With the work that I do, I am often asked about allyship. For starters, I did co-found a male allies programme for women in technology when I was at JPMorgan so people often think that our business, Men for Inclusion, is all about male allyship.
However, over the last year or so, I am getting more and more conflicted by the word. For starters, I am not sure that everyone understands that allyship is a doing word. Second, there is a real danger that allies see their role as “fixing” the under-represented community. For example, when it comes to gender, there is a risk that male allies are coaching, sponsoring, mentoring, training, supporting women on how to succeed in the current culture with the current behaviours. In other words, are we helping women to adopt male behaviours in order to progress in their careers?
Our view at Men for Inclusion, is that we need to pivot our conversation to be about Inclusion – which is about all of us.
Finally, when it comes to allyship, who gets to decide? I don’t think I can proclaim myself as an ally. I think that is up to someone else. If there is an individual or a community who feel that the work that I do means that I am an ally to them, that is amazing to hear, but I feel that others have to take that view, not me.
The work that lots of amazing allies have done historically should be recognised and it has definitely moved us forward. But I think we are getting a bit stuck now. There are only so many allies that can step forward. It is definitely a great step on the journey, but it is time to move on. We need to build an army of inclusion leaders. Inclusion is the fertile ground in which diversity can flourish.
An inclusion leader starts with turning the mirror on themselves and questioning their own behaviours. Am I being in inclusive? Am I treating my colleagues equitably? How they would like to be treated, as opposed to how I assume they like to be treated like me.
An Inclusion leader is coaching, supporting, training, mentoring, sponsoring everyone (men, women, non-binary, straight, gay) on how to succeed in an inclusive workplace. They are challenging workplace culture when it is not right and building consensus on how teams go about changing it. It is not about having all the answers, but finding the right questions to explore with everyone, including (and especially) those in majority groups, alongside their under-represented colleagues.
So I try to be an inclusion leader. I am not sure I always get it right, because none of us are perfect and we all make mistakes. Boy, are those constantly reinforced stereotypes sometimes hard to buck! But I am convinced to keep trying and hopefully sometimes make a difference.
Here are a few more ideas on what being an inclusion leader means to me:
Giving everyone in your team access to opportunities
Bringing everyone into the conversation by observing in/out dynamics in group settings
Listening more to the lived experiences of others – especially those that do not look like me
Deliberately building new connections and relationships to explore and learn
Calling out things are not right, but using it as an opportunity to coach and learn, rather than punish or castigate
Telling others it is ok to call me out because I am still learning
Trying to share my social capital equally with my colleagues whenever possible
Looking out for and trying to improve problematic processes (e.g. hiring, promotion etc.)
Recognise and celebrate when people do good, inclusive things
Spread the word, be visible and contribute when you have the opportunity.
There are many many more but I have probably already exceeded the word count that means no one will read this.
If you would like to hear more about Men for Inclusions programme to help build Inclusion Leaders across your organisation, please contact me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/garypford/
Research reference : https://www.kcl.ac.uk/giwl/assets/iwd-2024-survey.pdf