Diversity

I was speaking with a genuinely authentic and well intentioned Singaporean women, whom i'd previously worked with in the same company, where she was a manager.

She is a performer, and is now a VP of a US based software organisation.

She informed me, she was doing a women's leadership post graduate degree.

So i asked her about the aspects to what levels, measurements and qualitative data there is that supports the systematic and structural suppression of women into leadership.

I inquired of what levels of nuance and specificity there was that supports the idea of the suppression of women to leadership, be it by country, industry or region.

She repeatadly said there was lots of data.

For instance she said of Singapore, only 1 in 10 women get promoted to leadership.

She said that the Middle East and Africa are leading the rate and promotion of women into leadership and positions of power.

I asked her which country's in the Middle East were doing this.

She said Qatar and UAE are leading lights for women leadership.

When i inquired about Iran, Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon, The West bank ( though not a country, but it wants to be as much) and Yemen, she was unsure or didn't know those places as being Middle East.

I asked her how does the data validate or substantiate that the reasons women are overlooked for promotion to leadership are becuase they are female or that being female supressed their standing?

I asked her opinion on the complexities of the wage gap and the differences of how men and women operate, prefer and strive to acomplish. I asked her if the fact that the majority of mining, engineering and construction workers are men and was this a problem? These jobs tend to get above the average wage, in fact well above.

Her response was unclear, she said maybe it was a problem (for women).

I asked her if the observation that generally, lines of business such as marketing, HR, Talent acquisition, operations are more female heavy, or that education, hospitality, childcare, healthcare have a significantly higher percentage of women, was an issue.

She replied that though true, this is a problem for women, becuase they are "service oriented" and not positions of "power and leadership". These are her words, not mine.

I put to her that i was unconvinced in most of her responses, as she did not provide me with any data beyond the 1 in 10 Singaporean women get promoted into power vs men, which i found far fetched at worst or uncorroborated.

Throughout our conversation, she kept answering my questions largely by telling individual stories of either women she met or stories she had heard of.
These stories were not necessarily about how they had overcome structural obstacles that were stacked against women, but largely about what they were doing with other women to promote women into positions of power. How they were all CEO's, MD's, Ministers, Heads of Ministerial departments, VP's and leaders in their own professions, with power.

She also kept referring to the main reason women get supressed is due to them having children.

She said i had unconcious bias.
She was unable to substantiate that claim.

I asked her if she had researched the unconcious bias test?
That this test is known as the Implicit association test, which was developed from the department of psychology of Harvard by a couple of professors in the late 90's and is publicly available to self test.
(https://youtu.be/ysnkoeGUnGo)

She hadn't.

I put to her, from listening to two talks on the usefulness of the unconscious bias test, that it was unreliable becuase of the wide variability of the test. That is, if you take the test 2 or more times, you produce markedly different results.

I did agree that we have unconscious biases, and for much of them, they are good biases. But that where we have an unjustified bias that existentially results in bad outcomes, then it does need addressing.

I put to her for instance, that data showing the wage gap, is unhelpful, such as the UK Department of Labor.
(https://gender-pay-gap.service.gov.uk/)


In the UK, businesses with 250 or more employees or more, have to provide the wages and sex each year.
The government then releases a generalised report that averages out the hours worked and wages paid and compares them by male and female.

I suggested that this data set is quite useless becuase it doesn't take into account the complexies and nuances of work and wages. I said Dr Jordan Peterson from the Uni of Tonoto, has studied these facets quite intimately and puts that there are about 19 or so variations to take into consideration.
(https://youtu.be/aMcjxSThD54)

She said that i was using this data to suit my own bias.

I asked her again, why was i being biased and she was not, where she was unable to explain the meta data of her studies. For instance, how does a female know she has been overlooked for a leadership position, BECAUSE she is a she and not a he? How does the data used, substabtiate that?

I have no doubt and have seen first hand, where there is a culture of not considering women in the same equivalency as men.
Japan comes to mind.

Ironically, Japan is one of the most polite and courteous cultures around Asia. Korea is similar

However, my observarion and discussion with an APAC colleague in HR, is that men in some groups have an unjustified bias towards hiring men.
However, women would do well to help themselves a lot. There isn't something misogynistic going on. There is a cultural imbalance, but nothing that a Japanese woman, in todays tight hiring market, can't navigate with perserverance and dedication.
It's similar for men. Men fight, compete and strive to achieve and overcome their colleagues and candidates. Leadership and power are not soley a male vs female issue. Power is not handed to men becuase they are men in corporate situations in modern markets.
Does it happen from time to time? Of course. But it's not ipso facto that men are put into leadership, BECAUSE they are men.

How many men are the lead editors of women's magazines?

I have never sat in a promotion or selection meeting and heard staffers say or even slightly infer the associate should get a promotion or be selected becuase they are a male.

But here's my current thinking - women tend to be more relationally and story oriented, men tend to be more number, object and functionally oriented.
My friend spoke pretty much uniformely in story telling and relating to other women she met.

It was largely how she felt. As i listened and listened, and tried to unpack her responses to my questions, it dawned on me that perhaps her highest priority was the journey, and not the data to support the context of the journey?

She referred back to many times of this course helping her to feel good about doing something to get women into power.

The other reflection that i had on our conversation was her constant and repeated use of the word "power" and a women's pursuit of it, almost as if it was the goal itself.
That is to say, the context of being in power was not very well articulated, or articulated at all.

And i think this is a really important point, becuase without giving context for why a gender should or ought to pursue power in of itself, is either misguided and on the other end, dangerous.

The way i think about this, is that men pursuing power, for the sake of control and what power brings, as we have seen, can usher in egregious effects. Same too with women.

That is, both sexes are deeply flawed and accessing power exacerbates bad effects.

However in my conversation with my friend, it came across as ipso facto, having more women in power will by virtue of their XX chromosome, usher in a higher or more moral or superior outcome.

I am unconvinced.

Now there is a growing set of data that comes to the conclusion that more women in a business, makes for higher profits.
One Mckinsey study i saw from a colleague doing his MBA and a sub project on the financial impact of women, showed that for every 10% more women in the company, the profitability rises commensurately by 2-4%.
(https://www.ft.com/content/1bc22040-1302-11e7-80f4-13e067d5072c)

The implication being : immediately stop hiring men and hire only women, as this will increase your bottom line. This is identity politics, and comprehensively disregards actual individual behaviour or competencies.

Where i reflect upon what my role or responsibility is, as a leader, is to enable others to be better, to unlock their potential through motivation and capabilities, to help them align their skills and desires with more options into the future.
And in that framework, be a leader that serves them, be they any gender.

Having worked in a company that from the bottoms up, is about the contest and markeplace of ideas. I have experienced first hand how diversity of POV and respectfully challenging inputs, creates better results and stronger teaming.

But i don't see them through a lens of gender or say sexual preference. As if who you sleep with or wether you have X or Y chromosomes is relevant to the battle of ideas.

But where gender can help is recognising that men and women bring different life expectations, hopes, experiences to the fore. Moreover it is proven that men and women think and process ideas differently, along with the nuances within the same sex.

How men and women work together also ushers in different working cultures and behaviours, which can be beneficial.

Just watch the differences where you have a single gender meeting vs one with both.

I think where i get unsettled with women's leadership courses, is that in some ways, it would be superior to have leadership training that encapsulates how to make great leaders for men and women, capturing their specific differences as men and women that enhance the opposite sex.
Moreover, from what i can tell and anecdotally researched, these women courses are more or less, run by women, constructed by women, networked between women and have women facilitating, wth the odd man come into speak about women leadership.
The Claymore Institute on Gender Studies, from Standford is an atypical example of this situation.

That is, men, who are seemingly the major obstacle to women leadership and getting into powerful positions are left off.

I turn over in my mind questions such as :

Have we (men and women) done a poor job at being better leaders?

What level of personal responsibility comes into play?

What augmented support is needed where it doesn't disenfranchise others unduly?

Why are we fixated on numbers, devoid of the context?

Am i doing the right things to help build others up?

What culture has gone into the person and their worldview?

My other question is, the way we enhance women in the workplace might be good but the means by how we do it, are not?

How we enhance men to be great leaders appreciating their characteristics and vice versa for women?

Socialism

American Politics

For a country that is the bastian of freedom, entrepreneurship, individual responsibility, it is fascinating that a 79 year old socialist is likely to be the lead presidential candidate in the up coming election.

Amazing.

Bernie Praises Murderous Communist Dictator Fidel Castro: ‘Had Massive Literacy Program’
https://www.dailywire.com/news/bernie-praises-murderous-communist-dictator-fidel-castro-had-massive-literacy-program

Illegal Colonialisation

Illegal Colonialisation

What universal moral law existed when other peoples, kingdoms or country's were colonising other regions of land?

How is land and property ownership a universal right?

Communisim certainly doesn't have that - in fact it has it as the opposite?

Atheism has nothing to say in this matter? Far less about what is owed or owned. 

Do I hate the impure things in my life?

Do i hate the impure things in my life?

It's a darn good question that i'd prefer to tell myself "hey, how about you distract yourself from answering that question?"

It might cause me to think about the sin in my life, especially the kind that causes grief on others and God.