It’s nice to see equality and diversity getting a shout out this week with the #thisgirlcan campaign going international with a new version opening up in Australia, and with a new #likeagirl campaign coming out from Always.
Given the tragic events last week in Charlottesville it is important that we recognise the importance of equality and diversity in marketing materials and within the industry as a whole. There are a number of initiatives at the moment trying to do just that. One we have covered before, the #SoWhiteProject is designed to highlight the need for diversity within the industry and is supported by some of the titans of the industry such as received support from some of the best known businesses within the marketing community: Media.com, Google, Above+Beyond, AnalogFolk, BBH, DigitasLBi, Dentsu Aegis Network, New Look, Saatchi & Saatchi, and Sunshine. It is great to see within itself that the industry realises the importance of diversity.
Diversity is becoming more and more important, and just this week Google sacked employee James Damore was fired by the big tech company for “perpetuating gender stereotypes.” In an internal memo which was leaked into the internet.
Again it is great to see companies like Google taking action on this memo and who wrote it, however since the leak of the memo several women who worked at the company and have since left say their time at Google was often frustrating where they regularly experienced slights about their race, reports The Guardian’s Sam Levin.
We do need to see more action on equality and diversity across all businesses and industries, and equality is one of the biggest issues in marketing and advertising today so it is nice to see these things changing over time.
There are some examples of companies making changes and the Saatchi & Saatchi’s New Director Showcase took a new direction this year and chose to highlight a polemic issue within filmmaking: gender diversity. With statistics showing that only 7% of commercial directors are female, the pre- reel entertainment was used this year as a platform to explore the topic of gender. As well as this The Creative Circle has announced the launch of The Creative Circle Foundation, as the longest running advertising awards body in the UK it aims support greater diversity in the U.K. creative departments of the future.
Change is happening within the industry and I hope it can only continue.
