#GoogleWalkout
Last week, we’ve seen Google employees walking out of their offices to protest against the way their company has been dealing with sexual harassment cases for the past few years. Google has not made any public announcements yet as they would rather listen to employees and solve the problem internally. But organizers of the Google walkout for Real Change are protesting for respect, and by campaigning for real change want to reach outside the realms of Google. They are demanding a change in their company’s policy with the following points:
- An end to forced arbitration in cases of harassment and discrimination.
- A commitment to end pay and opportunity inequity.
- A publicly disclosed sexual harassment transparency report.
- A clear, uniform, globally inclusive process for reporting sexual misconduct safely and anonymously.
- Elevate the Chief Diversity Officer to answer directly to the CEO and make recommendations directly to the board of directors. In addition, appoint an employee representative to the board.
What the walkouts are re-enforcing one more time, is that organized masses can initiate change and bring awareness to the top in the aim to create a dialogue. Even though Google is trying to keep the matter internal, the fact that people marched across the globe, paved the way for other organizations to voice their discontent.
Not Only At Google.
7% of Investing Partners at Venture Capital firms are female (from The CrunchBase Women in Venture Report), so it isn’t only in technology companies but also the ones that found them that the lack of diversity is an issue. The FiftyFiftyPledge gives tools encouraging women to become VC’s, they are building a community creating activities reflecting the pledge. We all recognize that the ability to run and grow businesses is does not depend of gender or ethnicity, and so should be investing and being investable.
Suki Fuller, founding ambassador and co-lead of FiftyFiftyPledge with Chris Tottman from Notion Capital, urges VC funds, companies and individuals to pledge for equality as a first step towards inclusion. Fuller live by the 3 A’s and she explained to me how every individual can use the tool to initiate change within their organization:
Awareness – What is the issue within our organization?
Advocacy – We are now pledging and being advocates to solve the issue.
Action – We are going to benchmark what we are doing today, this is where we are and this where we will be in a few months.
The change comes from both side of the equation, Fuller encourages scouts, LP’s and VP’s as well as entrepreneurs to reach outside their first and secondary networks. By talking and connecting to a diverse pool of people, equality is more likely to happen, and biases and stigmas to lower. She adds:
“Asking questions to groups you do not encounter regularly is what will boost your understanding of their views, their challenges and where you can align with them or not.”
Innovation And Creativity Happen When We Perceive Differently.
Baroness Martha Lane Fox commented on the Google walkouts on BBC Radio 4′ The World At One’ programme –
“There is a higher percentage of women in the House Of Lords, which is a thousand of years old institution, than in the internet world which is arguably thirty years old.”
Having a voice, protesting, changing policies or pledging for change is participating in opening up perceptions. In order to be innovative, teams need to be diverse from generations, genders, social and ethnic backgrounds. Working against biases is one of a human biggest challenge but impossible to be practiced if we keep working with similar minded people, if we keep hiring people from the same social networks and if we are not in regular conversations with different ways of thinking.
I will leave you with this anecdote. A train passenger recognizes Picasso in his wagon. He comes to talk to him and says: “Why don’t you paint people the way they really are?” Picasso asks the passenger to clarify what he means by “the way people really are”. The passenger takes a picture out of his pocket and says: “This is my wife.” Picasso replies: “She’s rather small and flat.”
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If your organization takes action to tackle diversity, inclusion, and transparency, please do get in touch. We need to relate the actions being made in order to inspire other organizations to do so.
