we cannot introduce change if we don’t understand where we are now

The #IWD2023 is over but to introduce structural change in the organizations, institutions, communities, we first need to see and listen to women, understand their needs and remove blockers to equity.

In my opinion, we cannot introduce changes if we don’t fully understand where we stand now and to understand where we stand now, we need #data. 

If I had to recommend 𝘰𝘯𝘦 book worth your time, it would be 𝘐𝘯𝘷𝘪𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘯 by Caroline Criado Perez. It opened my eyes to the problem of how the data gap influences male-centered design of, basically – everything, and how that impacts safety and health of #women.

Some examples that stuck with me:

🔹 women are 47% more likely than men to be seriously injured in a car crash

🔹 women are 50% more likely to be misdiagnosed when having a heart attack; the symptoms are different for men and women; those of women are not universally known, even by medical staff

🔹 female pianists suffer more wrist injuries because of the standard length of the piano keyboard

🔹 on average a woman needs 2,3 times longer in the bathroom than a man and that should be taken into account in architecture design

If we design processes not taking into consideration the results regarding half on the world’s population - the results of that design can’t be good.

I also highly recommend the podcast of Roman Mars at my favourite 99% 𝘐𝘯𝘷𝘪𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘗𝘰𝘥𝘤𝘢𝘴𝘵, with Caroline Criado Perez. A great interview that actually led me to that book.