
Women are shaking things up with bold pursuits for social change.
What’s happening? According to the 2017 Deloitte Millennial Survey, educated and employed young people between the ages of 18 and 32 increasingly believe in the power of local and nonprofit organizations to make ethical decisions and lead positive initiatives. A report by Weber Shandwick and KRC Research found that 47% of Millennials today (more so than later generations) believe that CEOs have a responsibility to be activists in their community.
Why should you care? As a founder or CEO of a major company, your incoming workforce has high expectations for how you conduct yourself and your business internally and externally, and let’s face it, you should too if you don’t already. And just like the generations before them, young people are leading campaigns to change the world — and women are increasingly finding a voice in these circles, leading grassroots organizations and causes.
Who’s leading? Jennifer Mandelblatt is a recent grad from Cornell University who found her calling as a gender rights activist. She founded and directs Platform under the slogan: “Our Bodies. Our Lives. Our Futures” along with five other female founders. The lobbying organization started as a convention last July where women from across the U.S. wrote a common agenda called the Declaration of 21st Century Feminism. “I’ll be honest with you, for every one ‘yes’ I got, I got thirty ‘no’s.’ But it’s that one yes that kept me going,” Mandelblatt told The Cornell Daily Sun on how she funded the organization.
What can you do? Supporting a cause and creating an organization or campaign around it are two very different games. Fast Company offers advice to effectively market a cause to loyal followers or how to turn a brand into a cause-fighting machine. And read Inc Magazine’s 6 tips to raise awareness on social media.