🧊🔨Glass Cliff, Meet Glass Hammer

5 Revolutionary Approaches Smashing Workplace Gender Barriers

Author

Eryn Peters
March 09, 2025

In partnership with

Happy Sunday, pals!

Happy International Women’s Day and Month to all 🌷 

In today’s issue

⚡️ Lightning List ⚡️ 

🏢 We need an intervention. Infosys enforces 10-day work-from-office rule.

👀 He sees you when you’re sleeping. Electronic employee monitoring reaches an all-time high.

🏆️ ISG Women in Digital Awards 🏆️ 

For the fourth year, ISG is hosting the ISG Women in Digital Awards to bring visibility and recognition to the rising stars, leaders, advocates, innovators and titans of our era.

These awards celebrate the women who are breaking biases, investing in women and equity, defining new possibilities for women in the workforce, and delivering outstanding contributions to the digital world. This year they have added a new award category, AI Champion, to recognize the women driving the strategic use of AI.

🧊 Glass Cliff, Meet Glass Hammer 🔨

5 Success Stories Redefining Women's Workplace Equality

As we dive into International Women's Month with this year's theme of "Accelerate Action," I've been thinking about how we talk about gender equality in the workplace. Let's be honest – it's easy to fall into the doom-and-gloom statistics trap. Yes, the global gender pay gap still hovers around 20%, and women hold just 25% of senior leadership roles. But focusing solely on what's broken doesn't exactly leave us energized to create change, does it?

So instead of my usual data dump on all the ways the system is stacked (though trust me, I could write that article in my sleep), I thought we'd flip the script. Let's look at the bright spots – the companies, countries, and initiatives that are actually moving the needle on gender equity in tangible, measurable ways.

1. 🇮🇸 Iceland's Childcare Revolution

Iceland leads with an astounding 85% female workforce participation rate, thanks to their comprehensive approach to the caregiving burden that traditionally falls on women.

Their universal subsidized childcare and designated paternal leave (that men actually take) effectively removes the "motherhood penalty" that stalls women's careers elsewhere. The economic impact? Iceland ranks #1 in economic performance with 44% female executives.

2. ♻️ Unilever's "Returnship" Program

Unilever's "Returnship" program offers project-based roles specifically designed for caregivers returning to work, achieving an 89% transition rate to full-time employment.

"We realized we were missing out on incredible talent by not creating on-ramps back to careers," explains Aline Santos, Unilever's Chief Brand Officer. The program includes mentorship and skills refreshers while acknowledging that caregiving develops valuable workplace skills like negotiation and crisis management.

3. 🇪🇪 Estonia's "Girls Code" Initiative

Estonia's nationally supported "Girls Code" initiative has reduced their tech sector gender gap by 18% compared to global averages by creating a comprehensive pipeline for female tech talent.

What makes their approach effective is its systemic focus – they didn't just create coding camps, they addressed the entire ecosystem from teacher training to industry partnerships. The result? Women now make up 38% of Estonia's tech workforce compared to the 25% European average.

4. 👀 Salesforce's Transparent Pay & "Cycle Support Leave"

Salesforce conducts annual equal pay assessments and has invested over $22 million to address unexplained differences. They've also implemented "Cycle Support Leave" – flexible time off for menstruation symptoms that reduced overall absenteeism by 22%.

"This isn't about special treatment – it's about acknowledging biological realities and removing barriers to productivity," explains Leyla Seka, who championed the initiative.

5. 🙈 Microsoft's Blind Bidding

With freelancers facing a 28% gender pay gap, Microsoft's freelance portal implemented blind bidding – where clients review proposals without seeing gender information until after selection.

The result? The gender pay gap on their platform is 62% smaller than industry averages. The most powerful aspect is its scalability – these design principles can be implemented across any digital marketplace.

🌟 The Formula for Accelerating Change

These success stories worked because they:

  1. 🪜 Approached equality as a systems problem – creating structures that promoted equity rather than just telling women to "lean in" harder

  2. 📊 Measured outcomes rigorously – tracking real data to ensure initiatives created actual change

  3. 👶 Designed for human reality – acknowledging biological differences and caregiving responsibilities

  4. 🔗 Connected equality to performance – positioning these initiatives as competitive advantages, not compliance burdens

  5. 🤝 Involved men as stakeholders – framing gender equality as an issue affecting everyone

Because here's the thing: progress IS happening. The OECD average for female labor force participation has reached 72.7%, up 6.4 percentage points since 2011. The gender participation gap has narrowed to 9 percentage points across OECD countries. And some organizations aren't just talking about equality – they're creating roadmaps others can follow.

What workplace equality success stories have you encountered?

📆 Upcoming Event 📆 

Join me and PowerToFly for Empower Her: Advancing Women in the Workplace and Beyond - a four-day free virtual summit & job fair! 💪

Topics will include

  • How to combat ageism

  • Psychological safety in the workplace

  • Climbing the career ladder

  • Plus tons of interactive upskilling & professional development workshops 🙌

If you are looking for some amazing inspiration plus the chance to network with some groundbreaking women leaders & allies, grab your ✨ FREE ✨ ticket today.

⭐️ Community Spotlight ⭐️ 

Tiffany Yu has been a longstanding disability advocate, community builder, and LinkedIn Top Voice. Her new book, The Anti-Ableist Manifesto, has just been released and is a must read!

Named one of the Editors’ Picks by Amazon and Library Journal, Best New Books for Teachers by We Are Teachers, and Most Anticipated New Releases by Audible.

Inspired by the viral The Anti-Ableism Series on TikTok, The Anti-Ableist Manifesto is Diversability founder Tiffany Yu’s revelatory examination of disability for any ally to go beyond mere awareness to be an active anti-ableist and help form a more equitable society for all.

Order your copy in hardcover, ebook, or audio.

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📚️ Term of the Week 📚️ 

Glass Cliff  noun | WORKPLACE TERM

the phenomenon where women are more likely to be appointed to leadership positions during periods of crisis or downturn, when the chance of failure is highest

Related terms: glass ceiling, glass escalator, leadership diversity

That’s all for now, pals. See ya next week.