Am I wrong and women aren't disadvantaged

[Wishforsnow]

I am trying to find information for where I work on how in virtual meetings women are talked over, ignored or men repeating a women's idea as their own. Also to highlight women will have less presence in the workplace because of this. However, apart from a few articles in American newspapers I can't seem to find much on this to forward as examples or reports that show this so I can request that staff ensure all attendees have a voice. Am I imagining that this is an issue or can anyone here guide me to some info or stats to help me raise this?

Not sure you will find much on virtual setting specifically, but lots in general

Have you searched google scholar on women workplace ?

Thanks I'll try that search. Maybe there isn't an issue for women and virtual meetings. I just noticed how men seemed to dominate then and quite often don't turn their cameras on when in contrast men seemed to even when not talking would do things to get noticed.

It's not so much there isn't an issue, I just wonder if it's been as much researched as physical meetings, simply because until 3 months ago virtual meetings were not the norm, and it's even 10 years ago virtual meetings were very rare

What is your role? There are various techniques to make sure all voices are heard (women, junior people, quiet people etc). If it's your meeting you can introduce some of them.

Virtual is v difficult as the talkers dominate even more than in real life.

There was a thread a while back, something about Microsoft Teams showing those who speak the most, disadvantaging women.

I'm on teams although only had small meets and it isn't like WebEx, it doesn't zoom in on who is talking.

I do think the dynamics are amplified when it's over the net rather than RL and people who are quieter or not expected to speak up just sit there silently while the others pontificate. ( I say this as a pontificator who used to be a younger woman who wasn't supposed to talk).

Do you have a virtual meeting policy? Who ever is hosting the meeting should be asking for people to put their hand up, use the hand if on zoom or the chat box. They can bring specific people into the conversation if needed.
If it is a large group over 20 we have a second host monitoring the chat box and bringing it to the attention of whoever is hosting. Should be some sort of process and control if someone is repeatedly speaking over others.

I'd be really interested to know the answer to this- I haven't had a problem with being heard on digital platforms so far, and the ability to IM and raise hands can have advantages.

I can certainly see the benefit in additional WFH for women (well, anyone, but more often women) who have caring responsibilities, so it would be lovely if it didn't come with a whole new set of disadvantages.

www.forbes.com/sites/ellevate/2018/09/19/how-to-take-control-when-youre-interrupted-in-meetings/#1b07c3b76c64

Just a point, many women participating in virtual meetings from home may have children with them. That's one reason they either don't do camera or can't always speak when they want or need to. That's partly what I believe to be a safe assumption to some extent, and partly my own experience. When Mummy's home, she's always fair game. Doesn't always seem to work the same way for Daddy.

There's some stuff in here www.nytimes.com/2020/04/14/us/zoom-meetings-gender.html

But I also think I saw something more specific somewhere. There's a bit more in here but not the concrete research hbr.org/2020/05/why-the-crisis-is-putting-companies-at-risk-of-losing-female-talent

Are you sure sharing articles is the way to win people over to behaviour change in your workplace?

How about asking people to notice whether women or the BAME or whatever are being talked over, etc. Maybe also run a poll of the women? If there is a problem then ask the people what they want to do about it.

Everybody knows that some men tend to bulldozer over women. I would be surprised if you needed to tell anyone, however, they may not have noticed themselves behaving that way or may have noticed but not know what to do to improve the situation.

This is not scientific or to do with virtual meetings but
www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-48278772

You could audit your meetings, time the length men vs women speak etc, ask women if they have specific reasons for finding participation difficult (eg childcare as PP said).
I don't know how a virtual meeting disadvantages anyone anymore than a physical meeting. I think evidence is important if you're trying to make a point/come up with solutions

Everybody knows that some men tend to bulldozer over women.

The first step is to realize it is not just you. That is the reason for the links to articles. Because everybody doesn't know.

Men do tend to be more verbally aggresive than women in meetings, at least that's my experience, but I wonder if sending articles is the best approach on this. In practice while men are often dominant it's a problem whenever certain voices aren't heard and it can be almost anyone this happens to that is a little quiet or not comfortable with the tech or whatever, and the same solutions will work for anyone. There are good practices associated with these kinds of meetings that a lot of people aren't aware of, and it's worth looking into them. It will make a big difference to how well they run.

bettybeans, TBF I think it depends on the industry.

In my current role, in fact company, it seems to be an age group where lots of people have young kids. It is also male dominated (100 people approx 5 women).

In (internal) meets the men are having toddlers and young kids wandering in, having to set them on their laps, answer the door, carve time out for homeschooling etc.

I mean they aren't paragons, all 3 men on my team have openly said that even though their OH works FT they had been bearing the brunt of it. They all said around week 7 that they had to 'step up' as it wasn't fair.

But it's fine. Is it fine because they're men and all in the same boat? Dunno. But everyone is like yeah fine whatever and v understanding.

That's separate from the way that virtual working has imo made the disparity between the ones who talk and the ones who don't even more stark.

It is worse on virtual meetings because men’s voices are generally louder and when someone speaks it mutes the sound of everyone else momentarily. So it’s harder to get back in. Unless you implement hand raising and that just feels like being back at school.

The only way usually to make meetings like this work is for everyone who is not talking to be muted.