On International Women’s Day let's not be satisfied by #inspo alone. International Women's Day is a call to *action*.

My thoughts on the dilution of IWD messaging, how it intersects with pushback against DEI, and how to move from inspiration to action.

“Celebrating” International Women’s Day with meaningless hashtags and corporate platitudes feels dismissive of the levels of inequity we continue to face.

A refresh of the 4 threadbare themes from above:

1. Stop Fighting For (Just) Next-Gen Women

2. Stop Making Us Role Models for Surviving a Broken System

3. Stop Giving Women The Spotlight (Just) Because It’s Good For Their Careers

4. Fighting for Women’s Equality is Not (Just) for Women

You likely know someone - or several people - who have had an abortion. If you know me, you know at least one. Nobody owes anyone a public telling of their abortion story. But I want to share mine.

Being an ally sounds great, in theory, but many professionals have confided in me that while their intentions are good, they get stuck on what to say in the moment when their allyship is needed. 

Gen Z women tolerate far less harassment at work than women of my generation, and they are more likely to speak out about things they believe in. Because they are digital media natives who are accustomed to telling their own stories, they are shaking up the industry. I expect more of this to come in future years, and honestly, it's a breath of fresh air. 

A video message to my young women readers.

Succeeding in financial services takes skills, knowledge, and a network. In the same way you can offer access to those things for men, do it for women.

For the last nine years I’ve been actively engaged in unlearning what I thought I knew about race in America, and relearning more accurate narratives, as well as learning to speak out on the topic of racial injustice. Now I have the context and the language to call my neighbor what he was- a violent, threatening, white supremacist.

To my fellow white woman readers, I’m sure you know what it feels like to be the “only” in the room. The only woman on a team, the only woman in a management meeting, the only woman on a committee, or the only woman at a client dinner.

Of course, not only do you know how hard it is to be the “only,” but you also know how hard it was to get into that room. So now that you’re inside, use that leverage to hold the door open and welcome others in.

When I was a girl, I wanted to be President. A child of the eighties, I was told by family, teachers, and the media that if I worked hard, I could be whatever I wanted. I was in elementary school when I looked at the posters on my classroom wall and realized that our President, Vice President, and all the former Presidents and Vice Presidents were all men. I realized then that I couldn’t actually be whatever I put my mind to. The Presidency was for men only; women and girls did not belong.

A couple of years into working in finance, I had a similar realization. Though there were some women in executive roles, and I eventually became one of them, we were few and far between.

What I’ve found in my conversations is that many advisors and financial services executives do care, but they just don’t know how to talk about it, or it makes them uncomfortable. But staying silent on an issue you’re uncomfortable with discussing is a choice, and not a smart one.

With that, here is what I’ve learned from those conversations about advisors’ challenge around discussing race, and some thoughts on how to overcome and work with the discomfort around these conversations.

Perhaps you’ve read studies showing that diverse organizations are likely to financially outperform industry medians.

Perhaps you agree with the moral imperative of working toward equitable and inclusive workplaces.

In either case, you may find yourself in agreement in theory, but struggling for how to move from theory to action.

The last two months of protests and political action as a result of George Floyd’s murder are a referendum on the criminal (in)justice system that punitively impacts Black Americans.

You might be thinking, “OK, but what does race have to do with financial services?”

Well, everything.

Do you work in financial services and want to learn more about racism and what you can do to help? Let’s chat.

Last year, I wore a Black Lives Matter shirt on stage at a financial services conference. Among the audience feedback about my presentation were comments that my shirt made people uncomfortable. A shirt - one that asserts the basic humanity of Black folks- made people uncomfortable.

Financial services has a racism problem.

One of the most common pieces of feedback I hear about my newsletter and social media presence is, “you have such an authentic voice.” The reason it is authentic is that it’s just me. I don’t have a ghost writer or copywriter, and I no longer have corporate communications standards to which I have to conform. Financial services marketing can feel like a sea of look-alike and sound-alike messaging; embracing my personal communication style made my messages stand out from that crowd.