Driving equity in the tech industry: insights from lOGITECH lEADERS
In honour of International Women’s Day 2024, the TASC Platform was delighted to be invited by Logitech to join 5 senior leaders from across the organization to discuss the issue of equity in the tech industry. Here, Christa Sürth, Executive Communications Lead at Logitech and convener of this event shares the insights gained from Logitech leaders through this lively discussion, and her own takeaways on how the industry can push the bar on diversity, equity and inclusion.
Christa Sürth, Executive Communications Lead, Logitech
Organizations (as part of society) are far from achieving true gender equity - according to the WEF Gender Gap Report, at our current speed we are 132 years away from achieving gender equality. Widening talent gaps, old-school structural biases towards how we should work, culture, policies… all of these are obstacles to achieving more equality. Different schools of thought might argue that the status quo makes for a more competitive company whilst others would say - supported by the newest findings - that diversity increases competitiveness. Logitech believes in the latter and invited its employees and some external guests to a panel discussion with accomplished Logitech leaders on how a company can be both equitable AND competitive.
As the recipient of the 2023 Cercle Swiss d'Administratrices award for diversity and distinguished as the only company on the Swiss Market Index with both a female CEO and chairperson, Logitech is committed to leading change in the tech industry. We recognize the importance of inspiring others, particularly in a male-dominated sector where 78% of tech employers struggle to find skilled workers. In Switzerland, women represent only 20% of the technology workforce and earn nearly 20% less than men. It's evident that promoting inclusion is crucial, although it presents significant challenges.
Under this years United Nations International Women’s Day with the theme “Invest in Women: Accelerate Progress”, we were delighted to invite Kitrhona Cerri, Executive Director of the TASC Platform to join 5 senior leaders from across Logitech to discuss how companies can address this challenge and, critically, are these efforts justified. Can an organization make these additional investments and remain competitive in the market?
The answer was a resounding ‘yes’, with agreement across the panel that targeted efforts on DEI drive tangible results across the business. From strengthening the talent pipeline, workforce wellbeing and career development, to sparking a culture of creativity and innovation, and growing our markets by including a wider customer base – the Logitech experience has shown that thoughtful action on DEI has exponential benefits for the company.
From a rich discussion, here are five top tips for driving equity from our some of Logitech’s leaders:
“Ensure everyone has the chance to speak up. We can each improve our own ability to listen and benefit from new insights.”
Maxime Marini, Head of Hardware Engineering
In the male-dominated space of Hardware Engineering, Maxime is working to bring more women into the workforce. He is seeing huge differences between his teams in Switzerland and in Asia, like China and Taiwan, where the percentage of women in STEM is much higher. In his eyes, this pushes creativity and innovation. His attempts to make this a reality across geographies includes making sure female voices are heard and valued in formal settings like recruitment. Maxime encourages his team to go beyond scanning resumes where communication biases can be embedded, to ensuring an equal number of men and women are invited to interview. There is still some work to do, and this work starts early with inspiring the next generation of women to aspire to careers in STEM fields.
“Stay informed, and demand to know what actions and progress are happening.”
Kirsty Russell, Head of People and Culture
Is there a bias in perception when it comes to women’s performance? 6 years ago, this question was asked by Kirsty and her team, as they looked beyond equal pay to consider the form of rewards received by gender. They found that women were being rewarded primarily with bonus payments but received less stock (a more forward-looking reward) than men. This is in line with the known bias that women tend to be rewarded for their past performance, while men are rewarded for their future potential. Finding this, bringing it up, and making it transparent allowed the People and Culture team to address the issue and ensure fairer rewards across the organization.
“Be intentional – everyone has a role to play. If you are not actively including, then you are probably accidentally excluding.”
Tana Dubel, Chief Information Security Officer (CISO)
As a rare woman working in cybersecurity, Tana used her platform as winner of the Swiss CISO Excellence Award to call out the lack of women in the industry. This generated a ripple effect in Switzerland and beyond, and Tana will now deliver a keynote speech at the 2024 Global Cyber Conference. Cybersecurity is one of the top risks facing the corporate world, but it faces a 4-million-person talent gap. Closing the gap requires new thinking and creativity: In Ireland for example, Logitech is working with the organization Purpl Unicorn on upskilling and reskilling migrants and refugees, especially women. Successfully, Tana’s team now boasts a colleague who is a biologist by training and is now a valued member of the cyber security team.
“We all have biases, but we need to try and embrace the need for change, embrace different perspectives, and look beyond our frontier.”
Delphine Donne, GM and VP, Head of Personal Workspace Solutions
As Delphine and her team embarked on a process of designing a product specifically for women, the gender talent gap was brought to light. Women made up just 28% of the team at the time so, in tandem, they set both market portfolio and team diversity goals. Designed specifically for women, products like Logitech's vertical mouse Lift or the Casa Pop-Up desk bring more women into an historically male dominated category. Female buyers of Lift are now up to 66%, and Delphine's team hosts 53% women. In her own words, “we now realize the more diverse we are, the more creative we are. These are only incremental opportunities”.
“Diversity, equity and inclusion are nouns, but questions need to be asked as verbs: Am I being fair? Am I including or excluding people? These questions can become habits, and new habits can change the world.”
Art O Gnimh, VP and Business Unit GM, Personal Workspace Solutions
Art highlights the importance of being an ally and role model in driving tangible action towards inclusion. As a concrete example of how these land in the business: Art and his team asked themselves how they got into a situation where their products are only bought by men. A Logitech study brought to light that this was not intentional but driven by unconscious bias. They found found that more women than men would reject a standard black keyboard. By offering another colour, they excluded less people. Secondly, they addressed their marketing to ensure more people could recognize themselves in the images used. Just by adding another image, they increased the conversion to sales. Millions more people are buying Logitech products today – of those people, the majority are women, simply because they are excluding less.
By convening discussions such as these, we aim to inspire our own workforce and wider community with an understanding of the challenges and examples of tangible actions to invest in equity. From the dialogue and my personal experiences at Logitech, I have drawn the following lessons and takeaways:
Diversity isn't just a moral imperative; it's also crucial for the prosperity of our business.
Diversity is the goal, actively driving equity and equality is how we get there.
DEI needs to be anchored in the company purpose, with clear goals set and monitored.
Culture plays a key role to foster collaboration and embrace radical inclusion.
Comprehensive training is essential for addressing topics such as unconscious bias, psychological safety, remote teamwork, and inclusive recruitment practices.
It is possible to make an impact. Our hope is that organizations continue to push the bar on diversity, equity, and inclusion. The future of work, the economy and society depend on it.