I’m speaking from a broad generalization here but let’s face it. Look at who’s really running this country and it’s a foregone conclusion that white men will continue to manage (inherit) its power and wealth for a long time to come. After reading a blog post by Lauren Bacon about women in tech and empathy work, it dawned on me that maybe we’ve been concentrating too much on improving diversity from a bottom up perspective. We know that change seldom happens coming from that direction, the major exception being revolution.
Diversity work focuses on breaking down the systemic and personal barriers women and people of color encounter in seizing their rights and opportunities, the key word being systemic. But I’ve concluded that ICT and STEM diversity work focuses on attraction and retention, not enough on the environment that has created the inequities. So I believe we need to begin the work of evolving the environment while giving those who wish to thrive within it the confidence to do so – whoever they are and whatever their passion.
We work with girls, kids of color, and high potential minorities to guide them on roads less traveled, from STEM careers to entrepreneurship to the C-suite. We mentor and coach them to be assertive, critical thinkers, strategic decision-makers, and bottom line, to have the grit to persevere as the exceptions but, too often, without acknowledging who they really are and what they care about. When a girl sees herself helping others and a black kid wants to record rap music, we think we’ve lost them.
It’s been my observation that efforts to address diversity do little to mentor and coach those young people who are on track to be the dominant players in their career environments. Why not teach them compassion? Why not teach them to go within and know and embrace their own passions?
I wish to bring attention to teaching empathy and grit.
I wouldn’t care if the majority of the world’s power brokers were white male if more of them tested high on the empathy scale. Granted, when that comes true, they would no longer be the majority as a result of deferring more to others because they care about people and their growth, want what’s best for all rather than a few, and enjoy the human connection, no matter the difference.
There’s plenty of research that’s proven people respond to leaders that care. If women are drawn to roles that allow them to interact with and care for people, that’s a good thing IMHO because the nurturing instinct is powerfully human and important to our evolution (wherever that’s going). We also need the masculine instinct to be the victor. But think about how invaluable the addition of empathy is to a victor who now must lead?
Empathy is learned with time and experience connecting with others. I believe it begins somewhere between K and 9, with lessons on how to relate with others at home, at school, at work and in Life. It continually develops from that point. Perseverance comes from setting goals that are linked to a passion so that obstacles are less distracting. Perseverance and persistence gives one grit, defined by psychologists as “maintaining an interest in goals despite obstacles, adversity or failure.” (To measure your own grit, follow this link to the 12-item Grit Scale.)
In closing with another generalization, let’s start teaching boys to care and girls to have grit now and maybe in another generation or two we’ll begin to make a dent in this systemic problem we’re attempting to address.
