels safe, entitled, and has credibility, is very strongly linked with what’s going on in that subconscious arena - that we all share.

Instead of just labelling it ‘bias’ let’s look at what’s really going on under the surface.

Let’s take a man and a woman, and give them the same background, qualifications, abilities etc. Now let's put them in the same high-powered career - for example finance.

On the surface all should be equal.?But when we look under the surface - the stuff that creates that subconscious?knee-jerk reaction - it's a very different story indeed.

So, asking the key question here - how does this subconscious operating system (which we all share) support these people being in their career?

The power foundation diagram below shows you the sources your subconscious mind will be using! Trust me - they are indeed there.

On those subtle levels of life, the man has historical, ancestral, biological and social advantages. For example, he is likely to be in a majority, and the higher up he goes, the more that is the case, so he has a basic safety in numbers security. Nearly all the major religions are patriarchal, giving a 'god-given' divine right for male authority. (Note that even if you yourself do not follow a religion, your ancestors certainly would have done, and the patterns and beliefs of religion are deeply ingrained in our heritage and society.) The Boys' club! Ancestrally, women had to obey men - and indeed the 'obey' was only taken out of the Church of England marriage ceremony in the 1960's. Traditionally the male is head of the house, makes the decisions and controls the money. The history of our civilisation gave all the control, power, freedom and rights to the man.

Biologically, the often larger size and lower voice means that a man can easily drown out a woman in a meeting, which triggers an instinctual fear response in the woman, and superiority response in him. (All automatic!)

Our world is a male default, male benchmark world, which women have had to fit into. So, the male is in his 'natural habitat' if you like. (Read a few pages of Caroline Criado-Perez's book 'Invisible Women' if you aren't convinced!)

Patriarchal beliefs are still deeply ingrained all through our society. From 'a woman's place is in the home' to 'women are bad drivers', we could go on forever here. Yet, the point is that each belief, or slight, or sexist comment is actually saying to a woman 'you are inferior'.

And of course the pièce de résistance - men have always been valued by their achievements.

So basically, everything on the subtle level supports the man's being in that position.

On the other hand, everything in our heritage undermines the woman's position. Powerful women have been persecuted and executed the world over, for centuries. The higher she goes in her career, the more of a minority she becomes which creates a subtle feeling of vulnerability. In this male default world, she has to make constant adjustments to fit in.

The double standard that we're all aware of continues to undermine her position. When a man behaves a certain way, he might be described as a 'born leader'. Yet if a woman says and does exactly the same thing, she's likely to be called arrogant, pushy or worse. This double standard is a manifest proof of the existence of this operating system I'm talking about.

Traditionally she has not had control of money, or freedom, and must obey men, so when she stands next to a man, the automatic response will be to assume he is the authority, and she is the underling. (If I had ￡1 for every time that had happened to me, I'd have retired to the Bahamas on the proceeds by now!)

And of course the final nail in the coffin...Women have always been valued for our bodies, our fertility and our desirability to men, and not by our achievements or minds.

Oh no there's an even worse nail in the coffin...patriarchal limits! Subconsciously there are many limits - saying that a woman must not outshine a man.

I was recently speaking to a young girl from a girls' school. She was telling me that she'd been so confident, speaking up in class all through her years there. Then in the sixth form she had gone to a mixed school, and was astonished to find she was not able to speak up, and instead sat there silently while the boys hogged all the attention. This had come as a complete surprise to her.

I know exactly what happened though. The subconscious power foundation had reared its ugly head and told her she must step back and let the men shine. These patriarchal limits - which of course make us women fume - are sadly very much in existence, in our workplaces, our schools and universities, and in our own personal relationships. They lurk beneath the surface, subtly pulling women down relative to men.

So, putting all that together, this is what we get...

Everything in the subtle subconscious layers of our world supports the man's position. Everything on those layers undermines a woman's position. Pure and simple.

He has hundreds of generations supporting him subtle. A woman has one, or two at the most.

Whenever we go into a situation, we sense the power foundation inequality - whether we are on the advantage or the disadvantage end. So the reality looks more like this:

This is why all these decades of equal opportunities policies haven't got 50% women into the top positions. This is why we still have the gender confidence gap.

THE SOLUTION

So, now that you can see what we are really dealing with, pointing fingers is never going to be the solution. The effect of the power foundation inequality is huge. Utterly huge. While it is there, unchecked, it will dominate, and women will continue to suffer as a result.

1) The first step to changing this is to acknowledge that the power foundation really does exist. Pushing it under the carpet doesn't make it go away.

2) Then it's important to STOP assigning blame. The power foundation, with all it's archaic programming is like a slow poison seeping through things. It's a heritage we all share. It affects everyone, and up until now, it had free-rein because it wasn't acknowledged.

3) Understand that taking the 3D world actions - although admirable and necessary - are never going to change this, at least not for many many years. We were trying to change the results, without understanding that we weren't changing the root of the problem. It's no wonder we failed. Deeper actions are required that actually reach this subconscious beast and update it.

3) The real solution lies in changing what is going on in the SUBCONSCIOUS. This is what I have specialised in over the last 20 years. The subconscious is not a closed book. When you understand what it's doing, and how, you can not only change that programming, but negate those knee-jerk reactions. That's when your life and your programming align, and the whole of society can get to the next level.

I teach women how to reprogramme the subconscious effects of the power foundation deficit, so they feel more empowered to speak up, stand out and get noticed - even when people around them are being dismissive - and teach specific mind skills to counteract the power foundation each time it undermines them. When they do this, not only do they react differently, but those around them begin to treat them differently too.

And what if you are a man who's reading this, and you want to help the women in your organisation to promote themselves and have more get to the top? Well absolutely, you too can learn how to not only turn off that pesky knee-jerk reaction in your mind that contradicts your enlightened 21th century beliefs. Not only that, but you can also learn how to level that energetic playing field in the moment, in those key situations like meetings, when the power foundation effects are at their most damaging - when women get interrupted, drowned out, talked over or dismissed.

This is the key to creating the society we all want. We must vanquish that beast together, instead of plastering over the cracks and wondering why nothing changes.

So next time you see an article flagging up yet another case of subtle discrimination against women, instead of just being angry, remember that it's actually the POWER FOUNDATION in action, and focus your efforts to change this.

Here's how I can help you:

1) Get started with my free guide "5 Easy Steps to More Confidence"

2) Re-power your life with 1-2-1 Power Alchemy.

3) Enquire about a talk or workshop for your organisation.

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N.B. Although in this article I've flagged up the GENDER power foundation, there are of course other power foundation in play too. Race, caste, class, accent, social background to name the obvious ones...all of these work in the same way, and of course affect men too. Each of us is battling the power foundation and how it defines who we are, every day. The solution is also the same.