While any day makes for a great opportunity to celebrate the women in our lives, International Women’s Day gives us one more reason to do exactly that. International Women’s Day on March 8th is a special occasion to acknowledge women’s incredible achievements, raise awareness, and encourage others to advocate for gender equality.

For this year’s International Women’s Day, the UN Women have announced the theme “Gender Equality Today for a sustainable tomorrow”, “recognizing the contribution of women and girls around the world to build a more sustainable future for all”. The role of gender equality for a better future is also acknowledged by the HBP:

The figures show that the project does its goal justice: In the current and last phase of the project, women account for 36% of all leadership positions in the HBP. This is an increase of 14%-points compared to March 2020 and of 20%-points compared to September 2017.

Comparison of gender distribution in HBP Leadership

The Directorate (DIR) and the Science and Infrastructure Board (SIB) collaborate with the DEOC to constantly reflect and improve related measures. Beyond the aim of fixing the numbers, the HBP is committed to enhancing leadership according to Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) principles: This includes setting measures for EDI on different levels of project governance, such as the framework, organisation of events, leadership commitment and development of talents. The DEOC contributed to and pretested the , providing at-hand tools for the implementation of EDI principles in everyday work of a complex, interdisciplinary research project.

“On the occasion of this year’s International Women's Day, I would like to emphasize how much being part of the DEOC has sharpened my own sensitivity of equal opportunities, although I have already paid attention to it before”, says Sylvia Aßlaber, member of the DEOC, “With numerous inventive initiatives, the DEOC makes a significant contribution to raising awareness of equality within the Human Brain Project and beyond.”

Based on the Diversity and Gender Equality vision, the HBP has taken several measures to promote and facilitate the implementation of these principles, among others an inclusive mentoring programme, a commitment of leaders, which includes a checklist, a Diversity In Research Paper Award (DIRPA), which highlights research that considers gender and further diversity traits, and a specific emphasis on gender and diversity as relevant criteria in the HBP Open Calls for Expression of Interest and the Voucher Programme.

Sylvia highlights: “Examples that particularly inspire me as an HBP Education Team member are those that focus on empowering young scientists, such as the mentoring programme or workshops on career development in our Education formats, which are attended by students with enthusiasm and from which they take a lot with them for their further career. Without the involvement of members of the DEOC that never get tired of underlining the importance of including female scientists in conference programmes, gender distribution of speakers in various HBP events would often be unequal.”

To make sure that all voices are heard and included in the further development of the measures, an internal survey was carried out.

 Based on the answers by project members, the following concrete recommendations can be derived for the HBP, as well as for other large-scale projects facing the challenges of collaborating successfully towards a common goal, despite having diverse communities of contributors and undergoing phases of restructuring:

• Considering measures for new personnel joining such a complex project and support networking and integration across distances and different disciplines to further strengthen cohesion
• Paying attention to participation, communication of shared values and standards, decisions and diversity measures
• Offering career guidance and encourage leaders to actively support scientists and managers of science alike, offering perspectives after the end of a contract or project
• Supporting newly appointed leaders to enable them to be recognised as competent and independent

“There is still a continuing need worldwide for more progressive mindsets and inclusive behaviours to be forged, but gender stereotypes are being challenged and diverse representation of women is more evident. In the HBP we are working together for a better and equal future, as an ongoing process to which we all can contribute”, says Andrea. Therefore, we invite you to contact usand share your thoughts on equal opportunities and bring in your ideas. We look forward to keeping the conversation going and creating an equal future together.