Are women only events, a bit of an own goal?

When I started my business a few years ago now, I was invited to a women in business event. It was all very pink and everyone was pretty much a one man band trying to sell to other people. Everyone seemed to be secondary earners that were fitting their ‘thing’ around other commitments. We also got a free glass of prosecco and I didn’t go back because I was too busy.

Thing is that in my business (HR consultancy) I am just as happy to work with men as women. In fact I don’t think they mind too much about my gender when I am giving them advice or coaching them or running a workshop for them.

However I do enjoy tremendously speaking to all female audiences as they are always so energetic and supportive. I do a lot of charity fund raising for some cancer charities and often the audience is predominantly female.

A few years ago I organised a charity event with my sister in law who was one of the founders of the very successful notonthehighstreet.com. We sold tickets to raise money for Maggies (the cancer advice centre) in Cheltenham. The event was sold out yet on the night we only had about 3 men in the audience. One of those 3 men asked me if it was a ladies only event? It wasn’t at all. It was simply an event about how a successful business leader had turned an idea into an extremely profitable company. Who wouldn't want to know more about that? But men saw that two women were speaking and didn’t attend. Had we been two men with a similar success story the attendance would have been very different. There is something in that. The men that didn’t attend expected a different type of event. A bit pink and fluffy. Not relevant to them. What?

A neighbour of mine was recently telling me that she had been asked to speak at a ‘Women in Technology’ event but was in two minds about it. Not the presentation part as this women is an extremely impressive individual and I can well understand why they asked her. But the fact that by doing so she was being identified first and foremost as a woman. So the context might be ‘Hasn’t SHE done well’. A successful career despite being female. Well done that girl/woman/lady. Of course she is happy to inspire other women to come into her industry but one wonders who such events are actually for and whether they achieve what they set out to beyond making money for the organisers :) For her part she just wanted to be recognised as a talented person not a talented women as it seemed to dumb down her achievements.

I worked in house as an HR Director for many years before starting my own business. There was always an agenda around Diversity which ranged from extremely half hearted to full on passion. To do something. As long as nothing much changed for the majority who were quite happy thank you very much.

In the public sector we were set diversity targets by the government. One was around employing more BME’s and women so we could represent the communities we served. I was running an HR team on the south coast and we met that target through a carefully crafted recruitment campaign and an inclusive selection process. This involved inviting people to come and meet us informally before we interviewed them and where it was possible, not being too formal during the actual interview. An example would be not meeting them in an office in business clothes if they were going to be doing a manual role for us and working outside. It worked so well. Anyway one of the individuals we hired worked in my team as an HRBP. She was very talented and extremely good at her job. I was thrilled we had hired her.

But it became embarrassing at large events as senior people would literally cross the room to speak to her – just because of her gender and the colour of her skin. As they were so aware of the diversity targets. So she left. She didn’t want those things to define her and I couldn’t blame her.

In the private sector we always had a focus on encouraging more women into leadership roles. And what we often did was have lots of high profile ‘Women in Leadership’ events that were usually for women only. Men (handpicked by HR as being suitable) were allowed to attend for the drinks afterwards and naturally many felt excluded. And no surprises that some of them didn’t change their behaviour or attitudes because of those events. But it was great PR and lots of pictures were taken.

Yes there can be occasions when women benefit from female only training sessions but that is not all women. I have worked with many that prefer to work with men as well. I do. These days there can’t be many issues in the workplace that can’t be discussed with men and women present. We are all adults and if we make employing women or anyone that is under represented in the workplace complicated then people are less likely to do it. And we will all miss out.

We know that a third of households now have a women earning more than her male partner or being the sole earner. Millennials have been entering the workforce and demanding flexibility and a work-life balance for some time. And we are giving it to them because they are talented and we want to hire or retain them. And companies that are increasingly embracing the ‘employees as consumers’ approach where employees and workers dictate their terms and benefits – are just more diverse. And upbeat fun places to walk into. Because that is what happens when your focus becomes inclusion.

Every company and individual is different so for me it is all about focus and options.

• So yes we should celebrate achievements – but for women and men.
• We know it makes business sense to encourage flexible working – but for women and men.
• Yes we should support and encourage people returning to the workplace - but men as well as women.
• And lets identify and tackle some of the issues that impact on both genders. Ageism is a big one. So is disability.

To create a workforce that achieves gender balance we need to balance our focus on gender.