Get Inspired, Be Empowered Forums Gender Justice Innovative ideas for gender equality Reply To: Innovative ideas for gender equality

Semantee Chattopadhyay
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@semantee03
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Let’s face it, we all are biased. There is no need to get defensive. We are built to be biased. The natural tendency to perceive things differently develops shortcuts. That robin is these shortcuts when applied to people can result in bias. How do we avoid unconscious bias to build a better society? Behavioural design offers a new solution to collapsed gender inequality in our lifetime. What if we could make it easier for power bi is mine is to get things right by changing our organisations? For example, in the 1970s major US orchestras made an indigenous discovery by adding a simple curtain to the audition process that allowed them to listen to the music rather than judge musicians based on their looks. Not only did they acquire better talent but the fraction of female musicians grew by more than 30 percentage. Simple solutions like this can also de-bias our workplace. Simply removing the names of our resumes gets a lot of bias out of the way and allows us access to the full talent of the candidates. Research has shown that comparing candidates to each other rather than the imaginary stereotypical applicant calibrates our mind to the best rather than those who we think looks the part. Behavioural designs like this have doubled the fraction of women on the boards of the UK’s largest companies in a very short amount of time. Seeing women in leadership whether in the business of politics changes what people think is possible for their daughters and themselves. In 1993, India mandated one-third of seats to be reserved for women two servers elected leaders to the local level. This not only offered new insights into public policy but also encourage women to speak up in community meetings and seeing women work made it more likely for girls in the community to stay in school, marry later and delay having their first child. This kind of gives way to the phrase ‘seeing is believing. Many organisations including Harvard have taken this to heart by hanging up more portraits of female role models. We can try changing who we look up to on our walls. It’s time to face it, we are biased. But we also can design around it if we have the research and tools to cheaply and quickly design how we work, learn and live. It’s not only the bright thing but also a smart thing to do. Now it’s up to us to change how we perceive the world.