30 Women Empowerment Panel Questions
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I recently wrote a blog with 45 female leadership panel questions and have been challenged to write about women empowerment panel questions! So, without being redundant to my previous blog posting, I’ll share my top 45 panel questions specifically directed toward the female empowerment experience. I suggest you look at both lists to provide some inspiration as you develop your own list of women empowerment panel questions.
Generally speaking, I like to follow this flow to sequence the questions from strategic to tactical:
Strategic Women Empowerment Panel Questions:
- Define women’s empowerment and equality – and what’s the difference?
- Is the lack of empowerment an equality issue or an equity issue?
- What is the change that is wanted? What would success look like?
- What institutional and societal changes need to be made for women to be empowered?
- What legal frameworks exist that may enable or inhibit gender equality and women’s empowerment?
- What rights do women lack? Where are the barriers that are locking them out of the economic system?
Benefits/Consequences:
- What are the benefits of having empowered women in the organization?
- What do you think is the most significant barrier to female empowerment?
- What are some of your personal experiences (or reasons) that motivated you to think/care about women’s empowerment?
- How can we calculate the positive impacts of having empowered women in the organization?
- Are there existing national indicators that could be used or adapted?
- What information already exists, or is being collected, that can assist in tracking changes?
- How can small changes be measured?
Women Empowerment Panel Questions that Beg for Specifics:
- How do you empower yourself and the women around you?
- What makes you a strong woman? What fulfills you?
- How can women stand in solidarity with each other?
- How can we expand women’s links to each other e.g. mentorship, coaching, and networking?
- How can we tackle our challenges from a position of strength?
- How do you actively communicate with women at your workplace to make them feel included?
- How do we go about breaking down barriers that hold women back: from discriminatory laws to an unfair share of home and family care?
- What is the most efficient way to work directly with governments that are resistant to change or slow to progress?
- What are ways men can be good allies? What do we need to do to engage and inspire male advocates?
- How can governments promote the economic empowerment of women?
- How do we close the gender pay gap, increase job opportunities, and access to loans?
- How can we enable more widespread public acceptance, even without government and societal buy-in?
- What practical steps have you taken to reduce the barriers faced by women such as flexible working hours, remote working, maternity leave, and work-life balance?
- Provide a specific and individual case study (one or more examples) in your career where you enabled the empowerment of women in your organization or group. What was the problem, what steps did you take to resolve it and how did you measure success?
Questions about Application to the Audience:
- What concrete steps can we take to advance women’s empowerment?
- What advice do you have for women who want to work in a male-dominated field?
- What advice do you have for people who want to do more?
A big thank you to Chemonics, Sarah Mason writing for DevEx, Women in High Performance Computing, and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development for inspiration in building this list of great questions for any kind of women empowerment panel discussion!
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For more information about how to moderate a lively & informative leadership panel discussion, check out our free 7-part video series on how to moderate a panel and other resources to help you organize, moderate, or be a panel member.
