To create inclusive workplaces, companies need to understand women’s needs, the barriers they face, make promotions transparent and define their pathway to reach their diversity goals, experts say.GETTY IMAGES
Civil engineer Holynde Smiechowski spent the last 13 years on PCL Construction job sites using her STEM expertise to construct buildings in Vancouver. Ms. Smiechowski is also a founding member of a diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) committee that supports women, who are a minority in construction and constituted just 14 per cent of the work force in 2023. The committee has been a springboard for making small changes on job sites to improve women’s experiences at work.
“One example of a change we’ve made is our fall protection harnesses,” explains Ms. Smiechowski, who says the standard-issue harnesses cause uncomfortable chest compression for many women.
“You have to get ones for females that are fitted a little bit differently. Having that awareness and ensuring we have those on hand for our trades so that they’re not stuck wearing something uncomfortable for eight hours is important. Those little things are important for people to enjoy doing their jobs,” she explains.
Creating inclusive workplace cultures saw a boom in the years after George Floyd’s death and the #MeToo movement sparked global conversations about how companies can better protect and foster diverse talent in the workplace. That’s under threat now, as under the Trump administration the culling of DEI professionals, practices, and programs is underway in the United States, with thousands of women losing their jobs as a result.
While the backlash against DEI programs in Canada isn’t as stark, women are still overrepresented in sectors with lower paying jobs, and the failure to foster women’s careers has a ripple effect that pulls down the entire economy, according to a 2022 report by WomenACT, a charitable organization that promotes women’s equality and security.
“If we want to have access to half of the available work force, i.e. women, we’ve got to understand what their needs are, what the barriers are, and be bold enough to say ‘Yes, we want to get to equal representation,’ ” says Erin Davis, a DEI practitioner for nearly two decades and founder of a consulting company that helps organizations create more inclusive workplaces.
“It can’t just be HR saying this needs to be done. It needs to be a strategic priority for the organization to create a more equitable working environment,” she says. Companies need to collect data to understand where they are at and “actually define what success looks like in terms of where you want to get to.”
The absence of clear goals for how to create a more women-centred workplace, Ms. Davis says, makes or breaks a workplace’s prospects of creating a truly inclusive environment. “If [organizations] don’t say how they are going to measure progress, then how do we know we’re getting anywhere?”
Lisa Paulo-Alberto, who has worked at the YMCA of Greater Toronto for 25 years and leads recruitment and onboarding for Child and Family Development staff members – who are 95 per cent women – has made changes to help its work force advance.
“Overall our staff [across the entire organization] is 80 per cent women. Our diversity, inclusion and belonging strategy and policy is to welcome all gender identities and expressions to apply, and we also invest a lot in our staff by way of professional development.”
That strategy improves YMCA retention rates, Ms. Paulo-Alberto explains. The chance to learn and grow with the organization is something “many are so excited about. They want that opportunity.”
In recent years, this investment has taken the form of courses for newcomers to Canada who have a background in childcare but require extra certification to qualify for roles here, called the Bridge-to-Work program. “We just had our first cohort, and it led to paid placements. The experience was uplifting.”
Also, the organization has launched programs to allow those who don’t have certain credentials to pursue certifications without having to quit their current roles and sacrifice income to pursue education.
This flexibility allows women, who spend an average of 7.5 hours per day on caring for their children compared to 4.9 hours for men, according to data from Statistics Canada, the space needed to make career advancement a realistic option.
“Our aim is to give women a chance to engage in the work force, provide for their families, and still earn while they’re learning,” says Ms. Paulo-Alberto.
Ms. Davis says introducing more flexible measures are a stepping-stone for women to reach their full potential in the workplace. “Robust parental leave for all parents, and remote or hybrid options with flexible scheduling really impacts whether women want to work within an organization.”
Openness is also a key component in Ms. Davis’s view. “Transparency in criteria for promotion is a big one, especially at the senior leadership level. That means showing a clear path to promotion, as opposed to individuals being tapped, when women may not always be part of those groups being put into stretch opportunities.”
Nuance also plays an important role, as not all women are starting at the same place when entering the work force. Language barriers, gender expression, race, disability and immigration status are just a few of the myriad of factors at play that could influence belonging, and ultimately career progression.
“Workplaces have to be using an intersectional lens when designing policies and not putting all women into the same category. Data shows us a lot of the gains women have made over the period of time women have entered the work force has been predominately for white women,” Ms. Davis adds.
Instituting these types of changes could have a positive effect on Canadian productivity, according to the WomenACT study, with the gross domestic product (GDP) predicted to see an incremental boost of 0.6 per cent with more financially empowered women across the country.