Are women programmed to think less and do more?

Meghan Malaatjie, a Masters in Science, Epidemiology, Candidate, Faculty of Health Science, School of Public Health, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa reflects on the gender norms she learned in childhood, her personal experiences with these norms, and the impact on her career, and aspirations to address gender inequalities as a public health professional.

Introducing madeleine kennedy-macfoy

The same day in March that the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared the COVID-19 outbreak as a global pandemic, my Gender at Work colleagues and I were in a meeting room in Hyderabad. Oblivious to this fact, we were diligently planning for what promised to be a busy year for the next phase of the Project funded by Oak Foundation. After successfully executing phase 1 of the project, our first larger collective planning session for the second phase was scheduled for April 2020. We drafted a broad agenda to be finalized after our discussion with Civil Society Academy (CSA), co-grantee in this project. Needless to say, things did not go as we had planned.

Reflections on the Transgender Day of Visibility

The same day in March that the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared the COVID-19 outbreak as a global pandemic, my Gender at Work colleagues and I were in a meeting room in Hyderabad. Oblivious to this fact, we were diligently planning for what promised to be a busy year for the next phase of the Project funded by Oak Foundation. After successfully executing phase 1 of the project, our first larger collective planning session for the second phase was scheduled for April 2020. We drafted a broad agenda to be finalized after our discussion with Civil Society Academy (CSA), co-grantee in this project. Needless to say, things did not go as we had planned.

Feminists Leading Change: Women in Leadership Roles

Despite some progress in the workplace in the last few years, gender stereotypes are still entrenched in our societies and workplaces. Gender norms, stereotypes and socio-cultural practises can still be very restrictive for women’s participation in the workplace. Currently, women make up less than 10% of executive directorships in FTSE100 companies. Research shows that for women to aspire to rise to leadership positions, role models are vital.  

Episode 19: Caring in a Post Covid World

In a passionate and wide-ranging conversation, Kumi Naidoo and Aruna Rao explore hope, fear, Black Lives Matter, feminist principles, intersectionality and structural change. They ask whether the institutions that were set up to protect us, like the police, and to enable social change, such as social services, the UN, and international development organizations, have failed us and whether we should keep trying to change them from the inside or tear them down and start again.

Episode 18: Dismantling Patriarchy – Close Encounters and Imperfect Strategies

Look around you and you’ll find many conversations about reimagining and transforming how we live and work – from how we enable the plant to thrive, to new ways of envisioning economics. And in all kinds of organizations, we are seeing real challenges to what was previously unchecked – abusive power dynamics, toxic work environments, sexual harassment, racism, and discrimination against all kinds of people who don’t fit what was considered ‘the norm’. In this episode – the first in a series of three – Srilatha Batliwala, David Kelleher, Lisa Veneklasen, Joanne Sandler and Aruna Rao reflect on the their close encounters with patriarchy in organizations and the dynamics they tried to ignite to challenge them which they outlined in their article on Medium.