Building the pipeline for girls to flourish in business - Charly Young MBE, Founder of The Girls' Network
There’s a moral case for your company to give equal opportunities for your team regardless of gender (or background, or sexual orientation, or ethnicity, etc). And there’s a business-performance one in terms of the improved decision-making that results from cognitive diversity.
But although we are without a doubt making progress, it can feel slow.
Recruiting women into senior roles is welcome. But we need to go much deeper if we're to systematically right the balance.
For me, one of the key actions is to grow paths for women right from when they are young through into junior, mid and senior roles in business. So rather than recruiting at a senior level, companies create more opportunities for women to rise through the ranks, grow their own talent, and promote from within rather than having to look outside.
My guest as we launch Series 3 of the Karmic Capitalist podcast is The Girls' Network founder, Charly Young MBE.
Charly set up the Girls' Network because she saw how many talented girls were not seeing or given opportunities because of what she terms the "double disadvantage" of being girls and coming from less privileged backgrounds. The Girls' Network matches those girls with women mentors and organisations to give them support, guidance and critically, role models to grow their self-belief and open up their opportunities.
Charly’s an engaging and passionate speaker and advocate, and it is insightful to see the entrepreneurial way she started the organisation (think MVP), the trajectory it’s been on, the impact it’s making and the opportunities to work with them.
(Disclosure - I loved this so much, I've been asking many of the super-talented and successful women I know if they'd get involved. The first one, a CEO of a consultancy I work with, has just completed training, and her mentee will be in for a real treat!)
Enjoy.
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