‘Grow your own tribe, be kind and let’s open up opportunities to everyone’

I have been lucky enough to be surrounded by strong and empowering women for most of my life starting with my mum.

As a brown girl growing up in a former mill town, my only hope for a job was working in the textiles factories of Greater Manchester supplying the rag trade of the 80s/90s.

Or if I wanted a ‘professional’ career, the other option was to do a secretary’s course.

There was nothing wrong with the two options, but according to society at the time, they were my only options.

There were no role models, there were no brown people on TV and even schools didn’t see us going anywhere because they didn’t see it either.

But that didn’t stop my mum, my biggest champion wanting me to look at the bigger picture. Which I did – at the time it was to go to New York where I would settle down as a writer in my penthouse apartment. I was eight years old when I relayed those plans to my parents.

A few decades later, I might not be in New York (but loved my brief visit there) but I achieved more than I ever planned. Having an ambition and having a someone champion those dreams has helped push me to overcome challenges and get to where I wanted to be and beyond.

Along the way I have also gathered a tribe of women who are my force and my energy, and who are constantly there, and I too for them.

There are also some men in that tribe too including my husband, my late father, my first editor (an old school hack that gave me the best possible training and start to my career when I joined as a 19-year-old).

As we celebrate #IWD22 and talk about #breakthebias, it’s important to remember those brilliant women we are surrounded by and who have paved the way for us. From your best friends to your sisters, your aunts, your mum, your gran to your colleagues, those women together make us stronger.

But we must also remember to be kind, because kind leaders, kind friends, kind colleagues have a bigger impact on our everyday lives.

That kind gesture or words of advice can lead to doors being opened, can help someone out when they’re having a bad day, can help someone be pointed to the right person, each act of kindness can only lead to good things.

And as we think about kindness, let’s also think about how far we’ve come – and we’ve come on quite a journey.

Last year 140,000 women founded their own business.

The UK has climbed to second in the international rankings for women’s representation on boards at FTSE 100 level, with new data showing nearly 40% of UK FTSE 100 board positions are now held by women.

Some amazing progress has been made, but it has taken decades to get to this stage and there’s still a lot more work to be done.

The workplace is still losing women to pregnancy and maternity discrimination.

When the pandemic hit, it impacted women disproportionately to men. They were more likely to be furloughed and made redundant and they were taking on the majority of childcare alongside doing their jobs.

A teacher friend at a school in a socially deprived area in Greater Manchester has spoken to me about her worries about the next generation of females who she feels are disengaged from the education system. How do we get to them before they feel their opportunities are limited?

When we talk about breaking the bias, we need to take look into our communities because levelling the playing field means levelling-out and up within our own towns and communities and making sure both men and women alongside ALL communities from ALL backgrounds are given the same opportunities.

So what I’m saying is… if you’re a teenage brown girl, there’s now more than two options available to you!

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