Episode 44: Why You Should Invest in Women Leaders
“Because of the women who have come before us, we have the power to lead and lead with conviction. We have the power to invest and hire women because as you can see – women are not only diverse problem solves, but we boost employee engagement, and prioritize social corporate responsibility.” - Erin Diehl
Happy March, failed it! Fam! This is very important month, Women’s History Month, and we are highlighting it in this episode! Erin speaks to her own experience as a woman, founder, leader, and entrepreneur. So grab your notebooks, and listen to why investing in women in your organization is extremely in today’s digital world.
In today’s episode, Erin talks to us about:
Women’s History Month and why it’s important to celebrate in a corporate setting
Statistics on female leadership to date
Three reasons why you should invest in female leaders
Links from show discussions:
About the Host: Erin Diehl is the founder and Chief “Yes, And” officer of improve it! and host of the failed it! Podcast. She’s a performer, facilitator and professional risk-taker who lives by the mantra, “get comfortable with the uncomfortable.” Through a series of unrelated dares, Erin has created improve it!, a unique professional development company that pushes others to laugh, learn and grow. Her work with clients such as United Airlines, PepsiCo, Groupon, Deloitte, Motorola, Walgreens, and The Obama Foundation earned her the 2014 Chicago RedEye Big Idea Award and has nominated her for the 2015-2019 Chicago Innovations Award.
This graduate from Clemson University is a former experiential marketing and recruiting professional as well as a veteran improviser from the top improvisational training programs in Chicago, including The Second City, i.O. Theater, and The Annoyance Theatre.
When she is not playing pretend or facilitating, she enjoys running and beach dates with her husband and son, and their eight pound toy poodle, BIGG Diehl.
You can follow the failed it! podcast on Instagram and facebook, and you can follow Erin personally on Instagram here. You can also check out improve it! and how we can help your organization at www.learntoimproveit.com. We can’t wait to connect with you online!
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So if you aren't sold on investing in a female leader, think of a Sammy who sucks? Let me say that again, Mike. Oh my God. Okay. So many bloops. Give me one sec Mike. Okay, here we go.
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Hey there, my name is Erin Diehl and I'm a half Southern half Midwestern mama (some call this voice the nasal twang) who took $5,000 to build and scale a one of a kind experiential organization that improves the lives of corporate professionals through personal development, humanity, and humor. Along the way I've built client relationships with some of the most notable companies in the country all while attracting a rockstar team of experts and hilarious facilitators. Sounds pretty awesome. Right? Well, what I didn't tell you is that my resume also includes a long list of comedy shows I bombed, improv teams I didn't make, companies who told me no, and many a heartache when it came to becoming a mother. I want to show you the real deal of the grit, creativity, and determination it takes to overcome your disappointments, embrace the suck and design the career you could only dream about. I believe we all have our own unique gifts that we bring to the world and it is our mistakes that help to unwrap them. Welcome to failed it!
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Hey failed it! fam, it is Erin and I wanted to start off by reading a review from our failed it! Fam member of the week. This is from Marzullo Associates and Marzullo Associates writes, “powerful and engaging, inspiring stories with humor. Erin brings a lot of energy and great guests with awesome advice. A must listen.” Okay. Marzullo Associates first and foremost thank you for this review. You have won yourself an improve you! DIY e-learning course from us at improve it. It's a three-week e-learning course, and we have 10 different offerings. You can find a list of those offerings at learntoimproveit.com/onlinetrainings, pick one of 10 Marzullo Associates and email me at info@learntoimproveit.com. And we will get you set up with your DIY e-learning course of choice for helping us out and leaving a review.
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failed it! Fam, just a quick reminder. If you leave us a review, we will read it on the show and you will win a DIY e-learning course, we call improve you!, of your choice. So if you're looking to get outside your comfort zone, try something new, learn to better communicate at work or enhance your presentation skills. We've got you just by leaving us a review here on iTunes. So thank you again, Marzullo Associates. Let's get to failin’ it. Hey-hey, failed it! Fam. What a time to be alive! It's March, we're getting out of the winter slump, hopefully here. Vaccines are up and we've been in this quote-unquote, new normal for a year. Bless up! What a year. Right? So the last - or this time last year, I should say, - I was getting ready to hit “publish: on this podcast. And then the world stopped, leaving me with four cans episodes that had zero to do with COVID working from home, remote learning, any of that.
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So, in true 2020 fashion a year ago, I pivoted and here we are 44 episodes in and a slew of awesome and great guests, man. I actually just finished recording an episode that you will hear the week after this episode airs with a fantastic guest Myles Berrio and let me just say the audio system that I use to record these podcasts now has a video component. So we were on video and ya girl had some tears. Mascara was running, even though I wear fake lashes, I had to reapply the makeup cause we're doing video now with these audio recordings. So he's just amazing and fantastic. And we've had so many great guests like Myles, and I'm also so lucky because I have this failed it! Family who shows up week after week to be their best selves, to be your best self personally and professionally.
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So you, my friends, you are the “why”, you are the “why “as to why this show works. And I wanted to take the opportunity this first week of March to highlight the theme of March, which is women's history month. Now I want to just take a side step real quick to February. February was black history month and I spent this month really listening and learning. I learned so much from some of my online mentors, one in particular, Rachel Cargle. She has a great Instagram account that you can go back to scroll through her feed and check out some of her posts on black history month. She has provided Google prompts within these posts. So you can learn more about black history. And I really found myself taking heat from those posts, going back and doing some Google prompting and checking out what she had to say, learning so much.
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We're going to link to her in the show notes. Her handle is Rachel.Cargle. But I am so thankful to every content creator and thought leader who provided information on this topic in February. I'll never forget what my friend, J'ai Brown and former failed it! Podcast guests said on this show last year. She actually came on following the death of George Floyd. And I'll never forget this quote. She said “black people have had to learn how to be comfortable being uncomfortable, our entire lives. And the difference is that you get to learn it while we get to live it.” That quote is not lost on me. Okay? And I know that I am not perfect and I want you to know I'm not perfect and I'm, I'm doing the best I can to educate myself on this topic. But her episode is number 11 of this show, “Crucial Conversations about Racial Injustice and Corporate America.
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I will link to it in the show notes, please go back and listen to that if you're looking for some content that will help you understand black history. So, we didn't touch it on this show in February because I am learning and putting that information into my brain. So, I wanted to move into a topic and another very important month, which is women's history month. Because without the women who have come before me and you, my friends, my failed it female fam members, we would be in such a different place today. So I know that there are hundreds upon thousands of women who have paved the way before me, before you. And I want to speak to you today from my own experience as a woman, founder, leader and entrepreneur. I think it's important to learn from our history, but as women making history, okay, we need to lean into the notion that we need more women in leadership roles.
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So let's just start. This is going to be a little different podcast today failed it! Fam. I'm giving you some cold, hard facts mixed with a little bit of my own experience, but a lot of facts. So, let's start with the fact that in today's world 2021, we have our first ever Madame VP, Mrs. Kamala Harris, which truly no matter your political affiliation should move you to tears. Okay? The fact that my 19 month old son will not know one but many women in office, because remember she's the first, but she is not the last. That is remarkable. Okay. My hope for him is that he sees many women in office holding important roles in his lifetime that we don't have to teach him that a woman being elected VP is an anomaly. I hope this is his generation's normal.
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We've also seen in the past month, Whitney Wolfe Herd the founder and CEO of Bumble become the world's youngest, female self-made billionaire after taking Bumble public with a baby on her hip. Okay? That picture alone makes my day. That is what is up, swipe left or swipe, right? Or good Lord. I'm a grandmother and I don't know which way is the right way, but just swipe all the things for that. Okay? Thumbs up, like, retweet, share to your stories, friend request - Yes. Now, and don't even get me started on 22 year old Amanda Gorman, who is the first person to be named the national youth poet laureate. And she did the most brilliant inaugural poem. I got chills. And let me just say, when she says “there is always light, if only we're brave enough to see it, if only we're brave enough to be it.” I don’t care who you voted for – if that doesn’t scream “YES KWEEN” I don’t know what does.
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he is a young woman, she is 22 years old, and her words and her mind are shaping the future for every generation. My point is, is that women have more of a seat at the table now than ever before. And we are continuing to push that goal forward. And as a female ran and operated business, (although we love our male facilitators very, very much) 1e are proud to be a continued push towards making women's voices everywhere be heard. So today, my failed it family, I want to highlight through my own personal lens, why investing in female leaders is so important. My hope with this episode is this. If you are in any capacity here to hire or train or build a team, you think of adding a woman to that team that you find high potential women in your organization to groom and take to the next level. That you seek diverse voices and not just women, but women of color, and provide them with mentorship opportunities and allow them to be mentors. That if you are looking for work or have the opportunity to choose who you work for, that for a woman. Let me give you some facts before I dive in.
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Okay. So according to McKinsey and Company's latest women in the workplace study, which surveyed over 64,000 employees and 279 companies employing 13 million people, just a few people, only one in five senior leaders is a woman and one in 25 is a woman of color. One in five is a woman. One in 25 Senior leaders is a woman of color. Picture a conference room or a boardroom in a high-rise in downtown Chicago, New York, wherever. And let that image seep in. Here's another sobering statistic. Okay. Like I said, lots of facts here today fam. 5% of fortune 500 CEOs are women, equal to the number led by guys named John. And this is from Ernst and Young in 2016. WTF. This study was five years ago, but what the flying fishsticks. Okay. First of all, my husband's name is John. So was his dad. And then he has two uncles, John Pierre and John Mark, and his mom's sister married a guy named John. My brother's name is also John. And my son's name is Jackson, which means son of John. I digress, but WT40. Okay. 5% of fortune 500 company’s CEOs are women. 5%. Ladies, Failed it fam, my friends, this has got to change. One more sobering statistic and an article that was published from CNBC in November of 2020, nearly 2.2 million women left the workforce between February and October of 2020.
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I mean, due to the craziness of homeschooling virtual learning, parenting, teaching, and trying to work at the same time, 2.2 million women said “see ya!” As a working mom who hasn't set foot in an office except to move myself and team out of it. I too was crippled with anxiety when this pandemic hit. My mom was supposed to be our primary caregiver this summer. And after she had her stroke, John, my husband and my dad and I played musical baby for four months while working at the same time, all of us, right? So I had help. I had two people, two amazing men in my life to help me and a lot of women out there don't. What if we made work a place where women can be both women and mothers and daughters and sisters and aunts and friends and all the things besides the title given on their business card.
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And I want to just have a side note and a preface here, that business card even accessed in 2021. Let's let's ask that question. But what if we could not only just be said title, but all of these other things, and we could bring all of those other things to work with us, and that was valued and accepted? So, what if we made work a place where investing in women - the entire woman, all of her titles, right? But not even just women - human being. Okay. And I want to just share that this is a podcast today about investing in women. And I want to say this men, you mattered too my failed it fam. Men, going strong, but today is not about you. We're focusing on us as women. I want you to know you matter, but today I'm talking about the ladies, okay?
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So, friends failed it fam. If today's statistics, aren't enough to make you want to call every woman you know and say, “you're doing great, keep going.” I'm going to give you three reasons why investing in women is so important. My goal today is for you to listen to this podcast and take action with your organization to share this show, this episode with a male leader who, you know, gets it and encourage him to keep hiring more women. For you - the HR leader, the sales director - to ask yourself, “How can I gain more women, more women of color on my team and embrace their perspectives?”
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Hey, failed it fam, are you looking for a challenge? Do you want more confidence, more bravery, more support, and more creativity in your life. Are you stuck in a rut and need a creative spark that will get you thinking outside of the box and help you see things with a new set of eyes? Well never fear my friends, the improvement five day challenge is here. It's a five day challenge sent to you five days in a row via email that gives you prompts to help you improve your confidence and be more brave. We also give you tips on how to better support your team as well as tricks to get the creative juices flowing. All of this is free. That's right free 99. We want you to experience the fundamentals of improvisation at work. So we are shining some light and a little magic on you and your inbox to sign up, head over, to learn, to improveit.com and scroll to the very bottom of our webpage. You'll see a prompt that says, want to learn more about improve it? From there enter your email. And you're all set and ready to rock this challenge. We cannot wait to improve your it, whatever it may be.
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So here's why investing in women is so important. I've got three reasons why, and I'm going to jump right into them. My failed it fam. So number one, when you hire more women, you get diverse problem solving. So just a quick exercise for you. Take out a sheet of paper or the note section on your phone. And I want you to write down your five closest friends. If you don't have paper close, you’re on a walk, what have you - think of your five closest friends or just pick one or two. Now below their names, I want you to write the numbers one, two, and three. Okay - so friend one, one, two, three. Friend two, one, two, three. And then under the number one, I want you to write their age. And then under number two, their gender. And then under number three, their ethnicity. Chances are that these people are very close to you in all aspects.
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If not - they are you right? They are exactly like you. And this is not a dig, but an observation, we tend to gravitate towards people like us. And that's okay. However, when you think of an organization, a team, and the leaders that make up those teams, you don't want all five people to be the same. You want different people with different perspectives and different life experiences and personality styles to help shape your organization. And this episode, like I said, friends, it's packed with data because I need some backup y'all okay. So here's another statistic for you. A study done at MIT showed that teams with mixed gender are more productive and creative. In fact, the economist found that simply moving from an all male or an all female office to one that was evenly split could possibly increase revenue by 41%. How? Their research found that the greater social diversity implies a greater spread of experience, which could add to the collective knowledge of a group of office workers and make the unit perform more effectively. 41%.
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If improve its revenue increased by 41% I would do a fricking back flip and trust me, I used to be somewhat of a cheerleader in high school and I could never perfect these. So I constantly had a rug burn on my notes for the amount of times I fell on my face. I digress. Now I will say this, my team, my internal team is all female - probably listening. And if you know, improve it you're probably like, “Erin, are you listening?” I do know that. And I will say, I am so proud of this fact. And it is not that we don't want to hire a male. We have not had a male come onboard yet that has fit any of the jobs that we've had. We've tried to hire interns. We've tried to hire males in specific roles. On the internal side, we have so many awesome, wonderful male facilitators.
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It just hasn't happened yet. But know that it is in the cards, but we are primarily an all female ran organization. So I just want to let us go back to this quote, 41% increase in revenue. I want you to let that sink in. Okay. And a side related notes, learning from different types of leaders and teachers is fundamentally important for growth to occur and for us to get round perspectives on topics. So when I was actually going through my improv training, which by the way was a total of three and a half years at three different schools, I had only four - that's right, Four - female improv teachers. Four. And I probably took 20 classes. So four. And I just remember being so excited for the female teachers. I related to them so much. I could watch them improvise and see what bits and pieces I could take for my own self.
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It was much harder for me to do that with a male teacher. So, I want you to apply this same mentality, this same philosophy to a team or to an organization and you get the same results. You need varying views of people to be in the room so people can see themselves in them and learn. And that's what leadership is all about. Teaching others, right? Yall, I'm taking you to church, but I'm feeling moved today. So let's keep going. Here is your number two reason why you should invest in female leaders. Number two, investing in female leadership increases employee engagement. So if reason number one doesn't light your undies on fire - we all know what it feels like to have an unengaged employee, right? So “Sammy,” we'll use air quotes. “Sammy” shows up to a zoom with their pits down. And, if you don't know what I'm meaning by this, I will reiterate here.
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I use the phrase “pits up” a lot in this virtual world. It means that we show up from the armpit up. And if you are a “Marvelous Miss Mazel” fan, yes, that is a pun on her words. But it is from the “pits up.” But Sammy's showing up from the pits down. So they are not feeling themselves. All right? They don't contribute at meetings and they have this eat poop look on their face every time you have a meeting. These Sammy's, oh my gosh, these people are the energy vampires to your team. They suck the lifeblood right out of you. So here are some attributes of female leaders that I think you'll find interesting. And I want to thank Google for this research, but also I'm a woman and I know a lot of women. So Google you stand corrected. So here's some attributes of female leaders: empathetic, open, mindful, mentor, promote work-life balance, high communicator, high emotional intelligence. Every single one of these attributes scream “engagement.”
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Chances are a female leader knows, or otherwise has the intuition, when engagement is down and is going to go through the appropriate communication channels to get to the root of the matter. Using this word I love, empathy, using mindfulness and a balanced approach. So, with high levels of empathy, we ladies, we know how to relate. We know how to listen, and we know how to help other team members who need us. So, if you aren't sold on investing in a female leader, think of a Sammy who sulks all day and think about who is best equipped to handle that conversation. And empathetic Emily or a bulldozer, Bob. Okay. Ain't nobody got time for bulldozer Bob and his dozer. That's a fact. That is a quote I found on Google. No, write that down. But truly - Bob's not a fan of, empathetic Emily's all day.
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Here is your third reason, my failed it family, why investing in female leaders is so important. Female leaders prioritize corporate responsibility. There are mounds of data that indicate that female led companies are more likely to prioritize corporate social responsibility initiatives. There is some research I found by Kelly McKelney - ‘kay? Probably botched that name. But, Kelly is the founder of the center for gender equity and leadership at the university of California. And Kelly found that companies have, that have women on their corporate boards are more focused on environmental, social, and governance issues than companies with no female board members. And I'll tell you what, I know this to be true. Being a female founder with an internal female team. The women on my team - first of all, you're fantastic. Second, care about social issues like racial injustice, environmental concerns, inequality, and just doing the right thing.
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I'm not saying a man doesn’t. I'm just highlighting the woman's strengths here. Okay. The values that women on my team emulate are the values of our organization and our core values are truly the root of everything we do. And everyone we hire. We stand by them because we believe in them and we know they are right. I could do an entire episode for you on how we developed those core values. And lemme know if you want one, you know where to find me. But from my experience, I will say, this is a hundred percent true. Women care. They care about people. It is in our blood. It's who we are. My female operating team. My female facilitators are for real, the best humans I know. They are smart. They are savvy. And they care not only about what is the right thing for our business, but what is the right thing to do for the bigger collective? Our community, our country, even the world, right?
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So I'll never forget. One time we had a potential partnership happen with a male operated business and our guard was up on a couple of things. But as it inched closer and closer to launch this partnership, we realized that we, improve it, was doing the the bulk of the work and that the profit would be evenly split between both partners. So not only had we invested time and money into this project, but it was eating up a lot of time and a lot of business goals that we had elsewhere. So I remember talking to our internal team about it, and I wanted this partnership to just work out so bad because of the investment. And I really did think the project would pan out. My team saw between the lines and guided me back to reality. And we ended up dissolving this partnership and going back to doing what we did and what we do well, which is workshops, keynotes, and live events.
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The partnership itself had some gray area that, that didn't feel right to us as a brand or to our clients. And ,if the project worked out, it could have been lucrative. Okay. I will say this, the values of that partnership did not match. So we moved on and we focused on the things that did and do align with our values. And it was the women on my team who helped me see that. That is corporate and social responsibility. That is the power of having women in leadership roles. So my failed at fam, today's tips are here to help you, help your team, and help your organization think about women's history month in a different way. Because of the women who have come before us, we have the power to lead and to lead with conviction. We have the power to invest and women because as you can see, women are not only diverse problem solvers, but we boost employee engagement and prioritize social corporate responsibility.
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Our voices are here to be heard and we lift up and acknowledge those women who have lighted our path. So, my friends and my failed at family, new friends who may be listening to this show for the first time. I hope you take today's episode. You can share it, pass it on with somebody, you know who will appreciate and take action based off these findings. And to my sisters in the failed family - I want you to never stop using that voice. And if there isn't a seat for you at the table, call me. I'll brin your folding chair. Fail yea, failed it fam. Fail Yeah.
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Hey friends, thanks for tuning into failed it. I'm so happy you're along for the ride. And if you enjoyed today's show, head on over to iTunes to rate and subscribe so you never miss an episode. New episodes drop every Wednesday. I'll see you next week, but want to leave you with this thought: What will you fail at today and how will that help your future successful self? Think about it. I'm proud of you and you are totally failing it. See you next time.