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What I’ve learnt from being a woman in business

Quite often I find myself the only woman in the room. As an MD and business owner in the digital sector, I’m regularly in meetings or roundtable events or pitches where I’m the only female present. It’s never bothered me, it’s never held me back or intimidated me but I do notice it.

I went to an all-girls school and was very lucky to be brought up secure in the knowledge that I could do whatever I wanted in life. The school often had fantastic ex-pupils who came in and inspired us to want to go on to be doctors, designers, writers, librarians, swimmers… Anything really. After school, I went travelling and then set off to university having never heard of the glass ceiling and being incredibly and wonderfully naive to any kind of discrimination.

I’ve worked in a lot of male-dominated industries; telesales at a double-glazing company, a manufacturing company, a large accountancy firm and then my first agency role. Throughout these roles, I’ve faced my fair share of sexism and discrimination but back then I guess I didn’t think of it as something I could complain about and just laughed it off. On the flip side, I’ve also been very lucky along the way with really fantastic senior female role models including bosses and colleagues who were all inspirational to me.

So now, as an agency owner, how do I feel about ‘feminism’? People have different opinions on what that means but my belief is this. Men and women should be treated equally. They should be given the same amount of time and attention, and opportunities should be presented to them based on ability, not gender.

Women in business also have different ways of handling the gender issue. I remember once visiting an accountant with a male colleague and despite him being told I was the one who “looked after all the money” and was the one asking all the questions he spent the entire time talking to my male colleague. At the end of the meeting, I asked him why. I told him I found it quite rude and wondered if he knew he was doing it. He was entirely apologetic and didn’t really have an answer. I’d like to think it might have made him think twice in future.

I’ve taken the same approach in a few similar situations, politely highlighted directly to the person involved how their behaviour might be perceived. It’s probably worth pointing out that it’s not always men. I was sent an email a few weeks ago from the IOD and it was sponsored by a company that offered corporate financing to women only. Immediately I was confused – what kind of service would I require as a woman that would be different to men? When I looked at the website my worst fears were confirmed – a pink website, with butterflies and watercolours of women with long flowing hair. Then when I read the blog I was treated to an explanation of corporate financing being similar to buying a jacket in the sale. I actually rang the woman who owned the company and she’d done some amazing things. I explained that, to me, her content was patronising and I felt insulted by it. She didn’t entirely agree with my view on things but she conceded that her blog content may be out-dated and promised to review it.

I’m strongly against marketing non-gender specific things solely to women. We all saw the backlash Bic got for bringing out a ‘Pen for Girls’, which of course was pink. If you have a minute the response on Twitter to this was one of the best things I’ve seen. I feel the same way about networking events. Why have female only networking events? I’d be furious if there were male-only ones. The thought that I’d do business with someone based on their gender is the direct opposite of equality, isn’t it? And I do concede the point that as society isn’t equal NOW then these kind of events help re-address the balance but I’d rather ensure I always behave in the way I want to be treated. It’s usually made worse by the way these events are marketing. PINK always pink and ‘cheeky cocktails’ and ‘get your nails done at the same time’. It’s terrible and just needs to stop.

So to try and stop future cringe-worthy situations these are my top five things NOT to say and do to women in business:

1. Ignore her in a meeting favouring to speak to the man in the room.
2. Be surprised when she tells you her level of seniority and then say “good for you” really patronisingly.
3. Apologise “to the ladies in the room” for swearing.
4. Talk to us in terms of shopping, or beauty. We may like those things but we don’t need the share scheme structure analogising in that way.
5. Give us pink things.

And not forgetting the women out there, a couple of things to remember:

1. Don’t do any of the above either. Support each other.
2. Call people out. It doesn’t have to be confrontational it can be measured and polite but sometimes people don’t know they are doing it.

Words by: Jane Rutter is the Founder and MD of Zeal, A full service creative and digital agency in its 8th year of Trading. Zeal has offices in Leeds and London and a roster of National and Global clients.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Zeal .