It’s not hard to find women pictured and profiled in the mainstream media.
If she’s beautiful and/or a celebrity, she’ll frequently score page one. We’ll know her name and worth. We’re told who she’s dating, how many children she has, and what she got up to over the weekend.
We can find plenty of women staring at us on the front pages of magazines. Some are perfectly styled and photoshopped, others are the victims of unflattering photographs. All of them are ‘too something’: Too fat, too thin, too beautiful, or showing too much belly and thus probably pregnant.
What is rare is to see women being quoted in the press as ‘expert sources’ anywhere. Despite the fact women are relevant to every news story covered and continue to make the majority of the household purchasing decisions, female sources were lacking once again during 2015.
Put your gender glasses on and the problem is particularly easy to spot in the business pages of our major newspapers and media outlets.
It’s easy to overlook the lack of female sources quoted because we’re very much socially engineered to simply accept this is the norm. The fact a newspaper can feature six male expert quotes (along with six headshots) in response to a new policy announcement – without an editor or sub editor ever thinking it looks a little strange – is telling.
In 2016, we need the inclusion of female sources to simply become the norm, rather than the exception or a token gesture. A lack of women in the upper echelons of leadership shouldn’t be an excuse for not delivering on this, as there are plenty of women one or two rungs down the corporate ladder who’d have just as much to offer. There are also many talented female business owners, consultants and entrepreneurs able and willing to put their hand up for such opportunities.
Both sides of a news story can help improve the rate of female sources quoted.
Journalists should consider the diversity of their sources when identifying a range of expert views on a topic, and seek to expand their contact lists to include a broader variety. Databases such as Women for Media will help.
But those women who are and can be sources must also help the journalists out. Journalists are under more pressure than ever to publish copy across multiple platforms. With tight deadlines, it’s understandable that they call on the same, familiar sources over and over again – the fact such sources have usually been male, means they’ll continue to be male long into the future.
So women can and should step up to look available. We can be active with our views on social media (and easy to contact), make email introductions to journalists regarding our expertise and story ideas, and submit opinion pieces or even a ready-made quote responding to an issue we believe an editor or journalist might be interested in (pre-empting a phone call). We can research the outlets we’re interested in being featured in to understand why they should want to source our views, and get to know the relevant journalists that regularly cover our industry niche. We can offer up other names of women that journalists might like to contact. We can come up with compelling, exclusive story angles that hook into the news cycle, aiming to make life as easy as possible for journalists and produce excellent content for their readers.
Meanwhile, when the journalist calls, we can ensure we’re always available and easy to deal with – that means no requests to approve copy prior to publication (a surefire way to never get called again).
Women don’t need a PR firm to do any of the above. The best relationship an expert can form with the media is the one she initiates and nurtures herself.
And it shouldn’t be a woman’s responsibility to sort out the lack of female experts quoted in the media, and I don’t for a second believe women are any ‘less available’ than men when it comes to offering a quote or an opinion. The above are tips that would help either gender out in getting the media’s attention.
So what can newspapers do to help?
Bloomberg offers a great example.
This time last year, the financial news publication issued a mandate to ensure that all news stories included at least one female voice. The ruling came from Bloomberg’s news editor-in-chief Matthew Winkler, who circulated an email to staff stating that all “work must include at least one woman’s voice, and preferably a balance of men and women”.
As Winkler explained, women are engaged in every topic covered by Bloomberg and its journalism should reflect it. He also offered an 800-strong list of female sources journalists could access to support a transition away from male-only stories.
Twelve months on and the mandate is clearly still challenging – some stories appear to slip through without a female voice included. However, the fact this mandate came from the very top – and is cited as being extremely important from one of the pioneers of business news – shows it’s a mandate that all publications striving for excellence in news reporting should consider.
Media outlets will ultimately produce better journalism that’s relevant to more people, if they get serious about including a broader range of sources.
So in short, here are the three points on my 2016 wish list:
- That more journalists actively seek to expand their list of contacts to include more women, and keep in mind the fact a more diverse range of sources will lead to a better story
- That more women take active steps to get in front of journalists – not because women necessarily do this any less than men already, but because journalists are time poor and need as much help as possible when it comes to acquiring more gender-balanced viewpoints
- That more media outlets follow the Bloomberg lead and initiate their own target or mandate for getting more female voices in the news.
I’m experimenting with a new LinkedIn group called The Women’s Content Movement to help promote female voices in the media, on the speaking circuit and as exerts online. Please join me in there — especially those female industry experts who want to get heard.
This article was first published on LinkedIn