Six years ago, McCarthy Uniforms, which has been making school and workplace uniforms since 1956, was struggling to expand internationally and teetering on bankruptcy.
These changes at McCarthy, plus others such as fine-tuning the ordering process to suit the women administrators doing the task, led the company to double-digit revenue growth. Dr. Kaplan says the process can help companies improve their product and services offerings by better understanding women as customers and stakeholders. It can also have a ripple effect on diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace, and boost the careers of women.
In the public sector, gender analytics has been around for decades. The Canadian government mandated gender-based analysis since 1995, requiring all departments to assess how gender will affect any policy or program. Since 2018, the government has performed gender budgeting, which entails doing a gender analysis of the annual federal budget.
The need for better data Dr. Kaplan says that while organizations may recognize the need to address gender-based shortcomings, many groups don’t know how to begin. “That’s why we’ve introduced training and why we’re having this conference,” she says of GATE. “Companies need help building this muscle.”
Internally, organizations can struggle to capture the right metrics, says Dr. Kaplan. “Many companies are upping their game on data analytics. But often they’re not including gender and race and other forms of data so they can hone their insights,” she says.