Results at the Top

Chapter 10HOW TO RID THE PLUMBING OF BIAS

“Barbara, I've been using the word ‘plumbing’ for a few years now as a metaphor for flushing out the systemic bias—both seen and unseen—that prevents women from advancing and succeeding in leadership. There are other metaphors that could work just as well, but ‘plumbing’ works for me on two levels: we are always speaking of talent pipelines, and plumbing itself is something that men can understand and appreciate.

“‘Plumbing’ refers to the systems, processes, and procedures within the company that affect the intake, evaluation, promotion, and ultimate retention of employees. Every business has plumbing of some sort. Common to all plumbing systems is the presence of one source of fresh water in and one source of wastewater out. The journey in between is what makes life bearable. Get the plumbing right and life is luxurious. Get it wrong and life can be unbearable and sometimes downright dangerous.”

“Richard, I want you to win! ‘Plumbing’ works for me. In our work at the Gender Intelligence Group, we use the word ‘lever.’ The word comes from the French lever, meaning ‘to raise’; we think of the initiatives and actions crucial for bringing about change and transforming cultures as levers that leaders and organizations raise. Put the correct levers in place and they become the key elements underlying the transformation—a fresh water system!

“We've identified nine such levers that we will share later on in this chapter and show how well ...