November 14th, 2009 - Approximately 400 women attended the first ever all male panel conference luncheon at the YWiB Beyond Pink event, held at the Hyatt Regency Hotel. The guys were in the hot seat however, they definitely did a great job in addressing several topics on women in the workplace and provided insight on how women can achieve their career goals.

The men on the panel:

Bob Elton - CEO, BC Hydro.
Mike Desjardins - Driver, ViRTUS.
Chris Flett  - Founder, Ghost CEO and author of ‘What Men Don’t Tell Women about business’.
Cameron Herald - Founder, BackPocketCOO.
Jason Pires - Weekend Sportcaster, CTV News.
Matt Corker - Alumni Relations Manager, Faulty of Science, UBC.
Philippe Desrochers - Career Manager, Hari B. Varshney Career Centre.

Some key points I walked away with:

When asked;  why women make less than their male counterparts in the same role, Chris Flett answered: “Because we know that women will work for less”. This was a honest and blunt answer but necessary to hear as I think  many women fail to  give themselves the credit they deserve. “You don’t get what you don’t ask for and when you ask for it, you only ask for what you think you can get -  constantly selling yourself short” . We as women know how to handle a family and we tend to be the leaders in the “home” but we for some reason can not transfer these skills into the workplace.

Interestingly, all the men on the panel admit that they would actually prefer to hire women over men. They feel that women have  a major advantage in the workplace. They find women are more intuitive, harder workers, and they feel that women with families are even more powerful because they know how to maintain balance and how to work long hours. Women also need to be assured that they can definitely manage both a career and a family, in what Flett calls a “profitable pregnancy”. As women we have to take responsibility and be communicative and honest with our companies and talk about our pregnancy plans. As long as our pregnancy does not become our boss’s problem, our deciding to start a family will not hinder our positions or our career paths. What do you think about that?

I think the most poignant moment for me was listening to Flett talk about knowing the difference between PASSIVE, AGGRESSIVE and ASSERTIVE behaviour. Simply said, if you’re passive you become someone’s bitch, if you are aggressive you become labelled as the “bitch” in the office and you’re scared of becoming someone’s bitch. When you are assertive, you  know what you want and go in with a plan. You communicate what you want without having to downsize people along the way. “Women need to be more communicative, people can’t guess your career goals”, says Mike Dejardins. Surprisingly it happens more then you expect but men will get certain positions in companies purely based on the fact that they simply “asked for them”.

Thanks again to the YWiB team for inviting me to this inspiring and informative panel and it was a pleasure blogging along side other local bloggers in the city: Rebecca Bollwitt (www.miss604.com) , Ishra Sharif (www.ishrasharif.com), Lisa (www.Sololisa.com), Arpen Thandi tweeting for The Crave Company, and Amy Chan (www.amyfabulous.com).

Sunny Shum, Your Industry Insider