They often do general token things like “hire women”
I’m not sure - I would probably want to look at what is well evidenced, i.e. what actually demonstrates reduced gender bias. Bias might be really hard to actually measure, so we might want to be specific about what we care about, e.g.
- salary gap between men and women
- % of workforce that is men vs women
and so on …
Policies that I’ve seen and come to mind (but may be flawed still, I haven’t thought much about this):
- provide childcare at the workplace, have somewhere your kids can be safe and taken care of while you’re at work
- seek out new hires, interns, and other candidates from all-women’s universities and colleges in addition to ivy leagues, major state schools, etc.
- have strong maternity and paternity leave
You make excellent points about the maternity and paternity policies. Fathers shouldn’t be ignored, and also it puts the parenting responsibility on women, leading to managers being less likely to hire or promote them. Supporting parents is a great way to reduce gender bias.
For me I’d go with more women in key management positions. They consider women when making decisions, for example making more parent friendly choices. In my experience it helps with diversity overall, other groups are more likely to occur to a woman.
