Photo courtesy of Ladies Get Paid
By Mindy Abovitz
Ladies Get Paid is a career initiative that provides education and community for women to advocate their value and gain the skills they need to advance their careers. Their mission is to see more diversity in leadership, in every industry. We talked to the founder, Claire Wasserman, to find out more about their incredible mission.
Claire, how are you hoping to implement your mission?
You mean, how are we going to topple the patriarchy?!
Yes! How are we going to topple the patriarchy?
It certainly won’t come from the top. I made a decision early on to focus on building a community, growing it grassroots style and provide education around career development. One woman, one raise: if each of us gained the confidence and the skills to take the next steps in our individual careers, it would move the needle for all of us. I think the quote, “A rising tide raises all boats” is a good analogy. Because of my previous roles at Working Not Working and the Art Directors Club, it made sense to focus on career development. Now in light of this election, I’m figuring out how we can take this grassroots movement we’ve started and use it as leverage to hold lawmakers accountable and get wage equality and female-friendly workplace practices into place.
What have you defined as a success you have had already?
Success to me are the emails I receive on a daily basis from women in the community who have negotiated big raises, left jobs that didn’t value them, and found the confidence to speak up and get what they deserve. I’m also proud of myself for quitting my job – as much as I loved it – to give myself the time and space to nurture this thing.
What can a girl do right now to prepare herself for this wage gap?
I think the number one thing you can do to fight the wage gap is to become a rockstar negotiator. It’s also crucial that you support other women whether it’s being a mentor or simply an ally. We all know Madeleine Albright’s famous quote, “There is a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women” and I can’t agree more.
Tell us about your hashtag:
Our hashtag is #FucktheWageGap because that’s exactly how I feel. I’m pissed off and you should be too.
“The number one thing you can do to fight the wage gap is to become a rockstar negotiator.”
What is the most exciting thing you are working on right now?
So many exciting things! Right now my main focus is organizing a conference in New York at the end of May (in collaboration with the Sydney-based women’s conference, Make Nice), as well as taking my town halls on a roadshow across America. My goal in 2017 is to work with our global community to bring our programming to their cities sort of like TEDx or Creative Mornings. I’d also like to hire a team to build out more media offerings like Lady Talk (our podcast), as well as video.
What would need to happen for Ladies Get Paid to be done?!
Honestly, I’m not sure our work will ever be done. If we achieved equal pay tomorrow, that might dampen our fire a bit but since our overall mission is about helping women recognize and advocate their value, I don’t see an end in sight.