Since I’ve been at B2B Marketing I’ve heard women note when they are underrepresented as event speakers and expert commentators. And I agree, they have been. So I’ve tried to see where the problems and potential prejudices lie.
While stories of prejudices do exist in marketing, and every other profession, the overwhelming majority of people I’ve spoken to say it’s mainly down to personality differences between men and women – women just aren’t as vocal.
In honour of International Women’s Month we’ve found some women who are happy to speak up. Read my profile interview with Anne Godfrey, chief executive at the CIM to see what she has in store for the out-dated body, and read our quick-fire interview with Logica’s marketing director Lynne Jones.
Later this month we’ll reveal our 2013’s ‘Rising stars’ online where we whittled your many nominations down to 10 B2B marketers to watch this year. It was only after we’d selected our final list that I counted to see how many women we had. I was surprised to see over half. However, they were brought to our attention via nominations, meaning my theory that women are less likely to push ‘brand you’ still stands.
It’s important for males and females alike to invest time and effort into ‘brand you’. It sits along with being pro-active in your professional development. Godfrey stresses if it’s important for someone with her years of experience to continue to show she’s taking an interest in it, marketers wanting to climb the career ladder must do so as well. One of this year’s rising stars can also vouch for that. She took ownership of her development and it paid off – she’s moved up in her company, secured a scholarship place with the Marketing Academy and, of course, features on our ‘Rising stars’ list.
So a little like the phrase your mum used to mutter after you did a poor job with your chores, ‘If you want a job doing, do it yourself’. Women: in order to see more females speaking at industry events get out there and find your voice (use the #findyourvoice hashtag if tweeting). Marketers of all natures: don’t wait for your boss to think about your professional development, DIY.
