Welcome to Inclusion Bites, your sanctuary for bold conversations that spark change. I'm Joanne Lockwood, your guide on this journey of exploration into the heart of inclusion, belonging, and societal transformation. Ever wondered what it truly takes to create a world where everyone not only belongs but thrives? You're not alone. Join me as we uncover the unseen, challenge the status quo, and share stories that resonate deep within. Ready to dive in. Whether you're sipping your morning coffee or winding down after a long day, let's connect, reflect, and inspire action together. Don't forget, you can be part of the conversation too. Reach out to jo.Lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk to share your insights or to join me on the show.

So adjust your earbuds and settle in. It's time to ignite the spark of inclusion with Inclusion Bites. And today is episode 116 with the title, igniting change from the top. And I have the absolute honor and privilege to welcome Mark Bateman. Mark is the CEO of Wequill and author of Disruptive Leadership. When I asked Mark to describe his superpower, he said, he is incredibly insightful when coaching others and able to build trust very quickly and get to the root of the challenge, also incredibly quickly. Hello, Mark.

Welcome to Jo. Yeah. Pleasure.

Brilliant. I hear you're in Malta. That's a lovely part of the world.

Yes. I recommend it, especially if anybody's currently under gray skies.

Looking out the window here in, sunny UK, not wind and rain and floods everywhere. So oh, yeah. Envious. Envious. So, Mark, igniting change for the top, tell me about that.

Jo I I I think I generally believe that leaders play well, self evidenced really, but leaders play an incredibly important role in not only our society, but our lives. And whether we are a leader or we follow leaders, Leaders are those that influence outcomes in some way. And it tends to be leaders that are top of organizations. And therefore, really what the leader or leadership team says, this is the direction we're going in, and this is how we all want to behave together. This is the culture you want to build. That tends to be what we tend to follow. So very much changes both at the top, but also led from the top.

Are people born leaders?

Well well, that's the age old question, isn't it? You know, I did a master's in leadership coaching, and it it was one of the really key questions that we looked at. I think that some have a personality type or traits that are maybe more suited, shall I say, to leadership. But others find themselves in leadership positions that never in a 1000000 years dreamt that they would be influencing others. So maybe there's an aspect of both nature and nurture, but actually many become leaders because they believe something powerful enough that they want to drive change in some way, and they find themselves as a de facto leader and then learn the skills of leadership in the process.

Yes. And you say that, become a de facto leader. A lot of people kind of end up, as you say, in leadership through progression, through opportunity. It's not always a tactical or strategic move. It's sometimes top top of the pile stuff. You know? You you're last one standing sometimes.

For sure. Yeah. You you have a you have a you see the world in a certain way or you have a certain ability or capability or a frustration or an anger or an excitement, and you take the lead. Literally, you influence. So you desire to drive that change. And whether you've got a capital l or a lowercase l, it doesn't really doesn't really matter. And it's not just in organizations either. Right? It's any aspect of community, society, in the family.

You can be the oldest. You can be the youngest. It doesn't it doesn't actually make any difference whatsoever. You could be a leader in one sphere and not a leader in another. So it's not like you are the leader and or you're not. It's very context driven as well.

Yeah. I can relate to that. Sometimes I wanna take my hat off and, sit at the back, and sometimes I wanna march at the front and, and inspire. You know, I I can it's a bit like playing some pub games like pool or dart. Sometimes I wanna win, and sometimes I'm just there for a laugh and and not I don't need to win. And No. Same with leadership. I don't need to feel that I'm driving everything.

It's nice to have a back seat and the shoulders drive.

Surely as well that that's an aspect of good quality leadership is knowing when to lead and when to step back. It's kind of an aspect of of self awareness, really.

Yeah. That's a really good point. Yeah. So how how do how do how do organizations identify potential leaders? What sort of skills are they really looking for?

Oh, great question. So there's a for me, there's almost this discussion around what makes a manager and what makes a leader. Right. And is there a difference between the 2? So you start off in your career. At what point do you become a manager? Is it capital M or a lowercase M or at what point do you become a leader? So my my personal working definition is that a manager manages what is, and a leader takes us to what is to be. Right? So so a leader tends to be more future orientated, whereas a manager is managing the current resources in order to achieve an objective that's already been set. The lead is very much about the future. I think you can be a leader from so we're really coming back to your first question.

I think almost that you cannot not even so much that you're born with it, but almost a sense that you you your family can tell straight away. You're not happy. You wanna change the world in some way. Right? And it Joanne be for a whole host of different reasons versus, as you said earlier, you know, it's thrust upon you. You just happen to be in, depending on your perspective, the right place or the wrong place at the right or the wrong time. And suddenly, here you are. You've got responsibilities to drive some kind of outcome. You know? If you find yourself in a crisis situation, you're the only person who can find the solution.

You find yourself in a leadership role whether you want it or not. So what makes a leader inside an organization, I think, is is those that are able to see something about the future that ultimately aligns where the organization's wanting to go and then can affect change, can influence others to to achieve that in some way. So you can be a leader without having the title, for sure.

Yeah. I'm I'm I'm sure you would you'll agree with this, but we all are leaders of self, aren't we, in some of some area?

We're not. Then who's leading us?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Lowercase l or we we just follow us all the time. But

Exactly. Yep. Yeah. Yeah.

So if we look at, I suppose, the evolution of leadership, going back about a couple of 100 years, you know, it's we've gone from that sort of army hierarchy

The hero.

Command and control

Yes.

Type leader. Yeah. To what the contemporary leadership model is is more soft skills, more empathy, more compassion, more humanity. Yeah. And influence. I I appreciate we've got different styles of leadership, top down, bottom up, transformational, all those kind of different definitions. So you particularly work, from my understanding, around empowering female entrepreneurs, female business people, people in organizations around gender equity. So how do you think if we look at the yin and the yang of femininity and masculinity, how do you think female leaders bring a different dynamic to organizations?

For sure. So to set a bit more context, so as the CEO WeQual, we work with the world's largest companies to drive gender equality. And to date, we work for about 350 global companies. We work at that sort of board c suite minus 1, minus 2 type level. We just launched a program right now for for mid managers. And what's fascinating so I've personally coached in the last 4 years, maybe about 300 women at that c suite minus 1 in these big global corporates. And what I've been surprised by what I've been extremely humbled, I have to say for starters, and that I found myself in a position where I'm meeting these incredible leaders who are genuinely driving positive change within their companies and yet are also having to overcome the fact that they're in the minority as as a woman. And what's fascinating to see is the the journey they've had to take to gain success within these typically male dominated environments.

And as a man, and for those of us who are listening as men, we don't always realize what what we do or how we behave or how we act and the impact that can have on others. Others. The whole definition of a successful leader or even a successful manager or a successful business leader or a successful entrepreneur or a successful founder, anybody, success defines success typically is through that historical lens, where if we go back 200 years, there's still some of those very strong masculine perceived traits as to what defines success. And you can see that even in funding conversations. When you look at, you know, for every dollar I come with the exact stats, and I write about this in my book. Something like for every dollar that's invested in the US, a man might get 38¢ back. For every dollar invested in women, it's 70 something cents back. Right? So it's more than double the return.

And yet women get much less than 5% of all of all funding. And the similar for for, as they call it, in in in America, you know, men of color or women of color, so non white, non Caucasian men, is much less than 1%. So there is a perception of what success looks like, and it looks like a Sam Bankman Fried, for example. Right? The founder and c CEO of FTX. It's a Mark Zuckerberg. It's an Elon Musk. It's a it's there's a very specific type that we perceive to be associated with success, and that's been driven through history. And that's where the challenge lies because, actually, there's a better return if we increase the diversity pool of those that are willing to invest in.

And that works at every level through an organization from the very entry level right to the very, very top.

Do you think there are agenda divides in terms of, I don't know, aspiration for leadership. Are men more willing to be go getters at an earlier age? I look

I look for example. So surely even the term a go getter. Right? Where does that term even come from? Right? I mean, I'm very driven. The women that we work with are very driven, but the women that we work with that are very driven have had to learn how to show up differently because if they appear to behave like a Joanne, where it's okay to be a go getter, to be ambitious, to be driven, for a man, that's okay. But for a woman, there are all sorts of labels that they then receive. And so they've had to learn how to navigate the entry level 3 mid management levels. Once they get to the executive level, depending on the culture of the company, that that that point, maybe nobody sees them as a woman anymore. They're now just expects to operate as an executive.

But all the skills they've had to learn as they've risen through those different grades, Like, you know, what to do when they're the only woman in a room, what to do when a man shuts them down, takes their ideas, the the the the, you know, the subject of mansplaining. They're being told they're they're being too bitchy, too ambitious, that they're not resilient enough, that they're too emotional. Whatever it happens to be, that women are judged. Anybody, interesting is that I understand the question, a go getter. Right? For me, what's really interesting is if you get any, any minority in a room, but I'm gonna focus on women because that's the focus that we quote, they're be they're what they talk about and how they behave is very, very different to the moment when a man walks into a room. The moment and, you know, it's probably maybe common sense. Maybe it's not. Maybe we've never thought about it.

But the moment a man walks into the room, the behavior changes, the conversation changes. Why is that? What would it look like if it didn't? Why does the conversation have to change? Just the men's behavior and language change where you could argue maybe it does. Right? So I was watching something from the 19 sixties where I think it was in Australia and a woman went into the pub and said, oh, women allowed to go into the pub now. And these men were, that's not right, is it? Oh, sorry. That was a northern accent, not an Australian accent. But right. Well, that's not right, is it? Because now we can't swear or now we so maybe men's behavior does change when a woman is in the room. But from a position of leadership or from a perspective of leadership, what defines successful leadership? And there is all this research coming out now that shows that actually women tend to be better leaders than men for a number of different reasons.

One, because they've had to learn to be more resilient because the the journey, the path to the top is far harder for women than it is for a Joanne. True for any underrepresented minority. Secondly, they have high emotion intelligence as a generalization. So they're better with people. They're more empathetic. They take less risky decisions for the company. So there were all these incredible strengths that come with being a woman that are more Joanne that feminine trait aspect that most men, and I don't mean this in any critical way, but because of history, we perceive it still as a weakness. She's too emotional.

Hang on. Wait a minute. Why am I she being emotional? And actually more importantly, why is that a bad thing? Is it actually a bad thing? And I'm not saying all women are emotional. I'm not saying that. Right? But we know if you look at hormone cycles between men and women, we're pretty much steady. Right? Our testosterone reduces slightly over time. For a woman, just look at their hormone cycle in 1 month. Poof.

Right? So but is there a strength that a woman brings by being more emotional that men don't recognize that actually we feel almost defensive about I mean, to shut down in some way because we're so logical and rational and whatever happens to be. So there's a really interesting debate, I think, to be had around this definition of successful leadership when we talk about male traits and female.

I've spent a good proportion of my life in male company and and more latterly in more female company. I I I've I've certainly seen a marked difference in styles, as you as you mentioned, conversations. I also believe that men change their their conversation. Men change the way they behave when a woman walks in the room, so it's not just that way around.

Yeah.

Men will suddenly become more polite or more charming. Right. Maybe the the feudalistic competitive alpha type traits tend to minimize a bit because they're now into impress the woman mode as well. So I see there's some kind of different traits come out. And so I think playing on that, there's a there's a there's a necessity for a really great balance of both the masculine and the feminine. Because if if half the workforce, notionally, is gender mixed, then having men in leadership positions isn't necessarily going to build trust and empowerment for women at lower levels. Having women in in or only women in the leadership will make men feel there's no aspirational yeah. So it's like this balance, isn't it?

A 100%. And you're gonna have a perspective on this that I couldn't possibly begin to Joanne. Right? Because of the journey that you've been through. But we see this time and time again is is that difference. And, you know, I've heard so many women even talk to me where they've been invited into, for example, a board meeting or an executive committee meeting, and they're the only woman. Right? They walk into that room and how they experience it. And then when they speak up, what they experience, and the room goes quiet, they feel deeply uncomfortable, and they stop talking. This happened only with 1 one lady, and and she left the meeting.

And after she said to the whoever was running them in the chair or the CEO, you know, what happened? So, well, we invited you, but we didn't expect you to speak. It's like, oh my god. Like, it it you know, this is happening day in, day out, day in, day out. So how is that impacting the business? And as you say, you know, these companies that still there are still a number of executive committees within not only UK FTSE companies, but globally. Right? So many global, especially companies that are all men. And they actually that there may be and I dare use the word token. There's a token woman on there, and they'll be the company secretary. Right? Well, they'll sometimes they're they're invited as the guest chair, whatever that means.

Right? Because now they have a woman in the room. She doesn't say anything. And by the way, can you make the coffees, please? Like, it's like, you know, all those all those kind of, Jo what I mean, I a stat that I I often roll out is globally globally, this is. In fact, if I was to say to you, listen, Jo, there's a 95% chance of rain when you're about to go out to the shop. Right? Before you walk out your front door, you would dress up for rain. Right? Lockwood be fully expecting it to rain. Well, 95% of all CEOs globally are men. 95%, which is practically like saying, it's all CEOs are men.

And I'm super conscious here. I'm running a business on gender equality. I do have a business partner, Katie Litchfield, who founded the company. So there's a whole story there, but that's not lost on me. You know? So how do we what would the world look like even if we doubled the number of CEOs that are women? But we got up to 15% or 20% or even 30%. What what would that actually do? How would that impact the culture inside those organizations? We know from the research, and I've seen this on your website as well. So I know you've spoken to this many times, but, you know, companies that have greater equality. Right? And we're talking about gender here, but we know it applies much broader than that.

Improve revenues as compared to the competition that don't. Improve revenues, profitability, employee engagement, customer service. They make less risky decisions, and they invest more in research and development. And on top of that, those companies also gain more of a focus on ESG and CSR, I. E. They become better for the environment. They be get become better for communities. They're better governed in in terms of making sure there's no fraud.

They're not gonna drain the pension pots and corporate social responsibilities. The way I see it is increase equality is better for business. It's better for people, and it's better for planet. Boy, do we need that right now? So what would it look like if we had anything approaching 50% on the top leadership teams across the world? What what would that look like? What would lee how would we change the definition of leadership at that point?

The the challenge sometimes is that we we want women to aspire to leadership positions. We want women to take on these roles. We want to create this equity. And I I can feel a huge desire in in the world to do that. But when women get there, it's not as comfortable. You know? The the the money is still controlled by by men, often the investment or whatever it is, people being judged harshly. We've seen a lot of women arrive in the boardroom, and within a short period of time, they feel very uncomfortable. You know, there's there's concrete cliff or this cliff that, you know, you get there.

You suddenly you're you're being judged more harshly than your male counterparts.

For sure. And also research shows that it's called the leap pad effect where they have to take more more almost lateral moves. They have to take more more roles. So by the time they do gain that promotion, they're actually more qualified than the men. They have more experience than the men, but also they're often given an opportunity for a role that a man wouldn't wanna take. Right? So let's say it's a really a really risky turnaround situation. Right? Hey. We've got this great opportunity for you.

We want you to go and run, Chad. Right? And we want you to do this turnaround where we want you to sell alcohol to all the village elder, but I'm kinda playing a little bit. But you get the idea. Right? It's almost like the the poison chalice is impossible. And not only is the pressure higher on a woman, but actually often and it's called the glass ceiling for a reason. Often, they're also given roles that men touch with a bargepole because men tend to have more choice than women. And I'm not against men. I'm speaking as a man.

Right? We need men. But what does it look like? How do we better support women to get those top positions for all the reasons that you've just outlined?

Yeah. I mean, we look at politicians around the world, Jacinda Ardern, Thatcher, Truss, Theresa May, and other strong female leaders around the world. The way we talk about them and describe them is from very I'm going to say misogynistic, and I don't mean that in a in a sort of horrible word, but just that kind of male perspective, how we're judging on beauty, on dress, and clothes, even other women Yeah. Judge judge them harshly about how they look as well.

And Yes.

Men men could look like Boris Johnson.

And I'm not saying a word.

Yep. And and people think he's it looks a bit slobbish. Yep. But it doesn't matter if if a woman looked

It's true.

Slobbish. Yep. She would not succeed at all. A woman has to look, and this is this is what's wrong about the whole thing. A woman has to look the part as well as as well as be the part.

And it's how it's how each of us without even realizing are embodying that perspective, that value set that is that is informed and kinda programmed by the society that we're brought up in. Right? And for many of us, it is unconscious. For some of us, it might be conscious. For some of us, we're aware. We're trying to change it, but we don't realize when we fall into that trap. Gosh. It's so easy. And women will talk about this as well.

You know, we we work in a lot of organizations where they recognize that culture is kind of against that it could just be against speaking up full stop. Right? And so therefore, it's even harder for a woman to speak up. And so then it can create competition between women who are already in the minority inside an organization. In one sense, that suits the powers that be because the powers that be may be more male. Right? So how do you create this sense of allyship? How do you create this sense of of underrepresented minorities in this instance? Women supporting each other, championing each other, advocating for each other, having each other's backs because it's so much harder for anybody who's in the minority.

But minorities tend to judge each other harshly as well, don't they? I mean But Yeah.

Because of the way that it's been set up. Right? It's it's unfair. And so it's it's it's a really, you know, that's that's difficult to change, but surely, it starts with awareness that it's happening. Because unless we're aware it's happening, and even those with a capital l or a lowercase l as leaders or managers having responsibility for others. Hang on a second. Is this happening? How am I contributing to this? Is it getting us the kind of results that we want? Could we improve the results that we want by shifting how we perceive this issue, by creating a more level playing field? What does that actually even mean? Is there competition between minorities because of how the game has been set up? Or how can we change the rules to that game? Like, these are not easy questions. Right? Well, they're certainly not easy to answer, but inclusive leadership, he wants to maximize the potential of all people everywhere. Absolutely, there should be an edge.

My my belief is that we're we're trying to tackle the problem too late. And what do I mean by that? By the time people get into into business, into into organizations in their twenties, whatever it may be, they've already been set expectations by society throughout their formative years as a young as a young person to their teens, into their twenties. So we're we're socializing people, young girls, to be young girls and young men to be young men without the equity at that level. And I always believe that we actually need parenting classes on how to instill empowerment into their young girls in the same way we talk about parents teaching their children about misogyny, around sexual misconduct, etcetera, etcetera, educating the boys younger. But by the time you've been socialized, you have so much limiting beliefs, so much impostor syndrome, so much sense of being behind the curve by the time you even get out of school into university into business. That I think we've done a lot of the, yeah, the the expectation setting, and then you have to exceed that program. You have to break out of that socialization, and that I think that's part of the challenge we gotta face.

It is. And every every culture has it. Right? Every country, every region, even even smaller localities have this very strong sense of within that culture, what is acceptable, what is not, how somebody should behave, how somebody shouldn't, how they should speak, how they should dress, not just on gender lines. Right? It can even be on cast. It can be on how much money you have, which school you go to, your accent, how you it's just a whole multiplicity of things. So, you know, we're talking about broader societal change. And as you was as you were speaking, it reminded me of some of the hot water that Disney's got into. Right? As they've started to try and, in one sense, redress this old historic pattern of what is a man and the hero, and what is a woman is the feminine, and that that, you know, the woman needs to be rescued.

And and so as they've sought to change their programming and now you will see it. Right? You will see black women as the as the role, as the hero, as the as the one you wanna follow in cartoons or in films. And there's been incredible pushback, and Disney's gone through some really challenging moments as a result of it. Because they're try they've kind of depending on your perspective rightly or wrongly. Right? But as a as as an executive team, they've decided, right, we're going in this direction. We want a more equitable world. We want to role model the underrepresented. And then the status quo, and this is the subject to my book, you know, disrupted leadership is about challenging the status quo, not just about challenging, but changing right to disrupt means you literally change the status quo.

You change what is into something else. And so that's something that Disney's tried to do, but it created all out war for them.

Yeah. I mean, we look back to the, what, the 1930, 19 forties, and Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, those kind of really strong, of the time, male and female stereotypes. The dwarves, hi ho hi ho off to work and Snow White stayed at home, cooked, cleaned, sang, and skipped for the, the animals in the forest and things. So that was kind of the thing. And, oh, at the apple falls asleep, needs man to rescue and save and kiss, make up, off his back, ride off sunset Disney ending. And I think it was was it Frozen was the first, Disney feature film where there was a strong female lead that wasn't supported by a male character. Right. And it was a basic, a matriarchal Yes.

Female led film. And that was the that was their turning point, I believe.

Yeah. I remember my daughter singing those songs time and time again. Yeah.

You'd be right. Those that that sets the tone for society. Those what you're growing up with, what you're seeing, the advertising, the pink and the blues.

It it really does. But I but actually and I it's something that I'm still, in one sense, working through because do I actually believe we will get to a situation where we have 50% CEOs being men and 50% of CEOs being women? Right? Cause that's ultimately where the power lies. Right? The CEO, the COO, chief operating officer, and the chief finance officer. But 95% of CEOs are men. So what would it look like if we increase that percentage? But, again, I think we have to be really careful with this because there is the masculine and there is the feminine, and there are traits that are more commonly associated with the masculine. And there are traits that are more commonly associated with the feminine. It's not that a man can't have feminine traits, and it's not a woman can't have masculine traits. Right? That's we're all this very incredibly complex mix of different aspects to us based on nature and nurture.

Right? But what but I'm really intrigued and and I'm and every time I see a very senior female leader working, and I'm sometimes have the joy of almost being a in a room, but not act you know, being in the back It it takes my breath away. I'm like, wow. Like, what? How did you do that? Like, I couldn't do it like that. I'd be far more direct. I'd be far more like calling the shots. Here's what I want. And they and and there's a there's a I know it's innate, actually, but there is a a deep skill that's been learned either as a result of being the feminine and also the result of being the minority, the one that has the less power. They've had to learn how to if I say play the game, there is an aspect to that because we're all playing this game.

Right? That they've had to learn how to influence, how to drive results without going through the front door that a man might do. Right? A woman might come through the kitchen window or through the back door. A man goes through the front door in the main because that's the expectation. So what the bit I'm trying to raise here is what does successful feminine leadership look like? And, you know, a number of a number of b corps in the world and b corps being those organizations that ultimately wanna do good for the world, not not quite not for profit. And that's all third sector, if you like. Hugely successful companies. Role models. A lot of them are run by women.

Wow. Gosh. And yet let's not let's not think that women don't lead successful businesses. You know, in my book, I interview Heather Sikorsky, she was at ABB. She's now at Schneider Electric. She's she stood up a bit. She started a business within ABB that was generating $2,000,000,000 in revenue. You know, she went and and automated the largest chemical plant in Saudi Arabia where women aren't allowed to manage anything.

Like and and if you may ask, she's the kindest, most feminine type of woman you might find, and yet she is able to drive extraordinary results. But if you met her, you'd never know. You'd never know. So there's something I think really remarkable and wonderful and and something I would love to see more of is is genuine feminine leaders, but they're still driving incredible results. I say still. Why am I saying still? They are. Right? They are. They're outperforming their male their male counterparts.

Is it, I I guess what you're saying there is you you use the tools you have in your toolbox. A man might use deep voice, power, masculine traits. Someone might use, say, nurturing, compassion, empathy, some of the soft skills in in more abundance. So you're you're influencing your sphere of influence, your creation powers.

Sorry. Even if you say it like that, though, I think, again, we could we can and I'm and I'm I'm questioning myself as I'm having this conversation with you. Right? Compassion. What would you say? Compassion, empathy. I can't remember the other one. What the other word was you Jo.

It's true. I didn't know it's true. It's a bad train.

Yeah. So I think when we use that, if we have a scale of 1 to a100, right, where a man is we're saying a man is at 0 and a woman's at a 100. Right? And then we see all the negative aspects of compassion and nurture and forgive me. I forgot the the third word again. Right. But we, but actually it's not

like that.

Right. If you look at the, the, the, the data from, you know, psychometric traits, etcetera, personality traits, a woman might be 52% and a man might be 48%. Right? We're not talking not to a 100, but when we say, well, she's a very compassionate leader. I think it's very but they do it with compassion. It do you understand what I'm saying? The the the differentiation Completely.

Yeah. And it's about I said, but it's around using where you score higher as your toolbox. I'm not saying and I'm

I'm not

for one been suggesting here that it's an absolute, you know, a 100% versus 0%. But you attend you know, we look at this profiling and other personality profiling types. We people have a stronger in red, green, or yellow, or or blue, and we we tend to know what people are gonna be stronger at. You know, the I'm not gonna go into nursing because I don't have that level of compassion. Mhmm. But I would more like to go into I could do coaching and mentoring mode because I I do have enough empathy to do that. But I'm not one who wants to be yeah. I don't I don't wanna get into the nursing side where you need more compassion.

I'm not heavy on that. So I think, yeah, it's it's it's it's it's looking at the skills you have and valuing them differently. And I think as you point as you called it out just now actually, we're we're associating these words with femininity, these words with masculinity as almost a positive trait and a negative trait. Everybody has a blend of those. Is it is it because men have been socialized in such a way to minimize those traits that they're not expected to be compassionate or nurturing? They're kind of Oh,

I've got I I think that so depends on the macro and the micro. And what I mean by that is, you know, if your father is somebody who is very hard and harsh, for example, and you're the son, it might be that then you also become harder and harsher because that's the example that's been set to you as to what a man is. Whereas if you've been brought up in an environment where your father is actually very gentle and soft, but can fight. Right? So it's not that he's gentle and soft. It's it's that he he has developed that aspect of his personality such that he is gentle and soft, but you would want him in your corner if there's a fight because he's gonna knock the living daylights out of somebody. Right? So I think it very much depends on on your upbringing. It depends on the local culture that you're in. By local culture, I mean, the school you go to, the neighborhood that you're in, you know, what the gangs are doing.

Like, it just depends so much, but I but when we're talking about mature leadership, right, so we're not talking about 5 year old or 15 year old or 25 year old. We're talking about if you're getting into your forties, fifties, and sixties, You know, I I generally believe that as leaders and, again, leaders are those who have an influence over others to achieve an outcome. Right? This is a very broad definition. I think it becomes incumbent upon us. And this is again, where I talk to in my book about what does great leadership look like and, and, and great leadership is where we are willing to ask ourselves the difficult questions where we're open to feedback, critical cutting negative feedback, and and we take it because we recognize it's gonna help us become better leaders. We're constantly wanting to grow and develop and challenge ourselves because we're about a purpose bigger than ourselves that we want to bring other people along with us on the journey. And I think then we start to mature as leaders. And as we start to mature as leaders, we start to see the the the importance of a diverse team that bring you know, and diverse in all of its different facets because we recognize that's what we need to succeed.

And so how do I, as a leader, bring a diverse team together? Am I hiring people that are in my own image that sound like me, talk like me, that I believe are my definition of success. Am I willing to challenge that? Am I willing to give opportunities and take risks? Because it's outside of my own comfort zone, because I haven't seen it before. Am I willing to go and get mentoring or get a coach or get someone who's gonna challenge my mindset, my my my beliefs, my my thoughts, my attitudes. Where they're saying, wait a minute, Mark. Why did you hire that? As an example, and I'm I have to very carefully I don't name any names. I was speaking to a CEO. I say of a FTSE company. Right? UK listed company.

How much can I say? So he had an all male executive committee, and I know that wasn't his intention. And he generally wanted to have women on his executive committee, but they're all men. Now the FTSE, there's there's a report that just came out, I think, last month. The number of all male executive committees now within FTSE companies is actually quite small, but they're still there. This company is one of those, so nobody can guess who it is. And I said to him, well, hang on. Why? Wait. That's that's not good enough.

Like, you're saying that you want women on your executive committee, but you don't have women on your executive. And he said, well, Mark, I tried With respect, you haven't because you haven't. Right? And it's incumbent upon leaders to drive Joanne. And he'd had a one of the power roles come and said, oh, we had women on the short list, but they went the Joanne outvoted and then and then he said, Joanne had to take our investors into consideration. Oh, that's a very telling statement. Right? So the outgoing CXO, whoever the c suite role member was, was liked by investors. He was white. You know? He was Oxbridge educated, comes from a certain background, speaks in a certain way.

So let's call him Michael. Right? So Michael, this was the outgoing CX. I, and okay, now we're going to, we need a new CXO. Okay. Let's find another Michael. That's always the easiest way because we have in our mind, and it's it's a human condition. Right? And that doesn't in one sense, there's no implied criticism other than if you're a great leader, you're a mature leader. You understand the absolute requisite need to challenge yourself and your thinking around the diversity that you need and your leadership team to drive the results? This is the whole separate aspect in terms of competitive sustainability over the long term and how you outperform your competitors over the long term.

I can talk about that in a second if that's helpful. But just as an example, right, he had an idea in his mind, not only of what he needed, but also what the external world needed, the investors needed. And it was somebody that's looked like and sounded like a Michael. Right? Okay.

It's like the old adage. You know, you don't get fired for buying IBM. You know? You don't get fired for hiring a man. It's kind of the Yeah. If you hire a woman, then in in it's there's an implicit perception there of you're hiring because she's a woman. You're hiring for 2nd best. You're taking a risk. You're putting a limb out there rather than having some confident hire, is it?

Well, it and you are all of those things. Right? Because the moment you break away from the way things have been done previously, you are taking a risk. You are. Hello?

On you.

It's on you. You're fine with that. Hello? What do you think comes with this role as a leader of this organization? Did you wanna repeat the hit the the the patterns of the past and become like a Kodak or or a Nokia even though this anyway or, like, whoever big or block like, these big organizations that just got into level 1 thinking, tick box exercise. We know what success looks like. Let's just keep rolling that particular wheel. And before you realize it, you're you're you're in a burning house and it's and it's it's all gone. Right? You as a leader, it is incumbent upon you to ask the really challenging questions, which is an aspect of diversity. So I could Jo I come on to the That's it.

Yeah.

So I was gonna ask you a question about is the recruitment process set up correctly? I'm I'm a big fan of anonymized hiring, work based samples Yeah. Jumping the CV Yeah. Getting that to your final 5 for that actually knowing who they are until until you start getting into the final 5 and meeting them.

Mhmm.

That would that would have learned a lot more broader a broader demographic to come through, in my opinion.

Yeah. I mean, I I remember I was speaking with, again, one of the women. She was the CEO of a of a company. And she's going, Mark, I'm not sure that we we've gotta be careful. We don't do positive. Gosh. She had a really interesting

Positive discrimination. You wanna take positive action? So, yeah.

So she had a really interesting ethical dilemma inside her business, but we started talking about positive discrimination. And she said, actually, Mark, we need positive discrimination. And here's why. Because when you have a minority, they're in a minority for a reason. How are you gonna bring the balance in unless you positively discriminate the other way? And, gosh, I can hear the screams now. Right? Oh my god. Can't do that. What what do you mean you can't do that? Like, if you have, let's talk in maybe more masculine language.

You have a football team and you have a team of 11 strikers. Right? And you got we just want the best players, and that's why we have 11 strikers on the team. We can score lots of goals, but we always lose every game because we've got no goalkeepers, defenders, or midfielders. Okay? Well, then you need to positively discriminate, don't you? You need to go out and hire a goalkeeper. He may not be able to shoot a goal, but you need a goalkeeper who can defend a goal. That's positive discrimination, surely. No. It's not.

It's wisdom. It's how to build a diverse team.

It's not positive discrimination. It's you know, which is unlawful in many territories. It's positive action. So it's using different techniques. It's about the attraction phase, the the the recruitment marketing, the employer branding, all these kind of things Yep. Encourage, favor of the the demographic you're looking to attract. I think that yeah. In in terms of the marketing, I think if you anonymize, you can

True.

You can get people in

for their process. But insurance

is a challenge. Now if you're looking for

Yep.

If you're looking for a FTSE 500 CFO, the majority of FTSE 500 CFOs are probably men.

They are.

So if you're looking for a CFO for with that credentials, your your talent pool is likely to be highly biased towards men with attractive

But that may be true, but this is really interesting. And this is actually why our business partner Katie set up WeQual to start with. So she used to work at the Financial Times, and she set up the Feet forums. And these were executive level events, primarily for UK listed companies. And every time she ran an event, there always meant turning up. So once she left the Feet, she had a black book of CEOs and chairs, and she said to them, hey. Listen. Where are the women? And they asked, okay.

If you can find them, we'll hire them. Jo okay. Now at the same time, the UK government had just done the report, right? That Hamtai Alexander report, which was that there were 5,000 women reporting into executives, executive committee roles within just the Foot CLA. And just the recent study that came out a month ago is over 5,000. So over 5,000 women, 5,000 women reporting into direct reports to members of the executive committee. It's not that they're not there. They're there, which is why we run the equal awards because we identify these women that are ready for the step up to the c suite. And it we're approaching 40% now of those women that have been actually promoted.

They're there. But there is still this bias. There is still this perspective perception, call it what you will, that we have to overcome, which is why we need sorry?

We want the person who's in in that ex ex Jo role, not the one reporting to the ex co. We're not we're not looking to step down when we're looking to to that is that is that part of the challenge? We're not looking for potential talent. We're looking for demonstrable talent.

We no. But the challenge the the challenge is, though, if you've got a a CFO and a FTSE 100 company, for example, they may wanna go to FTSE 20 company. Right? Because you don't wanna go and do the same job you've just done ever. Right? Because that's just boring. So you always wanna stretch role. So promotion is always a stretch. So alright. Maybe if you're, you know, the world's largest company, you don't want a first time CFO.

Okay. I I can understand that. But if they've been the CFO of a region, that's maybe doing 10,000,000,000 in whatever currency, and they're a woman, but you pick somebody who's not got that experience because they're a man, that's clearly not in the best interest of your business. And there are plenty of women in those kind of roles.

Jo, I mean, when when I talk about it seems like allyship and privilege and those those kind of things, it's about the people who hold the power, who hold the privilege. It's their responsibility to open the door. So women can knock, but the door has to open, and the person behind the door is generally a Joanne, has to open that door.

Yes.

Yeah. That that's the challenge. Jo how do how do we mentor and coach men to be more welcoming? You know, like you talked about the in this person who couldn't make the decision to hire a CXO who was female. How do we educate those men to make those other decisions, not in a brave way, but in a kind of matter of fact way?

Well, I I think there's 2 aspects to it. 1, dare I say, and I I don't mean to minimize this, but education. Right? Because I don't think I still think today, most are not aware of the the better improved KPIs you're gonna gain by having a more diverse team. Right. And that starts with gender. So the more diverse your team, the more likely you are to outperform your competitors. Is it going to cause you a problem? Of course it is. Because you're going to have diverse perspectives in the room.

It might take you that little bit longer to get to a decision because you're gonna have diverse perspectives. But when you do reach that decision, it's gonna be more thought through. It's gonna actually be better for your business. Right? So the first part is the educational piece. The second part, and certainly, you know, a number of the large corporates are doing this now primarily because they have to release pay gap data. They've got targets in their own reports in terms of where they wanna be by gender representation throughout the organization, but also at the top, is the importance of sponsorship, mentorship. Now, you know, again, as a as a business, we have something called We Call Executives where we bring together women from all these different global companies through an a number of monthly development sessions. And there's a number of themes that we talk to time and time and time again about how a woman can take that step up to the executive committee.

And there are absolutely some things that women Joanne, and I would argue should be doing to help them take that next step up. Right? Be very deliberate. Be very intentional. Don't be afraid of coming across as ambitious. Be really clear about what the role that you want. Have the conversation with your line manager. Be clear about where your gaps are. Tackle where the gaps are, get a board role externally because that's gonna give you experience that you can bring back into your own business.

Except there's a number of different things, but sponsorship is, as you say, so important. And, yes, a woman's sponsor is great. There's very few of those. So find male sponsors, men on the board or on the executive committee. These are obviously in large companies. If you're in a smaller company, who's at your top team that you can reach out to and say, hey. Listen. I I either wanna be where you are, or I want this role that's way more senior than I am now.

I love what you're doing, but I need support. And I'm I'm just wondering, would you be willing to be my mentor? Or actually, sorry, in this instance, my sponsor. Because a sponsor will advocate for the person when they're not in the room. Right? They will identify development opportunities and open the door for you to take them and invite you to people and bring you into a room in a way you could never do yourself. That is the power of sponsorship. And so a lot of these big organizations do have more formal sponsorship programs now for that very reason. But the world is a big place, and that doesn't cover everybody. So

No. So how how do you work with, aspiring women to because some of it's mindset and some of it's opportunity. So how how do you coach and nurture women to have belief and accelerate their own careers?

But, I mean, there's always 2 parts to it. Right? It's the system and there's you. Right? And you talked earlier on about, okay, but we can be the leader of our own lives. And now it probably come also coming down to more to my personal philosophy as well. Right? Which is life is really, really short. How you're gonna make sure that you drive the impact or have leave the legacy that you want to leave? Well, first of all, you probably need to have an idea of what legacy you want. And not everybody knows the answer to that question. It depends how old we are.

It depends what stage of our career. It depends how much personal development we've done. It depends what traumas we've been through. All sorts of all sorts of things. Right? Different life crisis moments, etcetera. But I genuinely believe that being clear about I mean, you talked about superpowers before, for example. So being really clear about what your superpowers are, why do you have those superpowers? And in order to achieve what and where do your superpowers become your kryptonite? What is it you want to do? It's about 70% of the women that, that we meet, that I meet, I'll say to them, well, what's your next step? Don't know. I feel like I got hit by accident.

I feel like I already overperforming. There may be an aspect of imposter syndrome. Again, it's not that men don't have it, but when women seem to have it more primarily because of the game they've had to play to get to where they've got to. Right? They're all men. They're in the minority. They've been judged more critically, more harshly. They have to pretend to be something. They're really not.

They have to be more masculine in their behaviors than they may want. So they don't feel that they're being their authentic selves, etcetera. Okay. But if you could, what would you do if you had a magic piece of paper and a magic pen and whatever you write down on this magic piece of paper, this magic pen is possible. Turn down the inner critic. What would you write? What's your dream? And for all of us, I genuinely believe it's about impact in some way. We wanna make a difference, likely a positive difference, and it may be in our immediate circle of our family. It may be a slightly wider circle of our extended family or our community or within an organization or for a particularly social demographic group or whatever it happens to be.

Right? We wanna make a difference. Write it down. Write the difference down that you wanna make. Be really clear about it. Is it gonna take you time? If you've never thought about it, for sure. If you thought about it, it probably still gonna take your time. And it's a constant distillation process, and you constantly revisit as you gain life experience. Right? But write it down.

Where is it? I what what why do I believe I'm on this planet ultimately in the years that I have, which goes like that so quick. All right. So once I start getting an idea, then I ask myself a very simple question. Am I on that path? Is that the direction I'm heading? And if I'm working inside a company and I realize I wanna save the world, but I'm I'm sucking oil out the ground, and it's it doesn't it doesn't vibe with my values, well, then leave and go find an organization that does. Right? So find a context, an environment, an organization that supports you in your purpose. And that's ultimately where we get engagement inside organizations is if we can map personal purpose with organizational purpose. You're gonna get more engaged employees than that. Okay.

And now what what's the journey? What's the step? What's the next step? Where's the gap? How are you gonna achieve more of why you're on this planet? Because it's so short your time here. It's not worth following somebody else, trying to impress somebody else, trying to seek validation from others, trying to gain a sense of status or ego from others. Right? It is about taking responsibility for our lives, which is where that l, that leadership, you said it right to the outset. We we lead our own lives. What that means, we take responsibility for our own lives regardless of the cards that have been dealt. That's difficult. That's challenging. There's also, I think, a freedom and a power that comes with that.

It's it's a game at play here where in order to succeed at these higher levels, you have to com commit yourself, your soul, your whole being to achieving these goals. You know, you often hear this. You've gotta show commitment to become partner. You know, you gotta be doing this. You gotta be networking. You gotta be out. You gotta be dining. You gotta be socializing.

Gotta play golf.

Yeah. Does that And I see

that dies unfairly I guess. Right?

I I no. I think it it depends on who you are and why you're doing it. Because it because I've coached, for example, many bankers, investment bankers here, you know, are making a killing financially, but they feel that they've entirely lost their soul because they're doing it purely for the pursue pursuing pursuant pursuing of money. Joanne more money than it could ever dreamt of. But now they wanna do something that's to them more purposeful, but they feel locked inside that environment. So I'm going, well, listen, life's really short, Steve, right? Steve life's really short. And, and, and if you're feeling like this, it's going to be harming you. Right? It's harming you spiritually.

It's harming you emotionally. It's harming you physically. It's be harming your relationships because ultimately you're giving of your energy and time towards something that you no longer believe in. Get really clear about what you do believe in and then make the difficult choices. Leave the comfort zone because life's for living. And that's true on on on any level. Right? Some people go out and dine and work all the house because they absolutely love it. Like, Elon Musk loves what he does even though it it it also has a lot of cost to it.

Right? And I I don't mean to set him up as an example, but, you know, he don't compare ourselves with an Elon Musk because that's just not fair on anybody. In our own lives, why are we doing what we're doing? And are we truly being true to our own sense of purpose? And the moment we take responsibility for our own lives, that's actually when we start becoming disruptive because we're willing to challenge the status quo. We're willing to cause conflict. We're willing to fall out with people. We're willing to make difficult decisions. We're willing to do things that other people think is a bad idea because we know that's the difference that we want to make. It steps out of safety. It steps outside of comfort.

That's where disruption takes place. And so when where the whole subject of today's talk was change from the top. Right? As leaders of an organization as well, how are you ensuring that that you as a leader are being purposeful, that your organization is being purposeful, that it's doing good, not just in terms of yes, shareholder return or or profitability, but actually it's good for people and it's good planet. That's really difficult. It requires great leadership. It requires you asking yourself the really difficult questions, really being self aware about why you're doing what you're doing, how you're engaging other people, have you built a diversity, all all of this.

I mean, if we and this is not criticism. It's more of a, observation. The business is geared up around patriarchal expectations. It is a it's a it's a man's world, you know, created by men largely.

Uh-huh.

And there's many women I speak to, many women who I hear stories from, have come to the realization they can't have it all. They can't grow a family, nurture a family, not just their maybe their offspring, but also their parents, their siblings, and, still that family environment Mhmm. And commit both feet all in, Texas Texas holding them style all in

Mhmm.

On a career that men can in the same way. So women come to realize that they can't have it all, and it and you can't compete by not being all in in a in a male only environment.

True. And and I again, for me, the really important question is to get really clear about what your purpose I mean, I you know, I've coached women who who and and and this is not set an expectation of this is how women should be. Not at all. These are so rare at some true. You know, a a top VP will give birth, and then 2 months later, be on a plane from America to Japan to run a meeting and then get back for their older daughter's play at school at 4 o'clock on a like, that's just, it's actually listening to almost insane. Right? These are very rare people. Don't try and be like them instead, be really clear about yourself. What's important to you.

And that might be important to you and you may have a clear purpose and then you'll make it happen. Right. But don't do something just because society expects you to, or because there's a pressure to be, take responsibility for your own life. Be really clear about the purpose and the impact that you want to have. And if that as a woman or as a dad or a mom or whoever is to ensure that your family has a really secure base that you're there for them, commit to that with pride. And there'll be a period when your children grow up that maybe you have to figure out what you're gonna do next. Okay? Well, then go through that process. But be really clear, you know, own own what you're doing.

Take responsibility for it. Declare us to your own purpose.

Jo we'd we'd call this episode ignite the change from the top. So we see maybe you you give an example of b corps. We see examples of of great female CXOs and CEOs and chairs, setting the culture from the top where you don't have to sacrifice your life for for the organization. And I'm a great believer that if if in order to remove the stigma and the the challenge of of of succeeding, you have to enable men to benefit from that as well because flexible working

For sure.

Succeeding without sacrifice becomes the norm then that men could aspire to, then women won't be seen as second best because they're they're not fully committed, not both feet in, if you like.

Yep.

So how do how do we get that culture into organizations where those male attributes we talked about, you know, go getting, that that we wanna minimize that. And you say, some women want it all. They they want they're prepared to jet off to Japan, come back, look after their kids. But how can I how can I have both of those? How can I how can I do both? I just don't wanna compromise. I think

it's, honestly, it's every single one of us has to figure that out. And I I know that's might sound a bit lame, but it's true. Right? We we have to take responsibility for our lives. We have one life. And my my core challenge in that is what is it you will really, truly, honestly want? And then be open about it. Be honest about it. Talk with your partner about it. You know, many of these women that make it to stop is their husbands or their partners, and most of them are married.

It's their partners actually that then take make decisions to leave their work to support their wife or their partner because the wife or their partner now has the the bigger, more paying, more lucrative career. So it's unique to every situation. For sure it is. Yeah. There's the I mean, the for example, one of our one of our clients is Sanofi, and they they give equal maternity cover to men and to women. And as you were just talking, then it took me back. So I've got a 31 and a 28 year old, 2 daughters. And I remember when my youngest, my oldest daughter was first born, and I think I took 2 weeks off, which was the maximum I could take off at the time.

And, you know, as a dad, that was a wrench then to go back to work for sure. Because I I wanted to support my wife because she was a new mom and she was breastfeeding with all of the joys and tribulations that comes with that, and also my my my daughter. Right? And then my second daughter was born. So I think that's a broader societal challenge as well. But how are we gonna get changed? We're gonna get changed by individuals who decide that there's a change that they want to see, and that drives them. And as a result of that, drive in them, they take a leadership role, capital l or little l, in making that Joanne. And it has always been thus, and it will always be thus. It's down to us.

Mark, thank you. Brilliant conversation. How could people get hold of you to find out more?

Thank you. So I'm on LinkedIn. Definitely follow me on LinkedIn, and you'll see both what I'm doing personally, both in terms of the book, but also see a weak wall. As a company, if you're a if you're a big company, you wanna better support your women, do look us up. Weakwall.com, wequal.com. We have programs for both executive level women and mid managers. We also run quarterly think tanks, which are open events. So for example, never mind.

We run quarterly think tanks. So depending when this podcast comes out, have a look at our website. You can register for those events. You can find my personal website atmarkdashbateman.com. And if you're interested in my book, my book is called disruptive leadership using fire to drive purposeful change. Fire is always disruptive for good or for bad. And so I talk about how you can ignite purposeful change by starting a fire, growing a fire, protecting your fire whilst ensuring you don't burn out. So if you're interested in that, have a look on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, available in all those locations.

Fantastic. Thank you. As we bring this conversation to a close, I want to express my deepest gratitude to you, our listener, for lending your ear and heart to the cause of inclusion. Today's discussion struck a chord. Consider subscribing to Inclusion Bites and become part of our ever growing community, driving real change. Share this journey with friends, family, and colleagues. Let's amplify the voices that matter. Got thoughts, stories, or a vision to share? I'm all ears.

Reach out to Jo dotco.uk, and let's make your voice heard. Until next time. This is Joanne Lockwood signing off for the promise to return with more enriching narratives that challenge, inspire, and unite us all. Here's to fostering a more inclusive world one episode at a time. Catch you on the next bite.