Heather Wallace and Dale Phillips discuss the Critical Women and Men Partnership at the 2019 Multifamily Women’s Summit with show host, Cyndy Trivella. Women have been discussing issues of pay inequity, gender differences, and marginalization in the workplace for generations; however, women make up only half of the conversation. Without including men in the conversation, we can, at best, only produce half of the solution. And, while women make up almost half of the workforce in many parts of the world, the most senior roles in the largest businesses are still overwhelmingly held by men. As such, men have a critical role to play in leveling the playing field for all talent, but they are often an untapped resource in the women and men partnership.

Men, often times, don’t know how to be a resource for a variety of reasons: 1) fear of retribution; 2) not understanding how to work with women; 3) men as a gender are conditioned to be “fixers”; and 4) lack of internal resources to help men to be mentors and advisors to women.