3 Ways to #BreakTheBias on International Women’s Day

Elizabeth is a freelance writer and project manager living and working in London. She runs The Otobos Group, a project communications consultancy specializing in project management.

  Career Development   Organizational Culture  

To celebrate Women's History Month and International Women's Day, we asked some of our contributors to reflect on their experiences being a woman in the project management workforce.

As we celebrate International Women’s Day, it’s time for some real talk. When I sat down to write about my reflections of what it’s like being a woman working in projects, it was easy to think of dozens of stories.

Should I talk about the time a colleague pretended to spike my drink, or about worrying where I would express milk at work while I was breastfeeding? What about that time when a colleague flashed a not-safe-for-work picture up on screen as he scrolled through his emails? Or the surprisingly joyful moment when we finally got a sanitary disposal bin in the disabled toilet? Or the (many) times I rang my own voicemail from a taxi because I was scared travelling in the dark around cities I didn’t know, and I wanted the driver to think someone was waiting for me?

And then I realized something: Those are all negative experiences.

There are so many positive experiences, but they aren’t the ones that are top of mind. I want to do my small bit to #BreakTheBias and celebrate women’s achievement by focusing on the good experiences, and three themes in particular:

1. Mentoring
All my mentors at work have been female. They have all been …

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