After a year of the #MeToo movement, the Young Women’s Trust reports that ‘It’s still a rich man’s world’. Sexual harassment, gender pay gaps and discrimination are rife.
It got me thinking…
I’ve had some wonderful employers with clear pay structures and fair recruitment and promotion processes, and some… less exemplary.
I was once asked in an interview: ‘are you planning on having children?’ I didn’t take the job.
In another organisation, a senior manager drunkenly approached me at a work party to share his view that women fell into two categories, ‘those you would f*** and those you wouldn’t’. #HimToo?
A friend of mine was even told to wear heels and a dress to progress – she already outperformed her higher paid male counterparts.
Most women have such horror stories.
As the CEO of a female-led company, it may seem that I have an agenda. I don’t. I simply believe that people should be judged in work on their performance, their commitment and their attitude, not their gender, their clothing, or their family plans. I don’t care if my team close deals in heels, trainers or pink fluffy slippers.