Speaker 1: Hi, This is Malan Vervier and this is Kim Azarelli.
Speaker 1: We are co authors of the book Fast Forward, How
Speaker 1: Women Can Achieve Power and Purpose, and you're listening to
Speaker 1: Seneca's conversations on power and Purpose. Welcome to this special edition.
Speaker 1: This new six part series called Getting to Equal will
Speaker 1: change the way you think about women and leadership, and
Speaker 1: it comes at a time when women's leadership has never
Speaker 1: been more crucial. We have two amazing leaders who are
Speaker 1: guest hosting these six episodes, Carol and Tastad, Group President
Speaker 1: North America and Deiana Bass, vice President Global Diversity, Equality
Speaker 1: and Inclusion, both from PNG, one of the largest consumer
Speaker 1: goods companies in the world. Together, Caroline and Diana have
Speaker 1: created an impressive gender equality strategy for PNG, and it's
Speaker 1: a strategy that's really breaking new ground on these issues
Speaker 1: in the private sector. And they'll be joined by incredible
Speaker 1: guests from all walks of life. In today's episode of
Speaker 1: Getting to Equal, Caroline Indianna talk with Tina Chen, the
Speaker 1: president and CEO of Times Up. They'll discuss the workplace obstacles,
Speaker 1: including sexual harassment and unequal pay, that make it hard
Speaker 1: for women to succeed, and they offer solutions and perspectives
Speaker 1: to help address those issues. Caroline, Indiana, thanks so much
Speaker 1: for joining us again today. I'm very much looking forward
Speaker 1: to hearing your conversation with Tina Chen. Thank you, Kim.
Speaker 1: For the last few years, there has been a sustained
Speaker 1: and focused national conversation on the experiences of women in
Speaker 1: the workplace, and no conversation about women in the workplace
Speaker 1: would be complete without talking about the hard things. One
Speaker 1: of those topics is sexual harassment and the entire ecosystem
Speaker 1: of issues that can make the workplace uncomfortable, unproductive, disrespectful,
Speaker 1: and even unsafe for women. These issues can hold women back,
Speaker 1: keep them from advancing, and even motivate them to leave
Speaker 1: the work force entirely. You know, Dianna, It's something that
Speaker 1: every company has to confront and must be constantly alert to.
Speaker 1: Companies have a mandate to construct a work environment where
Speaker 1: everyone feels safe and where everyone every individual can thrive. Now,
Speaker 1: all workplace sexual harassment has been around for as long
Speaker 1: as women have been in the workplace. In lateen things
Speaker 1: reached a tipping point with revelations about Harvey Weinstein, followed
Speaker 1: by headlines about so many other once powerful leaders but
Speaker 1: this is a broader issue than sexual harassment. It's related
Speaker 1: to pay equality and the fair treatment of people in
Speaker 1: the workplace. And what's important to remember is that when
Speaker 1: these topics are not discussed, or when unfairness goes unspoken,
Speaker 1: and when action is not taken, you get a culture
Speaker 1: where entire groups of people are marginalized and undervalued. You're
Speaker 1: so right, Caroline. I am very happy to welcome a
Speaker 1: woman who has, throughout her career been at the forefront
Speaker 1: of the fight for workplaces that work for everyone. Tina
Speaker 1: Chen is president and CEO of Time's Up, which was
Speaker 1: started at the moment when the sexual harassment became a
Speaker 1: front burner issue. Formally, Tina was assistant to President Obama,
Speaker 1: Executive director of the White House Council on Women and Girls,
Speaker 1: and chief of staff of former First Lady Michelle Obama.
Speaker 1: Tina has a long history of advocating for gender equality,
Speaker 1: particularly for working women. Time's Up is dedicated to ensuring
Speaker 1: workplaces that are safe, dignified, and fair for women of
Speaker 1: all kinds. I'm so excited to welcome you to the
Speaker 1: podcast with us to day, Tina. Thank you for being here. Oh,
Speaker 1: it's a real pleasure. To be here. Thanks for having me, Tina.
Speaker 1: Let's start with what Time's Up is and why it
Speaker 1: was started. You know, you were there from the beginning,
Speaker 1: as you co founded the Times Up Legal Defense Fund
Speaker 1: back in tell us about all of that. Well, you know,
Speaker 1: as you mentioned, there was this moment in October when,
Speaker 1: thanks to the reporting of the New York Times and
Speaker 1: the New York magazine, um, the stories about Harvey Weinstein
Speaker 1: cracked wide open. And what happened was women all of
Speaker 1: a sudden realized they weren't alone up until that point.
Speaker 1: So many of these women who were survivors of sexual
Speaker 1: harassment in the entertainment business thought they had suffered alone.
Speaker 1: Because actually that's one of the part of what I
Speaker 1: call the predators playbook, right, which was to keep people
Speaker 1: silent and siloed from one another so that the full
Speaker 1: dimensions of the problem were unknown. Um And spontaneously, these
Speaker 1: women started gathering in l a in late October just
Speaker 1: to come together to support one another, having realized they
Speaker 1: weren't alone. But to their credit, they very quickly turned
Speaker 1: their personal pain into action. They wanted to figure out
Speaker 1: what could they do, Recognizing they were women of privilege
Speaker 1: with platforms that would affect women in other industries and
Speaker 1: help them, and I happened to be in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: A lot of my life is just being in the
Speaker 1: right place at the right time. You just never know.
Speaker 1: And one of the things that became clear that we
Speaker 1: needed to do was to create some mechanism to get
Speaker 1: lawyers to help defend these women because the other part
Speaker 1: of the predators playbook was playing itself out. And that
Speaker 1: was as women started speaking up using the hashtag me
Speaker 1: too that Toronto Burke had launched several years earlier. Was
Speaker 1: they were getting threatened with defamation lawsuits, because that's what
Speaker 1: used to happen. If you spoke out, you were going
Speaker 1: to get sued, you know, by the predator, and that
Speaker 1: could have shut the whole thing down. It also became
Speaker 1: clear to me something as a lawyer I did not know,
Speaker 1: and that was although you can get attorney's fees in
Speaker 1: Title seven cases for sexual harassment, you can't get it
Speaker 1: if you're a low wage worker, right because your wages
Speaker 1: are so low, so the recovery is so low. So
Speaker 1: if you are a victim of sexual harassment as a
Speaker 1: restaurant worker, as a farm worker, you can't get somebody
Speaker 1: to take your case, and so we needed, you know,
Speaker 1: that little defense fund for them. So I'm really proud
Speaker 1: that the National Women's Loss Center took it on. But
Speaker 1: the part of Times Up that I'm now, you know,
Speaker 1: the as in CEO of is our advocacy you know,
Speaker 1: and impact lab research arm of the movement to really
Speaker 1: you know, expand to the work that we're doing. And
Speaker 1: what we're doing is number one, continuing to focus on
Speaker 1: survivor justice always right, subborting survivors when they speak up,
Speaker 1: like the Harvey Weinstein survivors during the Weinstein trial. But
Speaker 1: we also know we don't want to just keep dealing
Speaker 1: with the aftermath, right, you know, we don't want to
Speaker 1: just be in a world where we're picking up the
Speaker 1: pieces right after sexual harassment occurs. You know, to really
Speaker 1: keep sexual harassment from happening, you have to deal with
Speaker 1: all the structural barriers that are keeping women from having safe,
Speaker 1: fair and dignified work. You know, that are keeping us
Speaker 1: from having fully inclusive workplaces where women and people of
Speaker 1: color and lgbt QA and disabled workers can fully thrive.
Speaker 1: As you said, you know in the intro, and move
Speaker 1: up the scale. We know, if it work places are
Speaker 1: more inclusive, they are safer, right, and um, you know
Speaker 1: we need to then therefore address all those such structural barry.
Speaker 1: So it is things like pay equity and paid leave
Speaker 1: and fairer hiring and promotion practices and the whole panempally
Speaker 1: of structural barriers in our workplaces. And so that's our
Speaker 1: mission is to you know, also work force safere and
Speaker 1: dignified work through changing you know, um, people, company and laws,
Speaker 1: so you know, really you know, addressing you know, public policy,
Speaker 1: addressing companies and private policy, and addressing you know, our
Speaker 1: culture and what we can do broadly in our world
Speaker 1: with people so important. That's so important, Tina, and I
Speaker 1: really appreciate the fact that you talk about fixing the
Speaker 1: structural issues. We talk about it in our language as
Speaker 1: fixed the system, but it is about getting at much
Speaker 1: more breadth of what happens in the workplace. And so
Speaker 1: i'm you know, there's such a significant impact to the workplace,
Speaker 1: particularly workplaces were harassment and um it is part of
Speaker 1: the culture. Can you talk a little bit about that. No,
Speaker 1: it's an important question. I mean, when you when sexual
Speaker 1: harassment is happening, that's a symptom, it's a symptom of
Speaker 1: a toxic workplace. Right, once you get to the point
Speaker 1: you know of um, you know, actual sexual assaults happening
Speaker 1: in the workplace, you've really got something very broken, you know,
Speaker 1: within a workplace. And let's be clear, sexual harassment occurs
Speaker 1: on a spectrum. You know, we talk, you know, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of attention to the Harvey Weinstein or the
Speaker 1: less Moon Vez you know, types of actual criminal sexual
Speaker 1: assault that we're happening in those cases. But harassment isn't
Speaker 1: just that. It's also you know, the more subtle verbal
Speaker 1: you know, harassment that occurs, you know, based on someone's gender,
Speaker 1: or based on someone's race or disability. You know, the
Speaker 1: cutting jokes, right, the belittling that happens. You know that
Speaker 1: then there's also sort of an escalation that looks like
Speaker 1: it's favorable, the I like what you're wearing, and how
Speaker 1: about some drinks, and then let's go on a business trip.
Speaker 1: And you know, you know, if at each moment, none
Speaker 1: of as a manager, you don't stop that, you don't
Speaker 1: address those microaggressions and those lesser forms of harassment, you
Speaker 1: wind up with a workplace that's escalated all the way
Speaker 1: to a place that's unsafe, and that affects your entire workplace. Right,
Speaker 1: it's not just the fact that the women have to
Speaker 1: suffer it. They're not as productive, they're not able to
Speaker 1: bring their full selves to the workplace. They will leave
Speaker 1: your workplace, so you're gonna lose your talent, will have
Speaker 1: high turnover rates. Um. You know, there's also the bullying
Speaker 1: that's not even sexual at all, you know, toxic workplace culture,
Speaker 1: and that's not even illegal. But the legal the bar
Speaker 1: for let bad behavior is really low. When you lose,
Speaker 1: you use the legal definitions because things like just the
Speaker 1: equal opportunity bullying, the guy who yells at everyone and
Speaker 1: throws telephones of people's heads, it's not illegal. And in fact,
Speaker 1: the winning defense in sexual harassment cases is to say, oh,
Speaker 1: I don't just harass women, I harass everybody. And if
Speaker 1: you add rass everybody, you win, You win the sexual
Speaker 1: harassment case. But I would so believable, right, I would submit.
Speaker 1: If you're and you all round, cup, you know you're
Speaker 1: running a company, right, as managers, that's probably not the
Speaker 1: workplace you want, right. That is not the kind of thriving,
Speaker 1: productive workplace that you want to have. Um, and and
Speaker 1: so that's why you've got to address culture, workplace culture,
Speaker 1: you know, broadly, because that's what we're trying to fix,
Speaker 1: UM and all of these other ways in which you
Speaker 1: make sure you have a diverse and inclusive culture. UM
Speaker 1: is part of it how you bring people who are
Speaker 1: diverse into the workplace, but then also how people treat
Speaker 1: one another in the workplace. UM. And I'm sure you
Speaker 1: all know this. UM is that tone of the top manners, right,
Speaker 1: you know, it starts at the top of a company.
Speaker 1: You know, and I've been saying to see ears that
Speaker 1: I've talked with, Look, this is every bit is important
Speaker 1: right now, how you fix your culture as your new
Speaker 1: technology is right or the latest real estate investment you're
Speaker 1: gonna make is a company because your forces your talent
Speaker 1: and you know right now, you know, the other thing
Speaker 1: that happens or the negative enforcement from the Harvey Weinstein moment,
Speaker 1: was all of a sudden companies realized, oh there's risk here. Right.
Speaker 1: It's not just something that's kind of like a nice
Speaker 1: to do for my employees thing. If I don't pay
Speaker 1: attention to culture, there's huge enterprise risk here. UM. And
Speaker 1: I think that was a motivator for companies to start changing.
Speaker 1: You know, it's interesting. One of the things that we
Speaker 1: talk a lot about is that, you know, in this
Speaker 1: work you have to really hold two realities. And one
Speaker 1: reality is that most men don't harass women, and the
Speaker 1: other reality is that most women do not lie about
Speaker 1: their experience of harassment or hostile work environments. I mean,
Speaker 1: both of those things are true. And so you know,
Speaker 1: peeling back the layers of the complexity of this issue
Speaker 1: in the workplace is really difficult. Research tells us that
Speaker 1: you're absolutely right, that is a very small percentage you know,
Speaker 1: you know, somewhere less than ten percent of and are
Speaker 1: you know, you know the people who are committing of
Speaker 1: the sexual solves. And the problem there is there were
Speaker 1: pe defenders, like when you tend to do this once,
Speaker 1: you tend to do it over and over again, which
Speaker 1: is why it's so important as employers to catch that
Speaker 1: right so that it doesn't happen over and over. And
Speaker 1: that's why that this this sort of silence that grew
Speaker 1: up around silencing survivors and not talking about it in
Speaker 1: a company and not people you know, employment actions being
Speaker 1: taken in secret, so you didn't know who was a
Speaker 1: sexual harasser and they could move to another part of
Speaker 1: the company, for example, because it wasn't identified. You know,
Speaker 1: um creates the problem and perpetuates it. And you're absolutely right.
Speaker 1: I get the question all the time about what about
Speaker 1: false reporting? Right? And again, what we know from the
Speaker 1: sexual soult field, And there's been study after study to
Speaker 1: try to demonstrate, you know, false reporting, and nobody has
Speaker 1: been ever able to document anything higher than a seven
Speaker 1: rate of false reporting, right, because think about it, people,
Speaker 1: what you have to go through as a survivor, why
Speaker 1: would you just make that up and bring it forward? Right?
Speaker 1: And and so the vast majority of women who raise
Speaker 1: these claims, you know, aren't lying about it. And but
Speaker 1: here's the system. We don't we believe at times, up,
Speaker 1: it isn't believe all survivors. That's not our call, you know,
Speaker 1: it is survivors need to be heard, and they're you know,
Speaker 1: what they're saying needs to be taken seriously, and there
Speaker 1: doesn't need to be due process. You know, we're not
Speaker 1: saying don't investigate and don't come out with a conclusion
Speaker 1: at the end. And at the conclusion at the end
Speaker 1: is it didn't happen. Well, then okay, Joe, but we
Speaker 1: need a fair process where the survivors you know, story
Speaker 1: was taken seriously and investigated, not just simply dismissed or
Speaker 1: swept under the rock, which is what typically happens. Have
Speaker 1: you seen any impact during the pandemic of either increased
Speaker 1: or decrease impact of harassment, hostile work environment experiences of women?
Speaker 1: You know, remember hara sment doesn't require physical presence, right,
Speaker 1: And I think the misnomer is harassment is only happening
Speaker 1: when I get you in the hotel room. That's not
Speaker 1: that's maybe the far end of the extreme. But harassment
Speaker 1: can happen on zoom calls, right. You know what people
Speaker 1: what what? What? People? You know are people who are
Speaker 1: shut down when they speak people, whether they're called, you know,
Speaker 1: belittling names, are treated like they don't have you know,
Speaker 1: they aren't you know, a serious participant in the Zoom meetings.
Speaker 1: We've heard stories of women who are getting you know,
Speaker 1: harassed by their you know, um uh manager because they're
Speaker 1: calling them at three o'clock in the morning, making all
Speaker 1: sorts of demands on them, you know, over the phone
Speaker 1: or again, belittling their work, work product and their conduct. Um. So, Yes,
Speaker 1: harassment can happen remotely. It's harder for managers to spot.
Speaker 1: It's one of the things that prompted us actually, in
Speaker 1: this moment of crisis, to put out something called the
Speaker 1: Times of Guide to Equity and Inclusion during crisis, which
Speaker 1: folks can get. You know, you can text the word
Speaker 1: leaders to three zero six four four to get open
Speaker 1: source free be the guide downloaded. Don't forget that when
Speaker 1: you're working remotely. Not everyone's home space is a safe space,
Speaker 1: right So the domestic violence Hotline has seen increases in calls,
Speaker 1: you know, with everyone can find in the home, it's
Speaker 1: not always a safe space for everyone, and employers should
Speaker 1: be thinking about that too. We'll be back after this break, Tina,
Speaker 1: this is such a fascinating conversation. I want to pivot
Speaker 1: a little bit and we want to shift a discussion
Speaker 1: to the issue of pay equality. Can let's talk about
Speaker 1: what you're seeing right now for women in the area
Speaker 1: of pay equality. Well, we just did a survey actually
Speaker 1: at times U um U in the summer, we did
Speaker 1: a a national survey with Chestadham and Perry and hum Research,
Speaker 1: you know, uh to find out what people are thinking
Speaker 1: about pay equity during a pandemic, during an economic crisis.
Speaker 1: I was heartened because it showed that over an overwhelming
Speaker 1: majority of both men and women, So we're talking about overall.
Speaker 1: In the survey of men even agreed that addressing pay
Speaker 1: equity even during a crisis is a critical important UM
Speaker 1: priority that we all need to address. UM. It's very
Speaker 1: different because I lived through the last Great Recession in
Speaker 1: the White House, right and working you know, on the
Speaker 1: White House counsel on Women and Girls, And what we
Speaker 1: found back then was people just thought they just wanted
Speaker 1: a job. You know, in issues of pay equity and
Speaker 1: paid leave, we're just personal issues for me to figure out,
Speaker 1: not public policy issues for legislators or something for my
Speaker 1: manager and my employer to figure out. And that has
Speaker 1: shifted in the last decade where people now recognize that
Speaker 1: these issues of the structural barriers for working families. Our
Speaker 1: issue is that we all need to care about Employers
Speaker 1: need to care about public policy makers need to care
Speaker 1: about UM. And that really showed on in our in
Speaker 1: our survey. But you know, the downside was, you know
Speaker 1: the huge impact that pay in equalities having, especially on
Speaker 1: black women and Latin X women. You know, a majority
Speaker 1: of Latin X women in our survey don't have two
Speaker 1: hundred dollars in their bank account right now. They're struggling
Speaker 1: to just make ends meet. Um uh. And you know
Speaker 1: that that goes for you know, like forty percent of
Speaker 1: black women. Um. And meanwhile that that's twelve percent of
Speaker 1: white men are experiencing that. And you know, we also asked,
Speaker 1: you know, what what would it take right what do
Speaker 1: you need to succeed in your job? And pay quality,
Speaker 1: you know, was one. They also know that they're not
Speaker 1: getting pay equity because of race discrimination and gender discrimination. UM.
Speaker 1: You know, we've you know, got majorities of black and
Speaker 1: brown women who are saying they had to leave jobs
Speaker 1: because of race and gender discrimination that was occurring. Um.
Speaker 1: And they also point the way to the things that
Speaker 1: we need, and it's all of the system fixes that
Speaker 1: we've been talking about. They need jobs that include paid
Speaker 1: leave and paid sick leave, you know, and better promotion practices. Um.
Speaker 1: And those are the things so you know, even in
Speaker 1: a pandemic moment, even in an economic crisis, what we're
Speaker 1: trying to say to companies is this is the opportunity
Speaker 1: to build your company back better. You know, build our
Speaker 1: economy back better. Um, make sure that we are more
Speaker 1: resilient for the future, because if we are, you know,
Speaker 1: this is a time when you've actually stripped your company down, right,
Speaker 1: if you furload everybody, then re examine your pay policies
Speaker 1: and start bringing people back into jobs where the pay
Speaker 1: inequity has been fixed. You know. So there's an opportunity
Speaker 1: in this horrible crisis, and that is I've been lining
Speaker 1: you know what we're going through to like stripping our economy,
Speaker 1: and it was a house down to the bare foundations. Right,
Speaker 1: everything is out of the house because everything is broken.
Speaker 1: When the opportunity now is to build our structures back better, right,
Speaker 1: when build and incorporate in them the things that we need.
Speaker 1: You know that think about paid sicklely. We've been talking
Speaker 1: a lot about paisickly as an example of this. You know,
Speaker 1: we are one of you know, just a handful of
Speaker 1: countries around the world that does not have some form
Speaker 1: of national paisickly policy. Well, what if we and then
Speaker 1: we had to scramble right to put an emergency one
Speaker 1: into the Cares Act. I think what it would have
Speaker 1: been if we had had one, If we had a
Speaker 1: national paisickly policy going into the pandemic, If businesses had
Speaker 1: been able to already build that cost into their business plan,
Speaker 1: if workers knew they had paid sickly to take so
Speaker 1: they could stay home if they were sick without risking
Speaker 1: their job or their paycheck or their family member was sick.
Speaker 1: You know, think how much better we would have been
Speaker 1: and we could be right now in managing this pandemic.
Speaker 1: And I would suggest to all of the business leaders
Speaker 1: who are listening, you do not have to wait for
Speaker 1: Congress to act. If Congress is acting slow or you're
Speaker 1: staying legislature, you can set the policies in your company
Speaker 1: that are more forward leaning and forward looking. And I
Speaker 1: would suggest if you do that right now, you are
Speaker 1: the business that's going to come out of the pandemic quicker,
Speaker 1: come out of the recovery quicker, and will be more
Speaker 1: resilient and ready for the next crisis, because we know
Speaker 1: another one will come eventually, and you will be able
Speaker 1: to build your business back better and more, you know, stronger,
Speaker 1: with more talent that is deeply invested in your business.
Speaker 1: You're absolutely right, Tina, and I want to go back
Speaker 1: to pay equality through that same lens it's so important
Speaker 1: that pay equality also be seen as an issue by
Speaker 1: both women and men. It has to become the minimum
Speaker 1: standard for companies looking at gender, race, disability, and more.
Speaker 1: And there's a related topic which sets an even higher standard,
Speaker 1: and that is wealth equality, which is starting to be
Speaker 1: a broader conversation around the world. Wealth equality is about
Speaker 1: the amount of wealth that women and men accumulate over
Speaker 1: their careers. It relies on having women get equal access
Speaker 1: to higher paying fields and higher paying jobs, and it
Speaker 1: requires all of us to look at our total talent
Speaker 1: bull when we're making advancement decisions. Otherwise those disparities remain
Speaker 1: at every level, and then the compounding impact of that
Speaker 1: creates a significant wealth gap for women versus men. A
Speaker 1: P and G. We've declared that we want to have
Speaker 1: fifty fifty representation at all levels of our company and
Speaker 1: representation of multicultural individuals in the US. We are working
Speaker 1: hard to ensure that we have women equally represented in
Speaker 1: the highest paying roles, whether that's leading a business unit,
Speaker 1: leading a technical center, or a manufacturing plant. And I'm
Speaker 1: really proud to share that today forty percent of our
Speaker 1: managers are women. Over of our c suite executives or women,
Speaker 1: and of our dependent directors on our board are women.
Speaker 1: Well unfamiliar with the work of PNG, and you you
Speaker 1: all have been doing a great job. I mean you've
Speaker 1: been intentional about it and put the work in and
Speaker 1: that's what it requires. That is what it requires. Intentionality
Speaker 1: is word we use so often, and as we've also
Speaker 1: said so many times, we know that women are highly effective,
Speaker 1: proven leaders, and we need to ensure that we give
Speaker 1: them that equal opportunity to lead. And in fact, on
Speaker 1: that note, Tina, I'd love to hear about the campaign
Speaker 1: you've started at Times Up, which is called we Have
Speaker 1: Her Back. So we launched you know, we Have Her
Speaker 1: Back in August, right as Vice President Biden was a
Speaker 1: speculation about who would he pick as his EP nominee
Speaker 1: was happening, and myself and several other of my you know,
Speaker 1: women women leaders that I know, we feel like we've
Speaker 1: been to this movie before. We knew what was coming,
Speaker 1: right and we could see it even before our nominee
Speaker 1: was picked. The kind of misogynistic and also a racial
Speaker 1: slurs and suggestive language um that we're being used, and
Speaker 1: you know, we kind of decided we weren't going to
Speaker 1: sit quietly like anymore about that? UM, And so we
Speaker 1: launched you know, we have her Back in August hashtag
Speaker 1: we have her Back. Interestingly, we co wrote myself and
Speaker 1: several other women leaders co wrote a memo to news
Speaker 1: editors UM just the weekend before Senator Harris was picked
Speaker 1: as a VP nominee, and we sent it out that
Speaker 1: that Friday morning, the weekend before before there was a nominee, saying,
Speaker 1: you know, we know he's going to pick a woman.
Speaker 1: Here's the thing you should watch out for in your reporting.
Speaker 1: Don't call her ambitious. Don't focus on her clothes or
Speaker 1: what she looks like, or what her husband did you know,
Speaker 1: or her personal pass and lo and behold twenty four
Speaker 1: not twenty four hours later, The New York Times ran
Speaker 1: a headline about risk corsages and comparing you know, like
Speaker 1: the last general lead for our race too. You know,
Speaker 1: did Walter Mondo want to bring a risk corsage to
Speaker 1: early for hour when they first met? And even worse,
Speaker 1: l A Times ran a story that compared you know,
Speaker 1: the VP nominee selection process to The Bachelor and compared
Speaker 1: you know, the White House to the Ultimate Fantasy Suite.
Speaker 1: It's like horrific, and they proved the case of why
Speaker 1: we needed we have her back. And there's been so
Speaker 1: many examples since then. And here's the problem, though, and
Speaker 1: here's how it relates to what's happening inside your company
Speaker 1: and other companies, is when women leaders are talked about
Speaker 1: like that, we then you know, there's a reason why
Speaker 1: we haven't been able to crack that highest class ceiling
Speaker 1: of the presidents of the United States, because that's how
Speaker 1: we talk about women leaders in our political discourse, and
Speaker 1: therefore we don't see women leaders as being able to
Speaker 1: occupy the highest homs. But it's not just that, you know,
Speaker 1: political discourse is so permanent. You know, it is the
Speaker 1: reason why not only can you not see a woman
Speaker 1: as president in the United States or vice president of
Speaker 1: the United States, you don't see your s CEO of
Speaker 1: your company or a director of your company. You don't
Speaker 1: see her as a district manager at that level. You know,
Speaker 1: the server and a restaurant who aspires to be the
Speaker 1: manager of a restaurant. The restaurant owners don't see her
Speaker 1: in that way. Because we are getting culturated to thinking
Speaker 1: of women not as women leaders, but as contestants on
Speaker 1: the Bachelor, and that's why we did this. And it's
Speaker 1: so deep. I have to say, right, this is this
Speaker 1: is so much the social norms, and that's why we
Speaker 1: want we have our back. We're trying to call it out,
Speaker 1: not to do cancel culture. It's not that is to
Speaker 1: get people to recognize the coded terms, the language they're using,
Speaker 1: and push back against it and don't let that be
Speaker 1: part of your decision making process, whether it's voting or
Speaker 1: trying to figure out who's gonna be the next manager
Speaker 1: in your company. That's exactly right, Tina. You know, I
Speaker 1: want to go back to the perception and language we
Speaker 1: use about women. You're talking about this earlier, but it's
Speaker 1: not just about the vice presidential race, and it's not
Speaker 1: just about one woman. I mean, we're o numb to
Speaker 1: the language that's used in the media and online and
Speaker 1: in everyday conversations that we don't even hear it anymore.
Speaker 1: I just had to pause on that for a moment,
Speaker 1: you know. I I keep saying to Caroline, I'm just
Speaker 1: so mad, and I don't know who I should be
Speaker 1: mad at. You don't know why you're mad, because it's
Speaker 1: just coming from all sorts of places and you can't
Speaker 1: even identify where it's coming from. Right. I had an
Speaker 1: activist one described that we're all living in a soup, right,
Speaker 1: and when you're in the middle of the soup, you
Speaker 1: sort of can't see it, right, and it can't taste it,
Speaker 1: and you can you don't know where the flavors are
Speaker 1: coming from, but they're surrounding you, right. You know, you
Speaker 1: need to sort of pull back from the soup and
Speaker 1: taste it and be able to understand what's going on.
Speaker 1: And that's what we're trying to do with we have
Speaker 1: our back is at least peel back that veil of
Speaker 1: what's the subtle signals that are affecting our culture. You know,
Speaker 1: culture is really important. It affects how we think about people.
Speaker 1: It's affects how we treat one another. You know, it
Speaker 1: does affect the issues around um tangible things like wealth
Speaker 1: inequality that we started talking about, because it affects, you know,
Speaker 1: how people advance, how they're viewed in their workplace, how
Speaker 1: they're evaluated. You know, Tina. The other thing that I
Speaker 1: want to just go back to for a moment is
Speaker 1: your comments earlier about the importance of national sickly, the
Speaker 1: importance of parental leave, the importance of flexibility in our
Speaker 1: policies that applies equally and gets used and adopted equally
Speaker 1: by men and women, because it also broadens that opportunity
Speaker 1: for men to play a bigger role at home with family,
Speaker 1: with childcare, with schooling, with homework, with dental appointments, whatever
Speaker 1: the case might be. And and that's another big important
Speaker 1: part of this, because the more that we can broaden
Speaker 1: the role and the norm for men, it also has
Speaker 1: a positive impact for women. You know, we have to
Speaker 1: start seeing UM women UH women's leadership as as something
Speaker 1: that is highly effective and something we should expect. We
Speaker 1: have to begin to see that men washing dishes, or
Speaker 1: diapering babies or taking kids to school in the morning
Speaker 1: is also the norm that we should come to expect,
Speaker 1: and these policies are an important part of that as well. Oh,
Speaker 1: it's interesting you mentioned that when I was in the
Speaker 1: White House, you know, we had a huge working Families
Speaker 1: agenda that we did and we worked on and we
Speaker 1: actually had the first ever White House some of them
Speaker 1: Working Families UM. And in one of the lead up
Speaker 1: events to that large summit we had, there were so
Speaker 1: many events on specific issues and one of them was
Speaker 1: on men on stay at home dad's you know, and
Speaker 1: the support that they need. There was a Mets player
Speaker 1: who actually took two days off and missed a game
Speaker 1: or two because for the birth of his son, and
Speaker 1: was roundly supported by the Mets, by the way in
Speaker 1: wait j League Baseball, but roundly criticized on sports radio, right,
Speaker 1: And we brought him in to talk about it, and
Speaker 1: there was there's a whole group of men who just
Speaker 1: were mazed and that they were at the White House
Speaker 1: talking about this. But the other thing that was striking
Speaker 1: is that we had some child psychologists, you know, a
Speaker 1: guy from Yale who came in and talked about the
Speaker 1: fact that it's demonstrated that if men are involved with
Speaker 1: their children, you know, in the zero to three range
Speaker 1: of their lives, that has lifelong effects you know, on
Speaker 1: child development, on child achievement. Absolutely, and you're absolutely right.
Speaker 1: These need to be policies that are parental leave, not
Speaker 1: maternal leave, you know, and men need to take it right.
Speaker 1: So the other thing about tone at the top is
Speaker 1: we need leaders at the top of the business to
Speaker 1: set the tone in the business to take the leave.
Speaker 1: When we build safer and dignified work. We're building it
Speaker 1: for everyone, for everyone to succeed. You know. We had
Speaker 1: a conversation with Eve Rodsky, uh, the author of a
Speaker 1: book called fair Play, and one of the things that
Speaker 1: we talked about with her on paid paternity leave is
Speaker 1: that not only is that really healthy for families, it's
Speaker 1: healthy for men. Um their outlook is better. But we
Speaker 1: also connected it back into the workplace that men who
Speaker 1: take paid paternity leave, paid parental leave come back into
Speaker 1: the workplace and have much greater empathy for women that
Speaker 1: are in that cycle as well, like they understand now
Speaker 1: what that all means. UM. And so I think in
Speaker 1: the world of creating workplaces that work for everyone at
Speaker 1: when when they come back in UM, that is also
Speaker 1: helpful for the women that they're working with who are
Speaker 1: going through childcare leave as well. Oh absolutely, And you know,
Speaker 1: and it is an ongoing thing. So it's not just
Speaker 1: dvery re leave moment. Right, We're not experiencing a moment
Speaker 1: where schools are closed, So what what are we doing
Speaker 1: during the day for kids if you've got school aged kids,
Speaker 1: but it's also elder care, you know, if they're if
Speaker 1: they're sick, UM and yourself self care. So caregiving really
Speaker 1: needs to get broadened and defined. And I am terribly worried.
Speaker 1: You know, that we are in a new caregiving crisis
Speaker 1: with this pandemic where you know, women are now opting
Speaker 1: out of the workforce because they have no choice, so
Speaker 1: there's no access to free or affordable childcare, and we
Speaker 1: I'm deeply concerned that we will lose all the progress
Speaker 1: we've made on women's labor force participation, where we're now
Speaker 1: in the labor force, that during the course of this pandemic,
Speaker 1: we're going to lose that, you know, and want employers
Speaker 1: to start thinking about if you've got a lot empty
Speaker 1: space now because you're only bringing half your workforce back
Speaker 1: to the office, maybe use that empty space so child
Speaker 1: aged school age kids can come to their school work,
Speaker 1: you know, one floor down from mom or dad, you know,
Speaker 1: so that mom and dad can actually come into the office.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think we need to start getting a
Speaker 1: little disruptive and a little creative in how we deliver
Speaker 1: caregiving in this country and how do we support the
Speaker 1: wages of these essential workers who are our caregivers and
Speaker 1: who are predominantly women. We're taking the house down to
Speaker 1: the foundation and building it differently, building it in a
Speaker 1: new way. Again. I'm moving to a slightly new topic here,
Speaker 1: but another industry that can probably use a reset is tech. Right.
Speaker 1: Tech drives everything we do, everything we touch, but it
Speaker 1: also has this huge gender gap. You know, I have
Speaker 1: a computer science degree, and I think there were more
Speaker 1: women graduating from computer science when I graduated in the
Speaker 1: eighties than they are today, which is a crazy stat right,
Speaker 1: And we need women in tech. We need women helping
Speaker 1: to design the products, the systems, and the world that
Speaker 1: we live in. UM there's a fun fact. PNG has
Speaker 1: the highest the nation's highest average rate of women credited
Speaker 1: with inventions, as determined by the number of patents that
Speaker 1: they've been assigned. Now, women inventors at PNG had a
Speaker 1: filing rate I think it's about which is higher than
Speaker 1: institutions and companies like M I, T, Microsoft, Amazon, UM,
Speaker 1: you know, and we make we make Tied and Pampers
Speaker 1: and Dodd you know. But one of the reasons our
Speaker 1: female inventor rate is so high is that of our
Speaker 1: employees working in research and development are women. And when
Speaker 1: you have diversity and invention, you get these products and
Speaker 1: applications that work for all people. So you know, these
Speaker 1: reset moments are so important. Well, absolutely, they used to
Speaker 1: complain it was a pipeline problem. I don't actually think
Speaker 1: it's a pipeline problem anymore. With increasing numbers of women
Speaker 1: with computer science backgrounds who are out there, they just
Speaker 1: are leaving, you know, and they're leaving because of the culture, right,
Speaker 1: the broa culture. And we've seen a lot of that
Speaker 1: um that happens. And I've addressed startups and I said, look,
Speaker 1: you're a startup, but you need to actually invest in
Speaker 1: this right way, because what happens with these startup companies
Speaker 1: is HR isn't invested in you know, by the by
Speaker 1: your angel investor. You're just dealing with the product. And
Speaker 1: then all of a sudden you are big and international
Speaker 1: and you get thousands of employees and a terrible culture
Speaker 1: that does not support women or anyone who is different,
Speaker 1: and then it affects your your product because you know,
Speaker 1: there's all the stories for example about face recognition, right,
Speaker 1: and face recognition being sort of completely sort of you know,
Speaker 1: not recognizing black people, not really fully recognizing women. But
Speaker 1: tech folks like to think, oh, you know, technology is neutral, right,
Speaker 1: It's just the algorithms, but the algorithms got written by people, right,
Speaker 1: and with people's biases, you know, built into it. It's
Speaker 1: the same thing with women's heart disease not being recognized,
Speaker 1: right because everything's been built on the examples of male
Speaker 1: heart disease. I mean, there's so many places that it's present,
Speaker 1: and it's so important that we that we get women
Speaker 1: represented so that our world can be a better place
Speaker 1: for all of us. So, Tina, this has been such
Speaker 1: a great conversation, and I want to go back to
Speaker 1: one other thing that we talked earlier and just put
Speaker 1: it into words. What's bothering me so much about the
Speaker 1: corsage comment and then the bachelor comment is that it's
Speaker 1: just such a microaggression against all women and it keeps happening. Well,
Speaker 1: it is because, as you know, the three of us
Speaker 1: are women who grew up in business, right and you know,
Speaker 1: I was. I was a corporate litigator for twenty three
Speaker 1: years before I went to the White House and loved it,
Speaker 1: and yet there were all those micro aggressions every day
Speaker 1: that she had to sort of deal with. The you know,
Speaker 1: I remember I had I had jurors who would tell
Speaker 1: me after a jury trial you know, we were so
Speaker 1: surprised you spoke English, so or you know, being mistaken
Speaker 1: for the court reporter, you know when the deposition and starts,
Speaker 1: So we have all of those things. So yeah, So Tina,
Speaker 1: we just have one final question for you, if you
Speaker 1: could leave our listeners with one final thought to remember.
Speaker 1: Tell us what you're hopeful about right now? What makes
Speaker 1: you get up in the morning and do the important
Speaker 1: work that you're doing. Well, let me acknowledge it's a
Speaker 1: tough time, right I think it still remains a very
Speaker 1: tough time for all of us, you know, during this
Speaker 1: unprecedented pandemic moment. So it's it's tough. I've been experiencing
Speaker 1: some of the toughness of of being isolated. You know
Speaker 1: that many of us are experiencing. UM. But I will
Speaker 1: tell you what gives me hope and keeps me up
Speaker 1: is the enthusiasm and the activism that's out there. You know,
Speaker 1: I think people are rising to the occasion, um, to
Speaker 1: this moment. This is a transformational moment. And you know
Speaker 1: it was thrust upon us, you know, um, by by
Speaker 1: nature and and it's a global transformational moment, and it
Speaker 1: as an opportunity for us to seize that moment and
Speaker 1: you know, make a turn for the good, you know,
Speaker 1: and not go back to an old stay as quote
Speaker 1: that wasn't working for so many people. But to build
Speaker 1: really a new future, and new economic future, a new
Speaker 1: workplace future, um and and so that that I'm thrilled
Speaker 1: by that opportunity that we have, and I'm thrilled by
Speaker 1: the energy that I see in so many sectors to
Speaker 1: do it. Tina, thank you so much. This has been
Speaker 1: such a fun conversation. It's been a real joy. Gosh, Tina,
Speaker 1: such fantastic work you're doing. Thank you. That was so powerful.
Speaker 1: Tina Chen is a force to be reckoned with. Here
Speaker 1: are a few points that I took away from today's conversation,
Speaker 1: and they all ladder up to Tina's main message that
Speaker 1: women deserve a safe, fair and dignified workplace. First, sexual
Speaker 1: harassment is a symptom of a workplace that is broken,
Speaker 1: one that keeps women out of positions of power. That's
Speaker 1: why when dealing with the issue of sexual harassment, we
Speaker 1: need to also fix the wider systemic issues that hold
Speaker 1: women back. Second, as we've said before in this series,
Speaker 1: now is the time to reframe our thinking about women.
Speaker 1: We need to ask ourselves why do society often talk
Speaker 1: about women only in terms of what they look like,
Speaker 1: what they wear, or what their husbands do. That kind
Speaker 1: of thinking undermines all of us. It keeps us from
Speaker 1: envisioning women as managers, as directors, or as CEOs. Frankly,
Speaker 1: it keeps us from envisioning women as the leaders they
Speaker 1: actually are. Third, closing the wealth gap for women is imperative.
Speaker 1: That means giving women not just equal pay, but access
Speaker 1: to the jobs that come with higher pay. And it
Speaker 1: means advocating for workplace policies like parentally and child care.
Speaker 1: These kinds of interventions allow both women and men to
Speaker 1: go for the higher paying jobs. And if you want
Speaker 1: a free copy of the Time's Up Guide to Equity
Speaker 1: and Inclusion during Crisis, text the word leaders to three
Speaker 1: oh six dash four four and join us Next week
Speaker 1: when Caroline and Dana talked a spoken word poet and
Speaker 1: podcast uster Amina Brown and consultant and author Tara J.
Speaker 1: Frank about the path to equality. Have a great week.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Seneca Women Conversations on Power and Purpose,
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