Women leaders at The Telegraph, Creative Equals, Pentland Group, ITV and more share stories from their careers and offer strategies moving forward to help dramatically shift the advertising industry in a different direction.
The advertising and media worlds need more balanced leadership.
Overall diversity (according to the IPA’s Diversity Data) doesn’t make such a sight for sore eyes but take a look at gender disparity in the c-suite and you’ve got a very different story indeed. 67.3% of men are in the c-suite compared to just 32.7% of females.
In an industry notorious for gender imbalance, we asked 9 shortlisted Future IS Female nominees from all corners of the industry to share their views on gender imbalance and ways of supporting the career growth of young females.
AW360: Biggest industry change to ensure more women got to leadership positions?
SS: I would say we have to collectively stop feeding stereotypes, not in terms of opportunity but also in terms of work output. A woman creative can easily come up with an effective FIFA campaign, and a male creative can crack a beautiful idea for Dove. We don’t just deal with molds and pre-defined notions from recruiters and society but also a great deal from clients paying the bills and for the work that gets allocated to us. Navigating this bias can certainly open more doors for women to leadership positions in the industry.
AW360: What’s the best career advice you’ve ever been given?
SS: One of my female bosses told me; “You have to choose the relationship you will develop with your work. Is it going to be flirty-friendly with one step in one step out? Is it going to be one of those toxic tussles where you take too much on or burn yourself out or is it going to be one that you commit to, where you acknowledge it every step of the way, grow with your work and it becomes more of a companion and never feels like a chore?”
AW360: What’s your advice on helping ensure more women get to leadership positions in the future?
SM: Find allies. There is already a hierarchy that exists, not only the industry but in the system of working culture, society and its structure. We need more women to be allies and allow access for women to be in the room and have the patience to grow and enable progression within the industry.
AW360: What’s the best career advice you’ve ever been given?
SM: Dan who is also the founder of The Elephant Room has said to me in the past that you have to be yourself and understand why you’re in the room. Ask yourself the question: is this value to me, am I getting what I need from it to be the best person possible? I’ve carried that with me for as long as I can remember.
Karen Eccles, Director, Commercial Innovation at The Telegraph Media
AW360: What’s your advice on helping ensure more women get to leadership positions in the future?
KE: I don’t think there’s one answer. From my personal experience I believe in a combination of key factors:
1. Men becoming more actively engaged in ensuring their female colleagues and peers have the same access and opportunities they do and speaking up wherever they see inequality.
2. Every company ensuring that their C Suite and senior leadership teams are 50:50 male / female. There is plenty of talent out there.
3. Equal parental leave & men actually feeling the confidence to take it, so that maternity/paternity breaks become the equitable norm.
4. More help for returners and more ‘older’ women in senior roles to act as role models and trailblazers for the women coming up below them. I know I’m biased but there’s a rich vein of women who take time out to raise families or continue their education and then feel out in the cold when they are ready to return to the industry. Their old peer group has often moved on and it’s hard to get that break to get back on the ladder. I managed to get back into full-time work by freelancing for a company that eventually offered me a job once they saw what I could do for them; but had I interviewed for that role after my maternity break I doubt I would have got it. I think we lose too many women from the industry in their early to mid 30’s, stalling their careers just as they are hitting their prime. We need to see them push through to leadership and C-Suite roles, whatever their choices happen to be about having families or not.
AW360: What’s the best career advice you’ve ever been given?
KE: So much great advice from previous managers and coaches, but my favorite advice from the past year which changed my experience of being a full time working mum-of-three was Karen Blackett’s advice to ‘leave loudly’ if we have to dash off from work early to a family obligation. Now instead of sliding out quietly to attend parents’ evenings or concerts, I broadcast it. She is right – if we feel the need to hide our lives outside work then some choices will continue to feel like an either/or. You can excel at your job and be a good parent, and ‘leaving loudly’ helps to make that the accepted norm.
Charlotte Cox, Brand Director, Teamsports, Pentland Brands
AW360: The biggest change that could happen in the industry to ensure more women get to leadership positions is…
CC: Attracting and developing more women in leadership roles requires company-wide change but this has to be driven from the top. It requires increased levels of senior engagement in gender balance and CEO driven initiatives to recruit, promote and retain women. Equality in leadership is not a women’s issue; it’s a business issue. As leaders, we all need to demonstrate this is a business priority by what we say, do, how we measure progress and how we lead to make an impact to shape the change.
The World Economic Forum recently shared that it will take 208 years to reach gender equality in the USA – if this is the biggest consumer market in the world, saying it once in an organization is not enough. Indeed, we will need to keep re-enforcing this as a business priority time and time again.
AW360: Who do you admire in the industry (or outside)?
CC: Jacinda Ardern (Prime Minister of New Zealand) the youngest female Prime Minister in New Zealand history. Increased gender balance will only happen if the biggest sectors that have the ability to impact change lead the way such as politics, technology, advertising, etc. When I visited the home of the Canterbury brand, in New Zealand, I heard that Jacinda projects authenticity and communicates with people in an honest and open way using kindness as a guiding leadership principle.
Ali Hanan, Founder and CEO, Creative Equals
AW360: What’s your advice on helping ensure more women get to leadership positions in the future?
AH: There are so many areas to dig into and understand fully. The biggest change is getting companies to understand the challenge of everyday systematic bias, which we see through our Equality Standard data. Bias is real: it holds women back from leadership roles. We see it exists on the shop floor in the way projects are allocated, people are picked for pitches or external opportunities, and chosen to work on clients. All leaders and line managers should stop, reflect and ask if bias is in play: do you have a culture of favouritism? Are there clear, transparent paths for career progression? Are visible role models on the board or at the top? What kind of data do you have to see these outcomes clearly?
The fact is we see is it’s ‘who’ gets access to opportunities within a business influences their career progress. We also see women experience a high level of ‘inappropriate behavior’ which means they don’t feel ‘safe’ at work, particularly women from BAME/multicultural backgrounds who experience this at a rate of 30%. The right to be ‘safe’ at work, feeling connected to the team, building a goal-orientated relationship with your line managers are all the things that need to change for women to be successful.
If you work at a company where the C-suite is not 50/50, ask your CEO what their plan is to get there.
AW360: What’s the best career advice you’ve ever been given?
Own your success. In a Major Players study, we discovered many women can manage to write their entire CVs without mentioning their achievements. They don’t say ‘I won, I led, I delivered’. The story women tell is often is a ‘we’ story, with their own role downplayed. Language is critical, particularly how you describe yourself. Speak articulately about how you achieved company goals, reached commercial objectives and took the lead on your projects and clients.
Anna Dilku – anna.dilku@aviva.com
Global Red Cross Partnership Manager
AW360: What would be the biggest change that could happen in the industry to ensure more women got to leadership positions?
AD: So many organizations in the industry are sitting on fantastic female talent but need to foster a more inclusive environment to help them to discover and develop it. A perceived lack of career progression opportunities can lead to women plateauing within their role or even leaving their employer altogether. Improving the visibility of relatable role models and sharing the successes of rising stars would help to remove misconceptions and address the leaking pipeline of women, ensuring more of them can get into leadership positions.
AW360: What’s the best career advice you’ve ever been given?
AD: Say “yes” to things you don’t think you can do. Whether it’s applying for a promotion, taking on a new task, or learning a difficult skill, one of the best ways to rapidly level-up or advance your career is to say “yes” to the scary stuff. Getting out of your comfort zone will help to equip you for your next role and, even if you don’t get it perfect the first time, the experience means you will learn and grow.
AW360: What would be the biggest change that could happen in the industry to ensure more women got to leadership positions?
LI: I think we can affect change by making change more visible. To encourage more women across all areas and levels in media, we need to be able to see and celebrate the women who are already doing fantastic work across our industry. Different people are going to be inspired by different profiles and achievements, so it’s important that we elevate relatable role models across all levels of seniority and from diverse backgrounds. And we can all get involved – by stepping up yourself, or encouraging and celebrating the contributions of the people in your teams and around you.
AW360: What’s the best career advice you’ve ever been given?
LI: Embrace change. It’s a piece of advice given to me by my mother when I was a young girl, and once I returned to time and time again throughout school, university, in every role and life transition. Accepting that change is both a given and a tremendous opportunity for growth means that you are a perpetual student; every interaction can be a chance to learn something new. I think this is so important for us in our fast-paced advertising industry. Constant change means no one is ever the expert for long. Embracing change means being prepared to be challenged and stretched, and to
challenge others in return.
AW360: What would be the biggest change that could happen in the industry to ensure more women got to leadership positions?
CE: Break some rules by decoupling experience from tenure and recognition. The received wisdom was that every 10 years a business churns itself. Today the life cycle of a business is 18 months. Within this context when hiring for leadership positions, businesses should challenge the conventional wisdom that age equals experience and think for more creative proxies for whether the candidate has the right experience for the role, rather than tenure, particularly when it comes to senior appointments and non-exec directorships. The culture of the industry needs to be less vertical in its thinking towards hiring, promotion, and retention. This will accelerate more women into leadership positions which in turn will help others see that this can be the rule, rather than the exception.
AW360: What would be the biggest change that could happen in the industry to ensure more women got to leadership positions?
CE: I would say we have to collectively stop feeding stereotypes, not in terms of opportunity but also in terms of work output. A woman creative can easily come up with an effective FIFA campaign, and a male creative can crack a beautiful idea for Dove. We don’t just deal with moulds and pre-defined notions from recruiters and society but also a great deal from clients paying the bills and for the work that gets allocated to us. Navigating this bias can certainly open more doors for women to leadership positions in the industry.
AW360: What’s the best career advice you’ve ever been given?
CE: One of my female bosses told me; “You have to choose the relationship you will develop with your work, is it going to be flirty-friendly with one step in one step out, is it going to be one of those toxic tussles where you take too much on or burn yourself out or is it going to be one that you commit to, where you acknowledge it every step of the way, grow with your work and it becomes more of a companion and never feels like a chore.”