Everyday gender biases and barriers remain a persistent problem in office culture. But men with a keen awareness of how women experience the workplace and how gender inequities torpedo profitability and mission outcomes can actively deploy strategies to overcome them. In the in-person work environment, these strategies include ensuring that women have a seat (and a nameplate) at the table; confronting other men when they make biased or sexist statements, including to women in team social events; and validating and normalizing women’s experiences in the moment. Men now have to adapt these strategies for the remote workplace.
4 Ways Men Can Support Their Female Colleagues — Remotely
Remote work during the crisis has exacerbated previous gender inequities at home, which has real ramifications in the workplace. Mothers are more likely to do most of the household labor, childcare, and home-schooling coordination, spending as much as 20 hours a week more compared to co-working fathers. They may be less visible and less available to their colleagues, and more likely to be passed up for stretch assignments or promotion due to gendered assumptions that they’re “too busy” at home.
Men must step up and be active allies to women during this time of remote work. First, include and sponsor women. Second, ensure women’s voices are heard in meetings, passing the mic to them when you can. Third, practice transparency by sharing information and processes that are hidden from women. Finally, evenly distribute virtual office housework, like note taking and committee work, and encourage women to say “no” more often.