'You can't be what you can't see'. Really?
I increasingly have a problem with motivational slogans. A visit to Paperchase now brings me out in hives (shelves of notepads screaming ‘Grl Power!’, ‘The Future is Female!’, ‘Girls Support Girls!’) and a trip around the London underground feels like walking the halls of a primary school (‘Be kind’, ‘Slow down’, ‘Be patient with others’).
It feels like a depressing indictment of society if you have to remind people to embrace basic human decency. Maybe I’m naive, but - and back to the Power of Bad- as much as the ‘baddies’ monopolise our news cycle, I really do feel like most people (even most teenage girls) are good and surely those that aren’t are unlikely to be influenced by a poster campaign or notebook slogan. Arguably, if anything it’s more likely to provoke irritability, as it does with me… (especially ‘be kind’).
But perhaps the slogan that frustrates me the most these days is ‘You can’t be what you can’t see’. Cute, simple and rhyming. The holy trilogy of trite sloganeering. Yet, all it makes me feel is patronised and defiant. Just.. Why? Why not? Why can’t I?
Of course, I get it. I’ve said it and lived it. I’ve appeared in glossy magazine spreads and on conference stages under its banner. It’s all about driving better representation - of women, and minorities especially - an aim I wholeheartedly support. I would love there to be more diverse people in my fields of technology and entrepreneurship. And as a working mother myself, I certainly tune more into stories about successful women for inspiration. We’re still living in a newish world where there are fewer of them, and even fewer successful working mothers. I enjoy their stories for the echoes of my own - the balancing act, the imposter syndrome, the moments of guilt, those frequent feelings of not doing anything well enough. But it’s their stories I’m tuning into, not their appearance (an awesome leather jacket, aside).
The individuals I find most inspirational often don’t look anything like me. They’re those with values and attributes that resonate - a shared sense of humour or ambition to solve the same problems I care about or… perhaps a similar tendency towards over-sharing. I take my inspiration from the unpolished entrepreneur who left school at 16; the kid from a broken home who started a social movement; the person who overcame a speech impediment to nail public speaking - or frankly anyone who has embraced uncertainty or done something differently to make a dent in the world. We just don’t know when we look at someone about the risks they’ve taken, the odds they’ve overcome or the sheer work and effort they’ve put in. Admittedly you have to scratch a little deeper than an instagram story to uncover this detail, but it’s only attributes, stories and experiences that can inspire action, not a photograph of someone in a sharp suit with their arms crossed, legs astride.
Perhaps I’m taking the word ‘see’ too literally in the slogan, but it’s noteworthy that it’s mostly women or minorities who are being constantly encouraged to over-share this level of detail.
Arguably ‘you can’t be what you can’t see’ is not only superficial in taking people at literal face-value but a little disrespectful of all the bad-asses in history who achieved firsts by thinking or acting differently, not looking different. Their stories should surely inspire everyone, not just those who share their physical characteristics. Do we distrust our children’s power of imagination so much? Might we potentially limit them by encouraging them to compare themselves only with those they look like? Maybe all these girls' story books about female pioneers might actually be more pertinent for young boys if we’re to continue to shift societal perceptions?
This all leads to an entirely different conundrum. If, as we’re frequently told, we are all identically able then why does having diverse-looking teams have such a positive impact on outcomes as the evidence seems to suggest? Isn’t this a contradiction in terms? I would suggest that visual box ticking works because we are different. Whether along ethnicity lines - perhaps by cultural or religious upbringing, or sex/ sexuality lines - whether due to societal conditioning or (shhhh) different average bellcurve aptitudes, physiological or chemical make-up (however frequently denied or bucked by outliers). To admit a personal bias, I’m almost certain women make better politicians due to their greater predilection towards empathy, self-reflection and reading a room; and that men make better… (ha ha. I’m not that stupid. Sexist statements only work in one direction).
So maybe it is a ‘good start’, or at least, I think that’s the point - and I do get that - particularly when so many other inequalities can also be disproportionately found within the visible tick-box . We start with ‘seeing’ (and perhaps by taking it less literally than I have), and then we can go deeper. Every little helps. But in practice, do we go deeper? If we prioritise ticking visible boxes, aren’t there the twin risks of a) us doing so superficially (borne out by any cursory investigation into the typically privileged educational/ socio-economic background of so many minorities in ‘power’) and b) of it potentially reducing the incentive to go deeper?
An aspiring young minority female entrepreneur from a broken home or inner city estate has more in common with a man who came from a similar background than they do with me - a white, middle-class woman. Someone with mental health challenges or who’s experienced debilitating grief is much more likely to identify with those who’ve suffered similarly- whatever their sex, race or sexuality. We are all a messy tapestry of upbringings, challenges and personal experiences that you can’t read in our faces or even CVs. Didn’t someone, now seemingly unfashionable, once say something about the ‘content of our characters’...? Is sloganeering dumbing us down and oversimplifying our human complexities?
There are so many critically important boxes we can’t tick visually. Humour, common sense, leadership or team-skills, deep knowledge, life experience, ambition and work ethic... arguably all more important to our success than our faces and more aspirational for those coming up the ladder. What of neuro or view-point diversity? Both, I would suspect, are more beneficial to an organisation’s outlook and success, let alone social-economic diversity- near impossible to achieve given the job market’s obsession with educational attainment and most people’s innate affinity bias towards those that talk and think like them.
Recently, I’ve been blown away by Sam Conniff’s ‘Uncertainty Experts’ pilot series showcasing awe-inspiring stories from an ex-convict, an ex-gang-leader, a trans scientist-philosopher, a prisoner of war and a pathologically shy activist. I also love this ‘Potential’ initiative from investors, Alex Dunsdon and Doug Scott- championing those outside the traditional entrepreneur mould - people who’ve been bullied, have ADHD or dyslexia, criminal records or mental health issues. Both initiatives recognise that what we ‘see’ simply cannot do justice to the inspiring stories within.
But then again, it would be foolish to ignore looks altogether. Particularly when the attractive vs. unattractive pay gap, at 15% is larger than either the gender or ethnic pay gaps. Sorry, what?... where are the campaigners?! Without beginning to understand how researchers rank such a subjective measure, in a world where people’s faces can be their fortune, I can’t see many being willing to front the campaign for the Ugly in photo shoots. And I have no idea how we’d manage affirmative action or ‘All Ugly shortlists’ for this challenge.
So as ever, I leave you with more questions than answers. Sorry.
I’ll conclude with a proposed revision to this much overused slogan:
“Of course you can be what you can’t see. It’s what you can’t see that’s worth aspiration”. ™ Jess Butcher
Catchy eh? The first run of Paperchase notebooks will be appearing in time for back-to-school.
