More women champions needed

Elaine Liew is presently the APAC Regional Vice President – Cloud Security at Palo Alto Networks and is based in Singapore

What according to you are the successes of gender equality movement which gathered momentum towards the end of the last decade?​ Organizations have started to establish committees around diversity and inclusion initiatives with accountable metrics applied not just to HR but to business functional leaders. This intentional initiative with the willingness to implement and track is a progress and success thus far.

At the start of this decade, what would be your three priorities for gender equal workplaces? ​Ensuring end-to-end from the phases of attract, recruit, develop, nurture to promote is key to more tailored training for women leaders. Rotational exposure for women to experience unfamiliar grounds, moving out of their comfort zone is also another area that companies need to look into.

How important is the role of men in this movement and what according to you should organisations do to involve them? ​Men can a very effective role in this movement to achieve gender balance by showing more appreciation, explicitly to women in their work, progress and contribution. Credit needs to be given and demonstrated where it is due.

How important is the concept of “Sisterhood” in accelerating change? Sisterhood is a form of support, being a role model for others, offering support even informally. It does go a long way in supporting and providing inspiration for other women at the workplace.

Do you think we need a young champion like Greta Thunberg for this cause as well? We need more than one such champion, it is in workplace everywhere in all countries. This calls for proactive collaboration between academic institutions, government bodies, and commercial organization. Norway is a prime example that has achieved a lot in this direction.