A lesson in how not to mess up with women.
Women at Google have come up with an ingenious and tongue-in-cheek way to raise awareness about gender equality after an investor made a sexist remark at the company's annual shareholders meeting last week.
When one investor wanted to ask chief financial officer Ruth Porat a question, he addressed it to "the lady CFO." He then directed his second question for Alphabet SVP of corporate development, David Drummond, to "Mr. Drummond."
Though Porat answered his question without acknowledging his casual sexism, frustration exploded both online and in the room, with another shareholder, Sonen Capital's Danielle Ginach, calling him out a few questions later:
"I am sorry to put another shareholder on the spot," she said. "But Ms. Porat is the CFO, not the lady CFO."
All this prompted other Googlers to stand up in solidarity by designating last Thursday and Friday as "Lady Day."The idea sprouted in an email group for alums of a Google leadership development program for women. One employee suggested that they should all change their titles to "Lady ___" in acknowledgment and light-hearted protest of the incident. As in, "Lady Systems Engineer," or "Lady People Analytics Manager."
/ciol/media/post_attachments/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/lady-day.jpg "lady day")
The lack of diversity in the tech industry - across both gender and ethnicity –is not a new issue. At Google, 70 percent of employees are men and 60 percent are women, and many other major tech companies have similar stats or worse. Googlers participating in Lady Day wanted it to be an opportunity to encourage critical thinking about equality in the workplace.
"It's really inspiring to have women leaders like Ruth to look up to," Anya Estrov, another Googler who changed her title, said. "I hope that by seeing this, women will continue to push themselves."
Besides Porat, Google has a handful of other women in its top executive positions - including seven of the 20 people in Google's inner leadership circle.
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Women at Google respond in a quirky way to a shareholder's sexist comment
A lesson in how not to mess up with women.
Women at Google have come up with an ingenious and tongue-in-cheek way to raise awareness about gender equality after an investor made a sexist remark at the company's annual shareholders meeting last week.
When one investor wanted to ask chief financial officer Ruth Porat a question, he addressed it to "the lady CFO." He then directed his second question for Alphabet SVP of corporate development, David Drummond, to "Mr. Drummond."
Though Porat answered his question without acknowledging his casual sexism, frustration exploded both online and in the room, with another shareholder, Sonen Capital's Danielle Ginach, calling him out a few questions later:
"I am sorry to put another shareholder on the spot," she said. "But Ms. Porat is the CFO, not the lady CFO."
All this prompted other Googlers to stand up in solidarity by designating last Thursday and Friday as "Lady Day."The idea sprouted in an email group for alums of a Google leadership development program for women. One employee suggested that they should all change their titles to "Lady ___" in acknowledgment and light-hearted protest of the incident. As in, "Lady Systems Engineer," or "Lady People Analytics Manager."
The lack of diversity in the tech industry - across both gender and ethnicity –is not a new issue. At Google, 70 percent of employees are men and 60 percent are women, and many other major tech companies have similar stats or worse. Googlers participating in Lady Day wanted it to be an opportunity to encourage critical thinking about equality in the workplace.
"It's really inspiring to have women leaders like Ruth to look up to," Anya Estrov, another Googler who changed her title, said. "I hope that by seeing this, women will continue to push themselves."
Besides Porat, Google has a handful of other women in its top executive positions - including seven of the 20 people in Google's inner leadership circle.