Knowing your origin story is not only a wellspring of self-insight and wisdom, but sharing it will also help you inspire others.Getty Images
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“Have you ever given any thought to the professional value of your origin story?” asks Anuradha Chawla, a partner at Kilberry, a firm of management psychologists. “If you want to inspire, build connection or be a leader worth following, spend time reflecting on how you came to be who you are. Knowing your origin story is not only a wellspring of self-insight and wisdom, but sharing it will also help you inspire others.
“Many think inspirational leaders are good orators. However, it’s not just what they say, but rather their insight and resulting wisdom that really galvanizes followership.
“Cultivating good insight requires understanding the events that shaped your life, the circumstances you found yourself in and the choices you made. That perspective helps clarify your voice and organize your efforts around what you stand for and why you are saying what you are saying.”
Read the full article for tips on how to think about and share your origin story.
Global report says it will take 131 years for women to catch up to men – it’s too long
Gender equality is a long way from happening and Canada is bearing the economic cost, according to the latest World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report, which shows that in order to make economic progress, countries need to harness the potential of the full population.
Since 2006, the World Economic Forum (WEF) has been publishing a Global Gender Gap index, which benchmarks progress in closing the gaps between men and women in economic participation, education, and political empowerment. As of 2023, it estimates the global overall gender gap to be 68 per cent closed, a figure which is up about 4.1 percentage points since 2006.
If we keep on at this pace, it will take 131 years to reach full global parity between men and women. And in North America, it will take 95 years, according to the report.
Read more on why Canada should be a leader in closing the gender gap.
The TikTok voice is female, youthful and unquestionably happy. That says a lot about the current moment
In real life, Christina Najjar sounds like a bored secretary, speaking in a near-monotone voice that dips frequently into creaky vocal fry. But online, where the Los Angeles-based 32-year-old is known to her 1.5 million TikTok followers as “Tinx,” she sounds like a different person entirely. There, she speaks like a QVC host on the night shift, in rhythmic, sing-songy cadences.
In the late 20th century, there was radio. That was the deep, male voice, spoken in a vague approximation of an upper-crust, British accent (also known as a Mid-Atlantic accent). Then there was the TV voice. That was the booming newscaster, meant to convey confidence and authority. More recently came the YouTube voice – vloggers who spoke with exaggerated movements, overstressing their vowels and consonants, practically shouting “HEY GUYSSSSS” from behind the webcam.
Now, a new voice has emerged, this one for TikTok. Across the platform, new vocal tones, cadences and patterns have quickly become standard. They’re voices marked not just by what people are saying, but how.
Read more about how the TikTok voice could be changing what it means to sound credible, authoritative and professional.
In case you missed it
Long COVID is taking a toll on the careers and mental health of women
Deborah Brown has tried not once but four times to get back to her job in the past year.
The 54-year-old from Fort St. John, B.C., works as an adviser specializing in auto and recreational vehicle insurance. She is also COVID “long hauler” – a term used to describe patients who got ill from the virus and never fully recovered. Ms. Brown became ill in February 2021 and although her case was mild and she got back on her feet quickly at the time, she hasn’t felt the same ever since.
“I was at the top of my game. I was at the point where the company was asking me to train other people. I was making a good commission and it was great but then I got COVID and things changed,” says Ms. Brown, a single mother who also takes care of her elderly mother. “I couldn’t pinpoint what was wrong with me. All I knew was, I could not focus and I could not organize, and I found myself very confused and very scared.”
Read the full article.
Could ethical AI help underrepresented groups get ahead at work?
It’s no secret that the pandemic resulted in women and marginalized communities being ousted from the work force in record numbers. Though many demographic sectors have since bounced back, the gains remain unequal among traditionally under-represented groups.
For example, employment in the accommodation and food service industries, which are traditionally staffed primarily by women, are still 17 per cent below pre-pandemic levels. And while the unemployment rate for racialized workers has returned to pre-pandemic levels, it’s still higher than that of non-racialized workers. Youth, Indigenous people, women with children under 6 and many other vulnerable sectors have experienced similar disparities.
“We’ve gotten back to a pre-pandemic level and this is something to celebrate, but is it good enough? If we want an inclusive economy, we have to put in the effort,” Kaylie Tiessen, economist and policy analyst at Unifor, said recently to The Canadian Press.
The question is: How can we raise these under-represented sectors to an equitable rate of participation in the labour market?
Artificial intelligence, or AI, might be the answer.
Read the full article.
Ask Women and Work
Question: I am an ambitious and hard-working person, but I’m starting to feel the strain of my very demanding, fast-paced work life. I’m having trouble leaving work at work and shutting my brain off after hours. I love my job, but how can I keep it from destroying my mental health?
We asked Kara Hardin, psychotherapist and CEO of The Practice Lab, to tackle this one:
The ways we learn to be successful often leave us feeling anxious, inadequate, lonely and lost. It’s more than just having a self-critical mind and a tendency to worry; it’s that we are often taught that working hard is the most important and effective way to relieve work stress. Because of this, doing and working become the only practices we have to manage work stress, which (perhaps ironically) impedes our ability to perform at work and to experience our lives with ease and serenity.
There are practices that can help immensely. More familiar practices include:
- Moving your body often
- Getting seven to nine hours of sleep each night
- Eating nutrient-dense food
- Connecting with others
- Time outside
Many of these familiar practices can feel overwhelming or out of reach. To help, I encourage you to cultivate two more practices that might be less familiar to you:
1. Embrace tiny changes
Ask yourself this question: ‘What is something in the list above that I know would help me feel better in my day-to-day life?’ Then, break it down to the tiniest step and do that. If you want to move more often, for example, set a timer and stand up (or lift your posture if that’s more feasible) once per day. Do that for a couple of days until it feels like you’ve got it down, and then ask yourself what another tiny change could be. And so on, and so on.
The idea is to shift our relationship to success, so that moving does not have to immediately mean exercising for an hour every day. Allow yourself to do small things that accumulate, over time, into big things.
2. Cultivate curiosity and self-compassion
If there is a part of you thinking, ‘Standing will not help me,’ I totally get you. I would also argue that if you could do more, you would be doing more. So, if standing or adjusting your posture is all you’ve got for now, there’s an opportunity to be deeply compassionate with yourself. That might mean saying to yourself, ‘I am feeling anxious and I am having a hard time doing anything more than sitting up straight. That’s so hard, so I appreciate that I am doing even this for myself, and I appreciate how tough it is to shift this entanglement I have with work. I am trying; it’ll come.’
Many of us know only one way to manage stress: by working. That approach is not only detrimental to high performance, but also really awful for our health. It took us decades to build that programming, so it’s going to take some time and effort to learn other practices to support ourselves. I’m practising right here with you!
Submit your own questions to Ask Women and Work by e-mailing us at GWC@globeandmail.com.
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