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March 8th is an important day as the world celebrates International Women’s Day. A day dedicated to celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women across the globe. 

Every year at Ogury, we like to take over the whole month of March to spotlight our female Ogurians and bring awareness to the key issues women face in the workplace. This year, we organized a series of internal events aimed at celebrating the women of Ogury, learning from and inspiring each other to play our part in mobilizing the collective power of individual action-taking. 

Here’s a summary of what took place.

Leadership Spotlight

We kicked off the campaign with a conversation with our Chief People Officer, Blandine Kouyaté, who spoke candidly about her leadership journey and her view on what it means to be an authentic leader. 

It was a great discussion where Ogurians were given a platform to share their own experiences, learn from others and identify ways we can better support our people to feel proud to belong at Ogury. 

Blandine Kouyaté, speaks about authentic leadership
Blandine Kouyaté, speaks about authentic leadership

Women of Ogury Awards

We launched a global internal campaign where we encouraged Ogurians to nominate the Women of Ogury who live and breathe our Standards, every day. We had so many amazing videos, presentations and even a poem – a real testament to how valued our female Ogurian’s are in the company. Our three deserving winners (below) were each awarded with a unique experience of their choice, on Ogury. This was a way for us to celebrate their achievements and thank them for their contributions.

Helene Bouteille
Helene Bouteille, as she leads her team with grit and determination. Her acute intelligence is astounding. Her work ethic is flawless and she leads by example. She manages a very hectic and intense work schedule and still makes her family a priority and is a super mum! Ogury is so fortunate to have Helene.
Franziska is an incredible colleague to work with for many reasons including: her energy & mindset, her incredible sense of ownership and the fact that she is always there to help in best interest of her colleagues and clients
Alexia is the most reliable teammate ever. She is always motivated by projects related to her already-full-scope, but also always happy to help with broader topics that are not directly related to her. She’s passionate about her work, and she leverages this passion to share Ogury’s messages externally and internally. Sometimes I wonder how she manages to get all these things done and executed perfectly.

Women of Ogury Chapter

Our Women Of Ogury (WOO) chapter has been relaunched. Employees from across the globe have come together, motivated by the opportunity to support Ogury in building a more diverse and inclusive company for all. The aim is to create a safe space for ALL employees to share ideas, discuss challenges and hold each other accountable for supporting the women of Ogury and playing their part in shaping the future of women in tech.

Locally Organised Events

All of our local offices bought employees together to celebrate March 8th with food, decorations and conversation! It was an opportunity to celebrate women’s achievements, raise awareness against bias and take action for equality.

Our London office ended the month by inviting Lynne Parker, CEO of Funny Women, alongside award-winning stand-up comedian, Jenny Bolt into the office. Funny Women believe in using comedy to spark positive change for women in the workplace. And in an action-packed session, they shared their tried and tested tricks of the comedy trade on how to use humor in the workplace, express yourself memorably and bring your ideas to life..

International Womens Day Celebrations
A snapshot of the International Women’s Day celebrations in some of our offices

The Road Ahead

So where do we go from here? Ogury’s celebration of women will continue far beyond a singular day, week or even month.

We are working hard to build a company that embraces and champions our differences and we recognize that the diversity of our teams is a major contributor to our continued success. We have a great representation of amazing female talent across our company, with almost 50% of our employees identifying as female, but we know that there is more to be done.

We’ve challenged our employees and leaders to continue to consider their role in making the world a more equal place for everyone and to look to their community to understand how they can support and use their influence – be that through their social media following, talents or skills – to take action.  

We’ve shared a toolkit of resources with our employees to support raising awareness of gender equity in all parts of life and amplifying female voices. It includes top reads by female authors, podcasts focusing on fighting for equity, prominent female activists to follow.

Our Employee Network Groups, The Mosaic and Women of Ogury also play an integral role in providing a safe space for our employees and in keeping us all accountable. Building an inclusive workplace means creating a culture that fully engages and supports all employees. Through the campaign, we have taken our first steps in creating opportunities for our employees to share their individual experiences and feel empowered to speak up about the struggles they face when it comes to gender bias. We are excited to build on the momentum of the campaign ensuring that as a company we continue to listen to our employees, learn from each other and together drive actionable change.

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