Our Mission

Gender at Work is an international collaborative that strengthens organizations to build cultures of equality and social justice. We will achieve our mission by pursuing the following goals:

Advance gender equality and transform unequal power relations by supporting both local and global social-change organizations to change their structures, processes and programs
Spotlight and change the unwritten rules and exclusionary practices that maintain inequalities by building a new way of thinking and practice across the globe
Grow, strengthen and sustain Gender at Work and its partnerships in a way that reflects our values: equality, accountability and work/life balance

Our Guiding Principles

To become the change we want to see
To help equip organizations to understand their role in building collective power in order to transform cultural systems and internalized values, and then to sustain the changes
To live by our practice: to create work/life balance, as well as time and space for reflection, respect for difference, accountability and co-responsibility, valuing each other’s distinct contributions, and to create an environment of mutual support
To make a positive difference in lives of marginalized women and men with an approach that is respectful, inclusive and non-prescriptive
To deepen knowledge through high-quality analysis, writing and resource sharing
To empower organizations to transform power relations. Specifically, to help the disenfranchised gain control over resources (physical, human, intellectual, intangible) and ideologies (beliefs, values, attitudes) and to develop the ability to change institutions and structures that support unequal power relations

Our Values

We value work/life balance. We also value the ability to negotiate difference, reflective learning and high-quality deep analysis.

A meeting to conduct a baseline assessment of an organization progressed smoothly, but the the group was not energized by the process. Collecting baseline information is tedious at the best of times. But things changed when the group was asked how they felt about working with their facilitators. This simple question of feelings, often overlooked, transformed the entire session. The natural shy nature of the members soon dissolved. Both men and women members revealed the traditional nature of their community and the fact that women are not viewed as significant contributing members of society.

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