Empowering Women and Girls - Q1 2023

I am nine months pregnant now, and I am sure this time that the new baby will be safe and protected from malaria.

George Kepha, 33, with her two children Helen Joseph, 8, and Elliot Joseph, 4, in Misungwi a town in the Mwanza region of Tanzania.

Higher temperature is one way the climate crisis hurts pregnancies

WRITTEN BY Claire Barnett, Executive Director, UN Women UK

When disaster strikes, the most marginalised groups are hit the hardest. This includes women and girls, who are more likely to lose their lives, livelihoods and access to basic services when a crisis rocks their community.

Crises — from natural disasters to conflict — affect women and girls disproportionately, and we need to act now.

Unique needs after a disaster

In the immediate aftermath of a disaster, as necessities such as food, heating and medicine are unavailable, women and girls are more likely to suffer food poverty and malnourishment because men and boys are prioritised for more nutritious food.

Women, who are often responsible for putting food and water on the table for their families, must travel further to collect these, expending additional calories while taking in fewer.

In the weeks and months following a disaster, women’s critical services such as refuges and counselling for survivors of violence, maternity services and other specialist needs are often the first to be cut.

Single mother-headed households struggle to access money to support the family, as jobs are scarce, and women are less likely to have the qualifications of their male counterparts. When strain is put on societies, domestic abuse rises, and cases of trafficking and sexual exploitation spike.

In times of hardship, female genital mutilation and child marriage are also more likely to be practised, removing more girls from the education system and opportunities for the future.

How we can help women

It is not a coincidence that women and girls are more negatively affected by crises — it is a result of millennia of inequality that is deeply ingrained into our societies and manifests when disaster strikes.

Against this backdrop, UN Women is increasingly shifting its focus into the field, prioritising urgent humanitarian response, such as providing period products, nappies, blankets and cash-for-work for women, combined with normative change so that we are better and more equally prepared for the next disaster.

We can take action, and there is a strong business case for empowering all marginalised groups in co-design processes for our response and preparedness. We need political and business leaders to understand that from plugging the STEM talent gap to creating longer-lasting peace following conflict, gender equality is the most powerful lever they can pull to be resilient in the next disaster.

Climate and human rights are not separate issues but are closely interlinked. It is only if we understand this that we can weather increasing challenges together and build a future that leaves no one behind.

To donate to UN Women’s work in the frontlines of the recent earthquakes: unwomenuk.org/campaigns/emergencyappeal-for-women-girls-in-turkiye-syria

WRITTEN BY Skye Wheeler Senior Researcher, Women’s Rights Division Human Rights Watch

Around the world, the climate crisis is hurting pregnancy health and widening the inequalities around who has a healthy baby.

Agrowing body of science from around the world links pregnant people’s exposure to higher temperatures to poor birth outcomes and maternal health.

Effect of hot temperatures

Rising heat caused by the climate crisis may not seem to be a reproductive health and rights issue, but it is. A growing number of studies indicate that exposure to extreme heat during pregnancy is associated with higher rates of low birth weight, premature birth and stillbirth. Other studies also suggest links between hot temperatures and poor maternal health. Heat exposure seems to increase the chances of dangerous complications like gestational diabetes — which develops during pregnancy — and maternal hypertensive diseases including preeclampsia, which, if untreated, can lead to complications or even death for both the pregnant person and the developing foetus.

Who is at risk?

Extreme heat will also affect people with fewer financial resources the most, including communities already dealing with higher rates of prematurity and poor maternal health.

In the UK, most homes are not air-conditioned. Rising energy costs mean some pregnant people may not be able to buy — and run — a portable air conditioner.

In the US, because of historical and current racism and discrimination, communities of colour often live in hotter, more marginalised neighbourhoods. Another consequence of injustices is a maternal health crisis that leaves Black women with much worse pregnancy outcomes than white women. The climate crisis threatens to deepen it.

In Pakistan, pregnant people last year faced searing temperatures along with other climate disasters, including catastrophic flooding from heavy monsoons. Low birth weight and preterm birth rates — both of which leave newborns with a much higher risk of dying — are very high in Pakistan, even compared to other low-income countries. Communities cannot afford additional pressures on pregnancy health.

Education and services

Harmful impacts on maternal health are another reason governments should cut carbon emissions. Educating people — birth workers, doctors and the public — about the effects of extreme heat on pregnancy and newborns is also important. Community birth workers who visit and provide information and connect pregnant women with services, serve on the front lines of this crisis. Better funding and training for community birth workers, whether in the UK, US, Pakistan or elsewhere, should be a top priority.

Every new disaster will push women’s rights further back unless we act now

Urgent global action is required to end female genital mutilation/cutting

Female genital mutilation or cutting negatively affects the lives of hundreds of millions of women and girls around the world. We are calling for a global summit that will commit the funding needed to end this practice.

FGM/C stands for female genital mutilation or cutting, which is the partial or total removal or injury to a woman’s or girl’s genitals. It is a social and gender norm held in place by entire communities.

Kimberley Ellis, Communications Manager at Orchid Project says: “There are more than 200 million women and girls living with this practice, which happens on every continent, except Antarctica.”

“It can cause death at the time of the cut or from infections. Later on, it can cause numerous physical and mental health issues such as posttraumatic stress disorder.”

Calling for a global summit

“Even though the world has committed to ending FGM/C by 2030 under the sustainable development goal 5, the ambition has not been realised. To accelerate progress, Orchid Project, in partnership with the Global Platform for Action to End FGM/C, is calling for an urgent global summit to secure financial commitments to end the practice. It is essential for investments to come from a variety of sources — from multilateral donors, philanthropists and the private sector, in addition to resources from national governments. Out of USD 2.4 billion needed to end the practice in 31 high-prevalence

countries, only USD 275 million in development assistance has been secured. This leaves a funding gap of USD 2.1 billion and does not include funding for other countries, particularly those in Asia and the Middle East.

“Additionally, the World Health Organisation has calculated that it costs about USD 1.4 billion a year to treat the health complications for survivors of FGM/C. If the practice were eliminated, women’s and girls’ lives would be transformed and billions could be saved,” Ellis explains.

Working together to end FGM/C

As a single-issue organisation that was set up in 2010 to end FGM/C, Orchid Project advocates for change, delivers research, shares knowledge and partners with grassroots organisations who work in practising communities.

Ellis adds: “The practice is rooted in patriarchy and unequal power relations between women and men, girls and boys. That is why there is a need to adopt a gender-transformative approach to ending FGM/C.”

“Governments and other key stakeholders, in turn, need to step up their efforts to finance grassroots organisations’ work so that we can collectively end the practice.”

For more information, visit fgmcfundinggap.org

Empowering women to gain control over their reproductive health and future

Metin Gülmezoglu, Executive Director at Concept Foundation, says that as a global community, we are not doing enough to ensure women and girls are empowered to control their sexual and reproductive health and prevent unintended pregnancy when they wish to.

The gap in access to reproductive healthcare

The issue is most acute in low-resource settings, where a lack of access to affordable, quality medicines are disproportionately affecting the most vulnerable women in the world.

Lester Chinery, Concept Foundation’s Director of Programmes, adds: “Equally, during pregnancy and childbirth, a lack of effective and affordable medicines to prevent and treat life-threatening conditions is a primary cause of the high rates of maternal death we continue to see in low-income countries — and why there has only been two drugs ever developed for use by pregnant women.”

Accelerating progress towards gender equity

Barriers preventing women and girls from accessing good quality reproductive health medicines not only have severe health and economic impacts on families, communities and societies worldwide, they serve to perpetuate deep-rooted gender inequities within global health systems.

Petra Procter, Senior Programme Manager at Concept Foundation explains: “We are working to tackle these issues by acting as an accelerator for innovation and access in

women’s sexual and reproductive health, while applying a gender-transformative lens across our programmes, projects and initiatives.”

An ‘end-to-end’ approach to medicine access Concept Foundation takes a systematic, end-to-end approach to addressing this issue, focusing primarily on contraceptives, medical abortion and maternal health medicines.

“We do this by working across sectors — at global and country levels — with key actors and stakeholders within country health systems, while considering all critical factors along the way,” explains Chinery.

Central to the Foundation’s work is ensuring both the quality and affordability of reproductive health medicines. “In low-income countries, lack of quality-assured medicines can reduce effectiveness and increase adverse outcomes,” warns Procter.

In parallel, quality medicines are frequently unaffordable for many women and girls in these countries, often made more challenging by a lack of infrastructure, referral pathways and stigma-related policy barriers that prevent women and girls from accessing the medicines and technologies they need, when they need them.

Gülmezoglu concludes: “Our work goes beyond quality of essential reproductive health medicines. We take a holistic approach to ensure country health systems and healthcare workers are equipped and enabled to deliver quality reproductive healthcare to all women and girls.”

INTERVIEW WITH Kimberley Ellis Communications Manager, Orchid Project

An international not-for-profit organisation is working to bring better sexual and reproductive medicines to women and girls around the world.

INTERVIEW WITH Metin Gülmezoglu Executive Director, Concept Foundation

INTERVIEW WITH Lester Chinery Director Of Programmes, Concept Foundation

INTERVIEW WITH Petra Procter Senior Programme Manager, Concept Foundation

WRITTEN BY James Martin

Diversity, equity and inclusivity is a key business objective for the IT industry and is necessary to be able to grow successfully and attract the right talent.

President of CGI in the UK and Australia Tara McGeehan says: “We are a global IT and business consulting services company. In the UK, we work across multiple sectors including government, space and defence, utilities, energy and banking as well as the public sector. “We pride ourselves on doing complex things well and work on some of the most mission-critical systems in the UK,” says McGeehan.

DE&I should be a key business focus Diversity, equity and inclusivity (DE&I) helps to inform how CGI operates: “Not just in terms of gender, but in ethnicity, social upbringing and disability,” she explains. “It enables us to bring the best people to our organisation who can deliver strongly on projects.

It also means we are relevant to our clients; because if we look and sound like our clients, we are more likely to win work and deliver the work they want. Connecting on the human level is not altruism but good business,” adds McGeehan.

Most industries are struggling from a DE&I point of view, so seeing one of their suppliers on this journey — maybe ahead of them — helps.

“Because our staff, who we call ‘members’ (they are shareholders in the company) come to work feeling they are change-makers, this encourages clients to think in the same way and builds stronger working partnerships,” says McGeehan.

Greater gender representation in IT McGeehan believes IT should be the most attractive career around because we are in the digital age, where technology is everywhere.

“The UK is the largest IT economy in Europe, but we are failing as an industry to articulate what IT jobs are. You can have any type of role you want — there are coders, but also people testing products, writing bids and developing new business.”

McGeehan says: “As roles are totally non-gender specific, there should be much greater female representation (it’s 23% female at CGI, whereas the industry average is 17%). We need to explain to girls it’s okay to like maths, but you don’t need maths to do IT. A lot of what we do is talking consultatively to clients, recognising their problems and coming up with solutions. We also need to identify good female role models, to explain how they are creating fantastic careers, working in other countries globally and making huge changes in society.”

The intellectual part of the challenge is what inspires me: solving a problem for the client. By using my experience and conferring with colleagues, you can help add real value to projects. After all, there is always someone more experienced willing to help,” says Kyra Quinn, Lead Enterprise Architect who is determined to inspire the next generation of females. Quinn studied Computer Science at university, before joining CGI as a graduate trainee in Edinburgh.

Advanced problem-solving

“I am particularly proud of being one of the main architects of the Edinburgh office team that helped to get the first Smart Meter in the UK up and running. That project has now turned into one of the biggest projects in Europe which supports

critical national infrastructure. There are lots of aspects to that programme around security, performance and working with many stakeholders and suppliers. Because it was using cutting-edge technology, there were lots of problems to solve. Fortunately, there were lots of accomplished people in the team, and by working together, we solved things, which is an aspect of our approach that I love.”

The importance of role models Quinn adds: “When I started, there were very few women in the industry. It was people from the same localities, normally men, who looked the same. There are now many more women and much more mixing of nationalities. We are in a truly global business; and I really enjoy working with people from India, China and Europe: different cultures and different ways of working,” says Quinn.

She partly credits her rise within CGI to having supportive peers: “Ever since I started, there have always been role models who would support me by saying, ‘good job’ or by offering supportive feedback. That is like ‘gold’ when you are forging a technical career,” she adds.

Inspiring other women

“I think showing women the examples of how females have overcome challenges to reach their career goals is a powerful tool in inspiring more female recruits to our industry,” explains Quinn.

“For example, my way of dealing with teams that have over-powering personalities is to focus on displaying my knowledge. I also think we need to communicate the industry perks including overseas opportunities and that, above all, it is really fun to work in IT.”

By reflecting on the diversity of our clients, we are making good business sense

INTERVIEW WITH Tara McGeehan President, CGI UK and Australia, CGI

INTERVIEW WITH Kyra Quinn Lead Enterprise Architect, CGI

SPREAD WRITTEN BY James Martin

Providing women with career growth support and opportunities

The representation of women in the IT industry still has a long way to go, and it’s our job to help ensure women are heard and supported.

Our Women’s Network is run by a committee of 20-plus members, of different ages, tenures, roles and backgrounds.

That helps us get diverse thought and opinion from our employee base,” says Debbie Street, Co-Chair of CGI’s Women’s Network and Vice President, Consulting Services for Central Government clients.

Street adds: “I think our industry has come on leaps and bounds from when I started 25 years ago, in terms of flexibility and recognising different talents. In those days, there was conscious bias, people were not considered for roles based on, for example, gender. I feel the real improvements at CGI come from a culture of openness and having conversations about bias in day-today activities. This helps us to move forward.”

Initiatives for women

The Women’s Network runs many initiatives to support women in their careers at CGI. One example is providing annual ‘Promotion Panel Know-how’ sessions, which give practical tips to help women prepare for promotion.

Street explains that the Women’s Network has a reach outside of CGI, including helping ‘levelling up’: “Our members go to science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM)

events to encourage girls to consider careers in IT. At a recent STEM camp we ran for young girls, two of twenty school girls had considered IT as a career option. But by the end of our discussion, ten were potentially interested in the idea.”

CGI also works to bring careerchangers and returners into the industry, particularly women who have had a career break and are looking for new opportunities.

Making a positive impact

Another goal of the network is to work with clients to help them progress their women in tech agenda. “We also drive positive social value. For example, we standardised our process and gifts for new parents, working with a small social value partner, every time we send a gift to a CGI member that helps orphaned and abandoned children around the world. If we look beyond ourselves and act with consideration and kindness we believe people, social enterprise and businesses can go a long way.”

Street adds: “From my perspective, DE&I is about having a range of thought and opinion, from people of diverse backgrounds, race, gender and ethnicity. All of our people are capable of challenging thinking and coming up with creative ideas; if we were all the same, we would lack that,” she concludes.

Learning from each other helps to provide the greatest DE&I support

Encouraging unconditional inclusivity in the workplace creates a safe place for employees to learn and educate others, enabling people to truly be themselves at work.

Unconditional inclusivity is about people being able to be their authentic selves in the workplace,” explains Donna Kelly, the Senior Vice President and lead for CGI’s South and Midlands Business Unit in the UK. “How we encourage that is by creating a number of networks that provide support to any individual who feels they are in a diverse community,” says Kelly.

“But it’s also about creating a safe, authentic environment where people feel they can educate others; so we are all learning about different cultures, ethnicities, genders, disabilities and sexualities.”

DE&I is everyone’s responsibility

Interestingly, CGI’s DE&I is not run by a professional member of staff but by the ‘members’ (staff). “Our experience

is that if you have DE&I run by one person, everyone will look at them and say, ‘What are you doing to make changes?’ Therefore, our whole leadership board believes it is, in fact, everybody’s responsibility.”

This means the company’s networks are voluntary-based. As well as gender, Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME), disability and LGBT+, there are 13 breakout groups, one of which is a menopause network. “We actually found that there were more men than women at a recent session about this topic, to learn more about what their partners, friends and family members are experiencing,” explains Kelly.

Listening to employee needs Democracy is at the heart of our company decision-making: “All the networks bring their ideas to the table. Based on those suggestions, we listen

and see if we can apply those ideas to our business. For example, we are now about to amend our paternity policy, recognising the support both partners need when having a child,” says Kelly.

She personally supports staff members to make changes within CGI by “giving them the belief they should speak up and creating a safe environment to speak out, without it being sensational.” She adds that:

“Learning from each other is often the greatest cure to DE&I challenges.”

Bringing clients with them on this journey is met by “sharing our practices, learning from each other, and keeping inclusivity at the centre. Because by having a team of people that reflect the diversity of our clients, we believe we can come up with the solutions that ultimately make projects successful.”

cgi.com/uk/en-gb/ careers/life-atcgi/diversity/ womenofCGI

INTERVIEW WITH Donna Kelly Senior Vice President, South and Midlands, CGI

INTERVIEW WITH Debbie Street

Co-Chair, CGI Women’s Network and Vice President, Consulting Services, CGI

Simple practices to help us narrow the tech gender gap

The 8th of March brings about International Women’s Day 2023 (IWD 2023) — a time to reflect on what you and your organisation are doing to support equitable workplaces for women in the tech sector.

WRITTEN BY Sheila Flavell, CBE, President, techUK

ADiversity in Tech report, by global emerging talent and reskill provider mthree, found that more than half of businesses (60%) do not currently have diversity targets in place. Although businesses have been actively trying to ensure all employees feel comfortable and welcome, 20% of businesses have received complaints from current or former employees in this regard. These figures paint a picture of a tech sector that isn’t reflective of the society it seeks to serve.

Highlight diverse representation

Role models and diverse representation are integral to ensuring that people see themselves reflected in the organisations that are looking to recruit them. Diverse role models create a dialogue allowing other colleagues to understand various experiences in the workplace and the challenges they face.

This is why techUK has reaffirmed its commitment to abolishing all-male panels. It is important to ensure diversity among speakers at events as we want to hear from a variety of perspectives and do not want to compound unconscious gender bias that exists within the industry.

We also need to support our male allies, who are shifting the dial on unconscious bias and gendered stereotypes. Moreover, we are collectively responsible for our office

culture. Simple actions can enable a better working environment for women.

Transparent pay and promotion processes

Let employees know the criteria and process for decisionmaking in areas such as progression, salary setting and pay and performance reviews. Organisations that take transparency seriously reap the benefits of giving 100% of their employees the best chance to succeed.

Transparency can have a positive effect on equality and diversity. The Behavioural Insights Team have identified this as part of their evidence-based guide for employers to increase their gender diversity, as women are less likely to put themselves forward for a promotion if the criteria are ambiguous.

The United Nations are exploring innovation and technology for gender equality as part of their campaign for IWD 2023, and this mission should be at the centre of every digital business. That is why, throughout March and coinciding with IWD 2023, techUK is running a campaign that aims to march forward to close the tech gender gap in 2023. We are bringing together the industry to influence perceptions and attitudes to do this — let’s do it together.

in data, evidence and tools, such as economic inclusion programmes that empower women with cash and entrepreneurship assistance, affordable quality childcare, digital platforms and mobile money. World Bank education projects in Angola, Nigeria and Tanzania are working to empower girls and shift the mindsets of boys. These build on a decade of learning through the Adolescent Girls Initiative and SWEDD projects, both testing approaches to eliminate harmful norms.

WRITTEN BY Hana Brixi Global Director, Gender Group, The World Bank

Women’s empowerment brings prosperity, resilience and wellbeing to communities. Leaders must harness evidence and spur collaborative action toward gender equality and empowerment.

March 8 is International Women’s Day. It is a call to mobilise. Gender equality and empowerment uplift lives and foster a better future for communities and societies. Women are key in helping countries overcome crises and unleash economic potential.

Making gender equality a success story Bangladesh, from 1970 to 2022, reduced its total fertility rate from seven births per woman to two, and cut under-five mortality by two-thirds. The female literacy rate quadrupled, and women’s employment doubled, all coinciding with a tripling of GDP per capita. Women’s empowerment has helped tackle child marriage and gender-based violence.

Challenges persist all over However, not every country is experiencing this transformation. In many places, women’s reproductive health remains at risk, girls’ opportunities are shackled, and women are excluded from good jobs. Discriminatory laws and harmful norms endure. We are even seeing a new wave of backlash to progress. This year, the World Bank Group is updating its Gender Equality Strategy for 2024–2030, distilling three directions in our work: innovate, frame and mobilise.

How we innovate, frame and mobilise With our partners, we leverage evidence to help countries design and implement innovative solutions to enhance gender outcomes. We invest

We also leverage evidence to frame solutions to fit local aspirations. Equipped with evidence and examples, community leaders recognise women’s empowerment as a catalyst for food security, while policymakers appreciate how adolescent girls’ empowerment leads to prosperity or how women’s leadership makes climate action and disaster response more effective. Framing, including both rights-based and tailored approaches, helps shift mindsets, incentives and behaviour. We mobilise resources and, with governments, we support collaborative action to enhance policies, norms and behaviours. Civil society, feminist activists, global and local thought leaders, governments, multilateral actors and the private sector must all make concerted efforts to deliver change.

Collective action is needed for gender equality and empowerment

Organisations that take transparency seriously reap the benefits of giving 100% of their employees the best chance to succeed.

How research elevates the voices of women who are marginalised

Northumbria University’s Centre for Global Development works to empower women, as well as to understand and tackle the risks, challenges and marginalisation they face across the global South.

A key element of our research is supporting women impacted by largescale natural resource extraction to share their perspectives and articulate their ideas for more equitable development to bring greater wellbeing to their communities and families.

Sharing perspectives

In my work, the women themselves often play a key role as researchers. This is true of the RECLAMA project, a collaboration with Universidad de San Francisco de Quito in Ecuador and the Black feminist community arts collective, the Mujeres de Asfalto (Women of Asphalt).

The project team trained 16 young Afro and Black women as peer researchers to carry out life history interviews to record the knowledge of older women across Esmeraldas province in Ecuador. Thanks to support from the British Academy and the Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF), their work has been exhibited and used to create a permanent community archive of their experiences.

As Dr Inge Boudewijn, the Postdoctoral Researcher on the project, comments: “This work would not be possible without the leadership of inspirational women like Juana Francis Bone, co-founder of Mujeres de Asfalto, who is an activist,

politician and author. She is an expert on gender issues and alternative methods for political advocacy and community research and was part of the Civil Society Advisory Group for UN Women.”

My previous research, supported by The Leverhulme Trust, included a participatory photography project in the north of Peru with female antimining activists.

Many of them had not had the opportunity to use a camera before, so we trained them to share their perspectives through imagery. Taking photos to communicate their hopes and priorities was a meaningful experience for them and something they felt a great responsibility for.

For the women photographers, it was important that their images and narratives travel to places they couldn’t, so an exhibition of their photos was shown in Peru, the UK and Belgium.

Living with political conflict

My colleague Dr Joanna Allan is researching women’s peaceful resistance to Moroccan occupation in Africa’s last colony, Western Sahara. Her work explores why Saharawi women lead non-violent resistance efforts and why feminist goals should not be separated from the wider Saharawi right to self-determination.

She is working with Saharawi women to explore the role natural resources have played in ongoing political and environmental conflicts in North Africa and Spain, specifically phosphates, which are used as fertiliser in food production around the world.

The Leverhulme Trust recognises the international impact of her work, which focuses on histories of women’s resistance to Spanish colonialism and subsequent military occupation by neighbouring Morocco.

“I work to show how the colonial and occupying societies continue to attempt to reverse the powerful position of women in Saharawi society and explore women’s strategies for resisting this,” she says. “Empowering women in contexts of countries pending decolonisation must involve standing with them in their fight for self-determination.”

Continuing the conversation Research conducted by talented Postgraduate Researchers is integral to the Centre for Global Development. Their research includes PhD projects in countries such as Chile and Bolivia around the theme of women’s activism and extractivism, often using collaborative and creative approaches.

Each project makes a real difference to the communities at the heart of the research, but there are more stories from inspirational women around the world waiting to be shared, and we will continue to elevate their voices.

Capturing and sharing stories of hope and resilience is key to supporting women who aspire to more sustainable and equitable futures.

WRITTEN BY Katy Jenkins Professor of International Development and Co-Director of the Centre for Global Development, Northumbria University

With input from colleagues Dr Joanna Allan and Dr Inge Boudewijn

Empowering women in contexts of countries pending decolonisation must involve standing with them in their fight for self-determination.

Businesses are realising that women should have access to every role which is only possible when they fulfil their commitments to deliver opportunities and diversity initiatives.

At Schneider Electric, leaders are committed to being inclusive, compassionate and respectful. They know that equitable opportunities will positively impact people, the company, and our world.

As the company’s VP for Services and Safety, David Pownall knows only too well that the electrical engineering and technology company is a male-dominated workplace. However, he is committed to promoting talent and taking action to encourage more women into non-traditional roles.

Changing the landscape David is responsible for the Services business and also has responsibility for the health and safety of almost 4,000 employees across the UK and Ireland.

More than flexibility

David stresses: “We offer all the flexible working policies, however, sometimes, it’s not enough and doesn’t address things like the anxiety women may feel when returning to work from leave, for example, and businesses often overlook the challenges women face in various stages of life. To overcome that, we must provide more psychological support that is reflected not only through inclusive policies, but through efforts from management.”

The role of leaders is crucial, and they are best placed to support women employees by understanding individual situations and working with them to come up with solutions.

“We have not always done a good job, but now, we are doubling down on these issues,” David adds.

Widening the career gates

Men can support women in the workplace by being true advocates for gender diversity. Speaking up alongside women, creates a supportive, flexible culture and promotes policies and initiatives that build a more diverse and inclusive society.

Today, the company has successful female professionals in a variety of roles, including marketing, business development, coordination, and order management. Moreover, the sales services team is now heading towards a 50:50 gender split and the company is committed to achieving 50:40:30 gender balance by 2025. This commitment means women must represent 50% of all new hires, 40% of all frontline managers and 30% of senior leadership.

The Women in Services Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) are an essential component of Schneider Electric’s diversity, equity, and inclusion strategy. It is open to everyone and serves as a safe space for women to be heard. David is also supporting a dedicated community of women in service, a forum for discussion to solve challenges in the tech sphere.

A drive to encourage women has seen increasing numbers of hiring successes in areas such as strategy, operational management, and leadership roles — but the big nut to crack, says David, is encouraging more women into engineering roles.

And with a global skills shortage, government, educational and industry sectors must be forced to think differently and accelerate their plans to empower, develop and retain women – and that is supported by building workplaces where all individual needs are respected, supported and developed. We all have a role to play.

Engineering and technology companies committed to attracting more diverse talent

Shifting from a male-dominated landscape is no easy feat, but more women are taking the lead across industries and showing they can stay on top of things — both at work and home.

Juggling a career with family is never easy, but with an increasing focus on helping women to achieve their goals has never been so important. With the industry suffering a skills shortage, support and opportunities have never been more abundant.

Maximising skills

Rhonda Doyle has learned how important it is to take advantage of the support available to her and, out of necessity, become a master of her own time.

The mother of two children aged 10 and four was promoted to Schneider Electric’s Senior Director of Field Service Operations UK&I last November.

She joined the company over two years ago after realising her operational management, people leadership and customer focus skills could be honed in on and challenged in a new environment.

Saying no

It was after coming back from maternity leave after her first child in a new, more demanding role that Rhonda knew she had to stop saying yes to everything.

“It was a very hard time for me,” she says. “I had limited hours and became extremely focused on what I had to deliver today, tomorrow, this week, this month.”

“In my personal life, open communication with my husband became a priority. To this day, we have a practical calendar on the fridge and as soon as one of us gets a travel commitment, it goes on there. Logistics is the biggest challenge for us but working together — along with family support and flexibility at work — helps us manage.”

Balancing work and life

Rhonda also had to accept letting go of some things, delegate tasks wherever possible and ensure she

always gets a good night’s sleep. She realised how important it is to re-examine her priorities and share when she’s struggling — something she prides herself on — even amongst peers. Over time, Rhonda recognises the importance of transparency in both personal and professional environments and accepts that it’s okay to ask for help.

“When I’m not working, I am spending time with my children,” she says. “I want to work hard and make a difference, but I want to do it in such a way that I still have a life whilst fulfilling my career aspirations.”

Rhonda finds comfort in the fact that she has freedom and control over her career path as Schneider Electric offers a Global Family Policy, flexibility at work, female communities, and numerous leadership development programmes with mentorship opportunities.

Spread paid for by Schneider Electric

How commitment from men can help to improve the workplace for women

INTERVIEW WITH David Pownall

VP Services & Safety, UK&I, Schneider Electric

INTERVIEW WITH Rhonda Doyle

Senior Director, Field Services Operations UK&I, Schneider Electric

SPREAD WRITTEN BY Sheree Hanna

Ambition and determination have brought Mayara Viana across the world to pursue the career she always dreamed of having as a young girl who grew up in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Mayara is the first in her family to become university-educated and has now been living in the UK for 18 months after proactively seeking out and securing her first management role at Schneider Electric through their internal platform: Open Talent Market. She has taken a leap in her career, starting as a sales recruiter in her homeland back in 2016. Now, as the company’s UK&I Talent Acquisition and Mobility Manager, she maintains a strong focus on diversity and inclusion, especially around women in the workplace.

Inspirational role model

As a tenacious role model herself, the job allows Mayara to inspire others to follow in her footsteps. However, she readily admits that taking the plunge into a leadership role didn’t come without feelings of insecurity and its own challenges.

“For me, there has been a real need to focus on building my own confidence,” she says. “Quite often, women suffer with imposter syndrome and from my personal experience of being in a non-native country, it can be required for women to find a sense of belonging. One

of the company’s policies around diversity and inclusion is to support with mentorship programs and invest in employee development.”

Part of the company culture is investing in support for employees and mentorship opportunities.

Mayara’s managers have helped her further develop her skills, and now, she has the chance to learn from senior leaders with the company’s Ireland Country President, Chris Collins, as her current mentor.

Early talent acquisition

Mayara is responsible for identifying young talent to join Schneider Electric where they can develop their skills, knowledge and network through from early career stages.

“Starting with graduates and MBAs, we run a global, prize-winning competition called ‘Go Green’ where we invite students to share ideas for addressing the challenges our planet faces,” she explains.

“In this male-dominated industry, if we’re to truly pave the way for change, then we must support, educate and encourage early career talent from early stages in their education. There are many opportunities to succeed in this industry and it takes change today to be able to build for the future.”

Schneider Electric regularly works with STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) organisations and offers a range of opportunities for young talents such as graduate and internship programmes, with a commitment to promote gender diversity and inclusion across all levels of the organisation.

There is no better role model for an international company committed to creating a more diverse, equal and inclusive workplace than having a woman leading one of its most significant regions. It’s time to lead by example.

Kelly Becker, Zone President UK & Ireland for Schneider Electric, was appointed to the role just over two years ago and is responsible for the company’s operations across the two countries.

“I was inspired to take on this position by my passion for innovation and sustainability, as well as my belief in the company’s purpose for empowering people to make the most of their energy and resources. As passionate as I am about our mission, I am committed to our people, their development and creating a workplace where people want to be, learn and can succeed,” she says.

Overcoming unconscious bias

Kelly is dedicated to promoting Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I) both within the company and the wider industry sector.

However, she strongly believes there is still a lot of work to do, particularly the need for more diverse leadership at all levels of an organisation and more targeted efforts to recruit and

retain underrepresented groups.

“Companies need to address unconscious bias and create a more inclusive culture where everyone feels valued and supported. I want everyone to recognise that they deserve a seat at the table,” she says.

Employers must not fail to remember that their employees have individual circumstances, goals and lives outside of work. They must offer support systems to help them through their endeavours so they can maximise their potential. Invest, develop, retain and repeat — we all have a responsibility to focus on our people.

Providing the right support Businesses and leaders who truly value DE&I ensure their advocacies and actions don’t stop at the end of the work day.

“I’m personally involved in a number of initiatives aimed at supporting women. I am a member of CBI’s London Council, I serve on the Leadership Advisory Board for the Darden School of Business and on the

Executive Board of Directors with the French Chamber and British American Business. Being involved and serving as a member allows me to inspire and support women in their career journey, particularly in this industry. It takes careful thinking and planning to succeed in driving diversity and this is not just based on gender, but diversity of thought, diversity of experience, diversity of background.”

“I believe DE&I is critical to driving innovation and creating a more sustainable future. As a leader, I work to foster an inclusive culture where everyone feels valued and respected,” Kelly concludes.

Attributed to its DE&I initiatives and employee experience, Schneider Electric is rated 4.2 out of 5 on Glassdoor.

As passionate as I am about our mission, I am committed to our people, their development and creating a workplace where people want to be, learn and can succeed.

~Kelly Becker, Zone President UK&I, Schneider Electric

Seizing opportunities can lead to the career you want

All women deserve a seat at the table – leaders must challenge, innovate and take action

INTERVIEW WITH Kelly Becker

Zone President UK&I, Schneider Electric

INTERVIEW WITH Mayara Viana Talent Acquisition and Mobility Manager, UK&I, Schneider Electric

Urgent call to develop strategies to include pregnant women in clinical trials

Research into drugs for use during pregnancy has been largely neglected since the negative effects of thalidomide on foetal development became agonisingly clear. Aside from oral contraceptives, very few drugs have been tested, trialled and developed for pregnant women. As a result, pregnant women are left without treatment options, or are exposed to the unknown effects of medicines.

Illness during pregnancy can be devastating for mothers and newborns. For example, in the case of malaria, it can lead to miscarriage, pre-term birth, stillbirth, low birth weight, anaemia in the mother, and in severe cases it can be fatal. In response to this, global regulators have issued a call to action to include pregnant and breastfeeding women in clinical research.

Pregnant women not included in clinical trials

A critical factor is that this population is not commonly included in clinical trials and while campaigners are eager to change this, they face ethical, cultural and biological challenges.

Anne Claire Marrast is Senior Medical Director at Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV), a product development partnership working with pharmaceutical and research institutions to conduct research and clinical development to provide antimalarial drugs for the populations most in need — young children and pregnant women.

“With malaria in pregnant women, there are two issues,” explains Marrast. “Pregnant women are more prone to get malaria and develop acute illness so we need the right drugs to protect and treat them. And when women get malaria while pregnant, there can also be consequences for the foetus.”

Ethics in clinical trials

Senior Researcher Karim Traore from the Malaria Research and Training Center of ICER (International Centre of Excellence of Research) Mali, says: “pregnant women should be included in clinical trials because they have a specific physiology.”

“This can have an important impact on drug outcomes in the human body, so it is important to include pregnant women to generate reliable data and develop well-tolerated and efficacious drugs,” he says.

With community-based, cultural and biological reasons cited for their exclusion from trials, he says efforts must be made to “overcome these barriers.” We need a shift in mindset about how to keep pregnant women safe, and the necessary capacity to ensure this within clinical trials.

Traore continues: “I think the main reason pregnant women are excluded from clinical trials is that we do not have available data on the potential effects of drugs we are using in trials, so this is an issue and clinical researchers do not like to take any risk for the baby and mother.”

“Current regulatory guidelines say clinical trials for new drugs should only be performed in pregnant women when there is no alternative available but in the case of malaria, for example, you may want to be prepared for the situation where this treatment fails because of resistance.”

MMV and ICER Mali are already taking steps to ensure the inclusion of pregnant women in clinical trials.

In addition, MMV and partners have set up a pregnancy exposure registry, MiMBa (Malaria in Mothers and Babies), to capture data on safety of antimalarials in all trimesters of pregnancy.*

Marrast and Traore believe that academia, governments, industry, regulators, medical personnel and civil society

organisations must do more to ensure that pregnant women are safely included in clinical trials for such drugs. For researchers, this means employing cutting-edge technologies to help de-risk compounds before they enter trials, providing greater confidence that the investigational medicine can be administered in pregnancy.

Tackling health inequities

Competent and functional ethics committees must provide specific protections for pregnant women in clinical trials.

Failure to advance relevant initiatives will continue to leave pregnant women and their unborn children vulnerable to the threat of malaria and other diseases. Malaria remains a major threat: According to WHO, in 2021, 13.3 million pregnant women were infected in sub-Saharan Africa — with more than 60% of cases occurring during the first trimester.

“We know this has consequences on the foetus and the newborn while at the same time, we have limited malaria drugs for pregnant women,” says Traore. “Inequities remain in treating pregnant women for malaria.”

Engaging global and local communities

He believes an important step in overcoming such issues is via community engagement, as well as gathering more data to overcome the fact that many drugs are not recommended for use during pregnancy.

“It is ethical to include pregnant women in drug development trials to gather much-needed data for this patient group,” he adds. Marrast says, “We should know how to dose pregnant women and the drug’s safety for the mother and the baby. There is an urgent need for healthcare professionals to have clear guidance and recommendations on how to best treat this patient population.”

Strategies such as the G7 Therapeutics and Vaccines Clinical Trials Charter (June 2021), the World Health Assembly’s Resolution on Strengthening clinical trials to provide highquality evidence on health interventions and to improve research quality and coordination (approved at the WHA in May 2022) and bodies like the International Maternal Pediatric Adolescent AIDS Clinical Trials (IMPAACT) Network and Accelerating Innovation for Mothers (AIM) are in place to strengthen approaches to clinical trials for medicines.

The emphasis is shifting towards protecting pregnant women through, and not from, research while abiding by internationally agreed legal, medical safety and ethical standards.

Marrast concedes that researchers have not been good at enrolling pregnant women over fears of harming the foetus. “I think we should reverse that and ask: ‘what is the risk of not including pregnant women and not providing the right treatment for them and the foetus?’”

*Key aspects of MiMBa, which means ‘pregnancy’ in Swahili, include: ensuring quality drug supplies for children and pregnant women; generating data on existing compounds to inform their use in pregnant women and neonates; developing new antimalarial medicines for pregnant women and neonates; and advocating for changes in drug development that promote the safe and earlier inclusion of pregnant women into clinical studies.

SPREAD INTERVIEW WITH

Anne Claire Marrast Senior Medical Director, Medicines for Malaria Venture

SPREAD INTERVIEW WITH Karim Traore Senior Researcher at Malaria Research and Training Center, International Centers for Excellence in Research Mali

SPREAD WRITTEN BY Mark Nicholls Find

Spread paid for by MMV

Failure to advance these initiatives will continue to leave pregnant women and their unborn children vulnerable to the threat of malaria and other diseases.

Taking action against malaria

The Speed Up Scale-Up campaign aims to accelerate access to treatment for pregnant women in malaria-endemic countries.

Preventive treatment

Speed Up Scale-Up is led by the RBM Partnership to End Malaria — a global platform for coordinated action against malaria of more than 500 partners and NGOs — and MMV is a member.

Intermittent preventive treatment of malaria during pregnancy (IPTp) is administered by giving a minimum of three doses of sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine at least a month apart from the second term of pregnancy to protect pregnant women and the foetus from malaria, reducing the incidence of maternal anaemia, stillbirths and low birth weight.

Last year, only one in three eligible women received IPTp, though that was up from 1% in 2010.

Call to action

African leaders have also been targeted with an open letter with over 1,000 signatories to raise awareness of the need to improve access to IPTp in countries where too many pregnant women are still suffering from malaria.

The story of Dianah Otiend and baby Elizabeth

Dianah Otiend is a mother of three from Homa Bay in Kenya. While pregnant with her third child, she contracted malaria.

Protecting mothers

During the early stages of pregnancy, she could no longer feel her baby, so she went to a hospital where doctors decided on early delivery amid concerns for her safety and that of her unborn baby.

With 125 million pregnant women in sub-Saharan Africa at risk of contracting malaria, her story is not unusual. Doctors in Kenya, and across Africa, see such cases every day.

Thankfully, Dianah’s story had a positive outcome. Baby Elizabeth, who weighed a little over 1kg at birth and was placed in an incubator, gained weight and is now at home with her family.

Raising awareness

Dianah’s story is the subject of a film that underlines the work of MMV’s MiMBa strategy, which aims to raise standards of care for women and their newborns affected by malaria by collecting data via a pregnancy exposure registry of outcomes for pregnant women who have been given antimalarial therapies.

Elizabeth George Kepha, 33, lives in Misungwi, a town in the Mwanza region of Tanzania, and is nine months pregnant. Raising her family alone, she finds a life-changing way to avoid malaria and improve the welfare of her children.

Elizabeth lives with her sister and her two children Helen Joseph, 8, and Elliot Joseph, 4. In 2019, she received Interceptor® G2 mosquito nets, developed by BASF; a next-generation net which has been shown to reduce malaria incidence by 44% to 46% compared with standard nets.

Reducing malaria cases

By 2022, the initiative had distributed over 35 million nets across 13 countries, protecting an estimated 63 million people and averting millions of malaria cases.

The distribution was part of the New Nets Project, a four-year consortium led by British-based IVCC to obtain a World Health Organisation (WHO) recommendation. The project is funded by Unitaid and the Global Fund.

“My husband and I are no longer together, and I support my children alone. Before the new nets arrived, we would sometimes have two episodes of malaria each month. This could cost between $40 to $70 per month, depending on how serious the case was.”

Before the new nets arrived, we would sometimes have two episodes of malaria each month.

Prioritising health and education

“For a single mother, this is a lot of money that could have been spent on school fees or buying stock for the small shop I have set up to support us. During my previous pregnancies, I had to take drugs in case I got malaria; and it affected the baby. Now, I am not taking anything because we can rely on the new nets — and I feel much healthier. I am nine months pregnant now, and I am sure this time that the new baby will be safe and protected from malaria,” says Elizabeth.

“These new bed nets have made a big difference — the children have not had malaria for eight months, and I’m no longer spending money on treating it. Instead, I can afford private school fees for the children. I have also been able to buy a plot of land to build our own house, and our future is looking much brighter.”

Malaria in pregnancy: reaching

pregnant women

Malaria remains one of the world’s oldest, deadliest diseases, stealing young futures, diminishing potential — and now claiming the life of a child every minute, despite being treatable and easily preventable.

The WHO’s World Malaria Report 2022 once again illustrated that Africa continues to shoulder a vastly disproportionate burden of malaria with 94.5% of global malaria cases at 234 million, and 95.9% of all global malaria deaths at 593,000.

Impact on women and children

Tragically, pregnant women, adolescent girls and infants represent the largest vulnerable group of those impacted by malaria, which poses substantial risks to both the mother and unborn child, including maternal anaemia, stillbirth, miscarriage, problems with child growth and cognitive development and low birth weight — a leading cause of child mortality.

Indeed, pregnancy-related malaria causes around 100,000 infant deaths every year and is responsible for 20% of stillbirths, and 11% of all newborn deaths across the WHO’s Africa region.

Malaria in pregnancy

In 2021 alone, in 38 moderate to high-transmission countries across Africa, there were an estimated 40 million pregnancies — of which close to one in three were exposed to malaria infection.

WRITTEN BY Emma Pomfret Media & Communications Manager, Malaria

However, although many malaria-endemic countries, donors and other organisations have taken steps to increase the delivery of life-saving interventions for malaria in pregnancy — such as Intermittent Preventive Treatment (IPTp) with quality-assured sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine (IPTpSP) — more than two-thirds of eligible women still do not receive the full triple-dose course today, with access and coverage remaining dangerously low in many areas of sub-Saharan Africa.

Treatment access

This is where The RBM Partnership’s innovative ‘Speed Up Scale Up’ campaign comes in to help ensure that every eligible pregnant woman and her unborn child is protected against malaria by 2025. Launched in 2020, the campaign is designed to deliver an urgent call to leaders and policymakers to scale up to at least three doses of IPTp-SP in pregnancy and commit to increasing their efforts to protect more pregnant women from malaria, particularly ahead of the influential African Union Summit this February.

IPTp-SP is also an excellent example of targeted delivery and improving supply chains on the continent. Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV) is currently leading a UNITAID-funded project to enable pharmaceutical companies in Kenya and Nigeria to manufacture quality SP, for both domestic use and other countries in Africa.

Ending malaria and improving women and adolescent girls’ access to malaria treatment and reproductive health systems is an unrealised opportunity for advancing gender equality in health and achieving crucial WHO malaria targets and sustainable development goals.

WRITTEN BY Dr Astrid Bonfield CEO, Malaria No More UK

How one mother finds a way to protect children from malaria

a safer world for

Tragically, pregnant women, adolescent girls and infants represent the largest vulnerable group of those impacted by malaria.