At the Nexus: Advancing progress on gender equity

The 2024 Global Gender Gap report from the World Economic Forum estimates that women’s representation in the workforce lags men across nearly every industry and economy. Globally, women account for 42% of the workforce and only 32% of senior leadership positions. While gender parity continues to improve worldwide, no country has yet to achieve workforce gender parity, according to the report.

That's just one of the reasons Johns Hopkins Carey Business School faculty Colleen Stuart and David Smith just launched the Gender & Work Initiative at Carey. Bridging research and practice, the initiative collaborates with industry leaders, organizations, and scholars to develop and share effective strategies for workplace equality by understanding the root causes of gender inequality in organizations and job markets and looking at both organizational structures and interpersonal dynamics. Then it will share its insights for practical application. 

In a quest to make the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg Center in Washington, D.C., a central hub for Hopkins gender equity research, Stuart and Smith will host two events in spring 2025 that will unite academic, practice and policy perspectives on critical, gender-related topics.

“We aim to capitalize on the Bloomberg Center’s location, in the heart of Washington D.C., and its proximity to a variety of gender equity organizations headquartered in the area, as well as federal policymakers,” says Stuart.

The gatherings are among 40 wide-ranging projects funded through the Johns Hopkins Nexus Awards, a university wide initiative launched in 2023 to support convening, research, and teaching anchored at the Bloomberg Center.

The first convening event expects to draw about 100 people and will bring together Hopkins faculty and staff involved in gender-focused initiatives with external participants working in prominent nonprofit organizations headquartered in Washington, D.C. The goal of the one-day gathering is to spotlight the impactful work in gender equity underway across Johns Hopkins divisions, programs, and centers, and to foster connections between university researchers and external organizations.

The second day-long event, expected to attract about 200 participants, will be dedicated to fostering men’s allyship by uniting researchers with practitioners, consultants, nonprofits, and advocacy groups.

Focusing on men’s allyship is crucial, Smith points out, since many organizations “inadvertently sideline men” from the conversation about gender equity initiatives by exclusively targeting women.

“This perpetuates the misconception that gender equity is solely a ‘women's issue’ and that men, often holding key leadership positions, need not be involved,” he says.

Setting an agenda for change

There are many gender-focused projects already underway across the Johns Hopkins enterprise — including the Gender & Work Initiative at Carey, SAIS Women Lead, and the Center for Global Women’s Health and Gender Equity at the Bloomberg School of Public Health — and leaders of these initiatives are expected to attend the first event, “The Power of the Collective: Strategizing for Impact for Gender-Focused Centers.”

Joining the Hopkins participants will be representatives from prominent nonprofit organizations headquartered in Washington D.C., as well as those from funding organizations and leaders from public sector organizations.

“By bringing everyone together for a day of interactive workshop sessions, culminating in a networking session to foster new partnerships, we aim to set an agenda for impactful discussion and collaboration,” says Stuart, whose primary interests focus on issues surrounding gender and work.

A pivotal role for male allies

The second event, “Cross-Sector Allyship: Engaging Men as Allies in Gender Equity Work,” seeks to move beyond current gender equity programs that target only women.

“The evidence is clear: When men actively assume roles as allies, mentors, and sponsors for women, they play a pivotal role in leveling the playing field for women at work,” says Smith, who is the co-author of Good Guys: How Men Can Be Better Allies for Women in the Workplace and Athena Rising: How and Why Men Should Mentor Women.

Despite the evidence showing that “gender equity needs to be a leadership imperative,” Smith says, there’s been little done to consolidate evidence and best practices of male allyship — metrics crucial for drawing investment from funders such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Smith and Stuart aim to fill that void with their day-long conference featuring research briefings, panel discussions, workshops, incubator sessions, and networking opportunities.

The Nexus events are part of the Johns Hopkins University Nexus Awards, e a universitywide initiative launched in 2023 to support convening, research, and teaching anchored at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center. Awarded projects and programs span the breadth of the faculty’s scholarship and expertise: Artificial intelligence and health policy, the arts and humanities, planetary health and gender equity, and much more. The Gender & Work Initiative is also supported by founding benefactor and Carey alumna Jenny Morgan ('86).