Gender parity starts with controlling our lifebrand
[Music]
[Applause]
i was told to kill myself
and if i don’t kill myself then someone
will kill me
anxiety is something i deal with every
day
um there’s just some days that i can’t
get the weight out of my chest
i have no confidence anymore um
i have such low self-esteem and i’m just
scared that
when i am applying for a new job that
someone’s going to bring it up and
i don’t know how to explain it i’m an
educated young woman
and i have future ambitions and
i was canceled over something that is
not my identity
this is a loving family star
a random completely uneventful night
damaged her life beyond repair
when she woke up one morning to find out
that someone decided to post an image of
that night
on social media without her consent
now she wasn’t acting with the intention
to harm anybody
or to express her identity that night
yet when there’s a picture
there always is a story to protect her
from further harm i cannot reveal
any of the details but what i will tell
you is that she lost
countless job opportunities almost all
of her friends
and most importantly her confidence and
her self-esteem
and what she got in return was serious
death threats
and strangers rallying other people
to go to her house and confront her she
was scared someone would harm her family
now sharing her story without being able
to reveal her identity
because she’s scared for her life that
has no
benefit to her she gets no credit for
this
she made this tough decision to come
forward so
tomorrow morning it won’t be your child
and family
that wakes up to a life in ruins
i’m a millennial my first phone was a
nokia
remember those i made my first facebook
post at 24
and i bought my first iphone at 26
and when i grew up we had to call each
other rather than sending text messages
and emojis and
you know we let loose we did a lot of
stupid things without thinking it was
possible
that one day millions of people would be
having access to what we were doing as
teenagers
virtually everyone in the world these
days
owns a smartphone they’re pointed at me
right now we’re all
exposed to constant visibility
gen xers let’s pretend real quick right
that all your 15 year old buddies and
girlfriends
that you used to hang out with in your
parents basement 30 or 40 years ago
that they all had smartphones
recording devices imagine that you
making out with that girl or boy from
next door
smoking illegal substances getting drunk
beyond no return pulling the pants down
their shirts up all of that stuff that
would now be broadcasted to millions of
people on social media
how do you think this would impact your
life what about your career
what about your family almost half of
the adults surveyed by euro rscg
they worry that friends or family will
reveal
personal information about them online
that they
don’t want to be made public appearing
on social media
is not our choice alone sooner or later
someone is likely to make that choice
for us
but it’s not just others that contribute
to our lifetime
content library children these days i
handed smartphones at the age of
11 and that includes access to the
internet now in many cases i’m sure it’s
done
for security reasons so the kids can
reach out to their parents in case of
emergency i totally get it
but what we need to realize is by
handing over that first
smartphone we are also handing over the
temptation
to find a way to explore the virtual
world that lives within that device
in that intended act of safety that
happens
way before kids and young adults have
the maturity
to navigate the roads of the internet
and social media in a responsible way
without exposing themselves or others to
possible harm
what this really means is that we’re
letting them
behind the wheel of their future way
before they
have reached the legal driving age
now part of generation z those are kids
and young adults of the ages 8 to 23
right now
but especially that following generation
that is entirely born in the 21st
century
they are growing up with smartphones and
social media exposure from day one of
their life
and they are unaware that with those
first
few posts the parents put out there
featuring them
and then all the likes and the loves and
the videos that they put out there once
they have access to social media
they started developing a life brand
now a life brand is our digital
fingerprint
it is unique to each person and it is
shaped by the collection of publicly
accessible content
shared by or featuring you and me
such as photos videos audio recording
social media posts
and comments lifebrand literally
has a life on its own it gains power and
strength
over the course of a lifetime if we
don’t control it and the more
content we accumulate in the cloud on
social media
or on paper if you grew up like me with
kodak cameras because that stuff can
still see the light a day
years later as we all know we all
possess
one life branch that’s just one
and imagine every potential piece of
content that we’re about to put out
there like that
bad tattoo that you once got that you
now want to get rid of
and you try to laser it away or cover it
up but the trace of it always remains
so we can go ahead and delete that
embarrassing image on social media that
we’re not proud of but
chances are our bff yeah that one day
might divorce us
has already taken a screenshot of it
this
next generation born between 2012 and
2030
they will be defined by their life
brands they will either become a victim
of it or with the right education
and awareness they can be the most
powerful generation
to have ever lived i’m referring to the
specific groups of kids and young adults
as
generation brand this is the first ever
generation
entirely exposed to uncontrolled
lifebrand creation
from birth initially through the parents
that start
posting about their kids on social media
when they’re small
kids babies now
if we think about women and girls of
generation brand they are particularly
impacted by possible life brand damage
current trends show that 78
of women use social media over 65
percent of men
and there is an assumption to be made
that this could be correlated to a
bigger desire to be liked for girls and
young women
and i would even go as far to say that
getting responses to social media posts
that can lead to like addiction and we
know with addiction comes the buildup of
tolerance
so especially girls and young women they
now have the pressure
to go and post more controversial or
unseen maybe even sexy content that
contradicts who they
are and that misrepresents their true
identity
it’s a spiral of like pressure who gets
the most likes the quickest and with
that comes a bigger
risk to harm our life brands and
possibly our future
now what furthermore comes into play
here is that women are a greater target
for online harassment
the guardian has conducted research into
the 70 million
comments 70 million comments
left on their side since 2006
and they discovered that out of the 10
most abused writers
eight were women we also know that girls
and young women are three times more
likely to be cyberbully than boys
and young men cyber bullying ties into
life brand cultivation and how it can
harm
the life brand journey and that’s
especially true for us
females research has shown that there’s
a confidence gap between men
and women and that gap significantly
impacts how we are advancing and
managing
our careers compared to our male
counterparts
now studies have also suggested that our
confidence
builds with age and experience over the
course of a lifetime
so taking those two things into
consideration technically speaking we
are already at a disadvantage when it
comes to advancing our careers
to senior leadership and executive
levels compared to our male peers now
that’s simply by confidence default
and now those are women like me
professional women like me they have not
grown up
with social media exposure from day one
of their life and they have not suffered
confidence hits with every click
scroll or comment they receive
if we think about the girls of
generation brand that are growing up
with smartphones and social media
exposure from day one of their life
initially through their millennial and
gen z parents
we are looking at a generation that
exposes their possibly
already lowered self-confidence to cyber
bullying
to backlash to criticism with little to
no education on how to act
react and most importantly digest such
attacks on the cell
so the expectation for these future
women to enter the educational path
and then the workforce with high
confidence and self-esteem
that’s not just unrealistic that’s
completely unattainable
if the current social media landscape
remains as is
and putting girls and young women in the
social media driver’s seat
without educating them on the impact
their social media interactions have on
their life brand
that’s like sending them to drive on the
autobahn
without a seat belt the consequences to
their confidence
can be deadly now without this
life-saving education
we are in fact shaping a generation of
future women that is not well equipped
to drive gender parity in business
and beyond that being said
if we are investing in educating
generation brand and especially
the future women of this generation
on the concept of life brand before we
give them
access to social media in the internet
the girls of that generation that you
and me will be hiring in a few years
from now
they are the true game changers they
will drive a cultural paradigm shift
towards full
gender equality and the current
statistics on gender parity in business
they’re well known i mean we’ve been
talking about this forever
there’s an under-representation of women
on manager levels and that’s the true
source for lack of female leadership
pipeline
women get less executive sponsorship
women get paid significantly less than
men
women are also less likely to choose
higher paying occupations and studies
have shown that young teenage females
are already growing up with strong
gender biases against other female
leaders
and then let’s not forget the covet 19
pandemic that now has pushed
millions of women out of the workforce
so we know that companies have a lot of
work to do to help remove
gender biases and to shape a better
future
for women and especially women of color
in the workplace
there’s no debate about that but the
only way how we can drive
full gender parity in business and
beyond is to create awareness
and educate young women on the concept
of life brand
early so they can develop confidence and
self
self-esteem and position themselves
feeling equal to their male peers by the
time they enter the workforce
this is about giving women the power to
initiate and drive
this change if we look
at both dilemmas and that’s the lack of
gender equality
and also the negative impact social
media has on our current and future
generation of women
with social media usage on the rise the
time has come
for a full reset not just on the social
media landscape
but especially on gender equality
through
millennial and gen z women actively
controlling their life brands over the
course of their career
so they can become life brand role
models for the girls and future women of
generation brand
that will not just increase access to
female leaders and executives through
social media
but it will also help us shape a social
media landscape that promotes women
their accomplishments and their
successes
how do you control a life brand a
controlled life brand consists of two
components
and that’s our identity and our chosen
purpose in life
identity in the context of life brand is
the summary
of our behavior and language displayed
on social media
and in the real world because everything
we say and do out here
that can find its way onto the internet
also
a purpose can be discovered through the
vehicle of a passion
an idea maybe your professional
expertise in a certain field
or an interest you might have or maybe a
hobby that you pursue
and managing the connection between
identity and purpose
that is crucial to truly controlling
a life brand our behavior and language
has to be in
alignment with our chosen purpose and
need to be portrayed
with integrity and that means that we
start
living our lives as our life brand
and the longer we control our life brand
the higher the chances that we will
develop a life brand voice that allows
us to drive and initiate change
aligned to our chosen purpose in our
social and real life communities
through the reach of social media
implementing the concept of lifebrand
and understanding the constant risk of
visibility we’re faced with
that will guide generation brand to
become mindful
of their behavior and language not just
on social media but also
in the real world and they will develop
the awareness
that every photo or video that features
them
that has the potential to permanently
damage their life brand it’s a
misalignment with their true identity
and their chosen purpose
now if you are a parent you’re probably
wondering right now
how am i going to get my kids to control
their life brand
that’s going to be really tough well let
me tell you preventing your kids from
going on social media
that’s going to be much tougher
living our life as our life friends that
will also help us remove deeply
ingrained gender biases
and instead equip the girls of
generation brand with strong belief
not just in their own but also other
women’s abilities to lead
and this mindset shift is driven by
millennial and gen z
women actively controlling the social
media landscape
as life brand role models transforming
generation brands thought patterns about
what they can achieve in life
lifebrand will be a confidence builder
for all future women
of generation brand no matter their
upbringing or their environment
we might not be able to change any of
those things
but no matter the circumstances a girl
is growing up in
she will very likely have access to
social media which gives her the power
to control her life brand and with that
her future
now it might not be obvious but this
change
right here that starts with all of us
every single one of us wouldn’t you feel
you had done your part if you prevented
an
image or video or social media post from
destroying a young person’s life
imagine for a second you didn’t bother
to bring lifebrand to your daughter
your cousin your niece your girlfriend
or the girl who walks your dog or
babysits your kids
and one of them end up destroying their
life brand
in their life forever
if all of us educate just one girl
or one young woman on how to use life
brand to build
early confidence and self-esteem they
can become whoever they aspire to be
despite their differences in upbringing
education
or background and that’s
how we will close the gender gap
together
thank you
[Applause]
[Music]
you