Introducing the Updated, Inclusive GA Tally App
The GA Tally has been at the center of the GenderAvenger community effort to demonstrate gender balance and imbalance on public stages, on top lists, and all sorts of events in the public arena. Its power is in its simplicity. In under two minutes images can be produced and shared on Facebook, Twitter, and email to communicate displeasure or glee about the representation of women’s voices. Until now, the GA Tally has focused on women writ large. From its inception, GenderAvenger leadership has wanted to develop a more inclusive tool, one that displayed the percentage of women of color.
With the help of Alexis McGill Johnson of The Perception Institute and our GenderAvenger Massachusetts team, the GA Tally has been updated to include women of color in its calculations. This is a critical improvement, and, of course, one the GenderAvenger community has often pointed out as imperative.
We strongly believe that it is critical for women from diverse backgrounds to join together to make their voices heard. The year is 2018, and women hold high-level leadership positions in most, if not all, sectors of government and corporations, yet when conference and event organizers gather to anoint speakers we still see the blatant inequality in who is speaking and sharing expertise, ideas, and industry knowledge.
The GA Tally can also track the amount of time women versus men are speaking and visually highlight progress or lack of thereof by the organization to become more inclusive.
Why is this important? Because we live in a global society, our country is comprised of rich diversity, and it is time for leadership at all levels to reflect that diversity. The echo chambers experienced in too many public settings are devoid of the richness of diverse perspectives. At GenderAvenger, we strongly believe that gender parity and equity matter and further that racial, ethnic, and cultural diversity is invaluable.
"Most Americans reject discrimination, yet we often don’t recognize bias in our everyday lives,” Alexis McGill Johnson reminds us.
At the Perception Institute, we seek change by cultivating productive conversations about identity differences. We are delighted to have been part of the development of the GA Tally, which will now help people to recognize when and how women of color are represented in the public sphere.
We are confident that the new GA Tally will dramatically advance the work GenderAvenger does. It will not only chart when a conference and/or event has failed to include women and women of color, but it will also visibly show public disappointment when the speaker ratio exceeds 40% women but includes no women of color. This is an exciting development for the gender parity movement.
We strongly believe in the importance of tracking progress or lack of progress. Therefore, in addition to the GA Tally enhancements GenderAvenger has revised the criteria for organizations, events and publications to obtain the GA Stamp of Approval:
Gold Stamp of Approval:
40%+ women of whom 50% are women of color
Silver Stamp of Approval:
40%+ women of whom 40% are women of color
Bronze Stamp of Approval:
40%+ women of whom 30% are women of color
This new Stamp of Approval system allows organizations to visibly demonstrate their growing commitment to gender parity and attention to inclusive diversity in all public forums.
My participation in the process of developing the new GA Tally and the criteria for the GA Stamp of Approval has led to an exciting opportunity for me personally. I am delighted to announce that I have joined the GA Board of Directors, which will be fun and challenging.
Marta Rosa, President of MTR Consulting Services, is an innovative, values-based leader who leads with integrity, vision, and compassion.