BeCOME ALLIES eBook

Gavriella Schuster Become Allies A framework for change
Gavriella Schuster Become Allies A framework for change

I am thrilled to share with you my new eBook – BeCOME ALLIES eBook: A framework for change.  It is hot off the digital press, and I would be honored if you would download and give it a read. This eBook guides readers through my framework for how to BeCOME an ally (a champion for women in the workplace) and the actions ALLIES take each day to make a difference.

I call on each person reading this eBook, regardless of gender, to BeCOME an agent of change—BeCOME an ally. I don’t expect you to do it without guidance. In my TEDx Talk, I outlined my framework for how to BeCOME an ally: Connect, Outreach, Mentor, and Empower. This framework addresses four fundamental methods to create a multiplier effect and get more women into tech. This eBook goes deeper into the framework and expands on the fourth method, Empower, with six additional actions you can take each day to help make our industry better, stronger, and more inclusive.

Actor Victor Webster said, “Everything we do, even the slightest thing we do, can have a ripple effect and repercussions that emanate. If you throw a pebble into the water on one side of the ocean, it can create a tidal wave on the other side.”

Consider the actions captured in this eBook your pebbles. Together, let’s throw them courageously and with purpose. Hopefully, on the other end, we’ll create a tidal wave of change.

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#empowHER50 Celebrating Women Powering Microsoft’s Trillion Dollar Shift with Gavriella Schuster

Thank you Mariana Carvalho and Women in Cloud for this Spotlight of my 25 years at Microsoft as part of the 50 year Celebration!

One of the top skills I learned at Microsoft was the importance of inclusion. If I had not focused on including others in my ideas, in the way I planned and executed initiatives, campaigns and programs, that there is no way I would have been successful.

Once we had identified a market opportunity, my focus was how to craft objectives and an agenda that would attract those around me to want to work towards it. How I could identify their WIIFM (What’s In It For Me) and ensure that what I was doing would drive success for those around me. I learned how to engage others, how to share my ideas when they were nascent to bring in other points of view and make those ideas stronger. I learned that nothing at Microsoft got done as a tops down command – everything was organic from the ground up. In the early days of my career when there was so much to be done and so few resources to do it. We all needed each other and we needed to pull together to capture the vast opportunity ahead of us. There was no right or wrong way of getting things done – almost everything was built from the ground up creating a foundation for the future.

As you read this interview, you should know that behind everything I ever accomplished there were hundreds of people both within the company and within the Microsoft Partner community that worked to achieve our objectives. I never did anything alone.

I very often have likened my role as a team leader to that of the first ball in Newton’s Cradle of Balance Balls. I started something, but it was others who kept it moving and helped it become something I could only dream of.

I am grateful for all of the great leaders who empowered me and gave me the opportunity to keep trying through the failure until we found success. And I am especially grateful to my peers, those who worked within their teams, hashtag#mspartners, Women in Cloud, The WIT Network who believed in our many missions and made them a reality.

When you are in the midst of working, you seldom take the time to look back at the progression of your career. I know that the decisions I made to move to new roles at Microsoft were not made by a desire to move up within the organization but through a desire to make a difference. I had a desire to continually learn new skills, to push myself to new experiences, to build more bridges within the company and within the community and to make an impact. I am thrilled that as I look back on my career, that this is precisely what I wanted to achieve.

Thank you Microsoft for giving me the platform and the empowerment to make my dreams come true.

Read the full interview on Medium.

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BeCOME an Ally | Breaking through the gender equity divide

BeCOME, Connect, Outreach, Mentor, Empower

Have you ever been fed up with something and thought to yourself, “WAIT! Why am I putting up with this?” I had one of those moments a few years ago and it set me on a path of change—a path that took an exciting turn a few months ago.

In November 2020, I had the honor of giving a TEDx talk about something that has brought me heartache for years: the gender equity gap in the technology industry. After 30-years of regularly being the only woman in the room, I’m hopeful that sharing my story on the TEDx stage will be a catalyst for scalable change.

BeCOME and Ally: How to achieve gender equity

In the talk, I share personal stories about feeling invisible at work, as if I’m wearing an invisibility cloak that I just can’t take off. I know many of you can relate—you know, when you share your perspective in a meeting and are met with deafening silence? I can’t tell you the number of times that’s happened to me.  

To be fair, I’ve worked with many kind and inclusive allies throughout my career. And Microsoft, like many organizations, have taken this challenge head-on—making great strides with allyship training and a clear focus on creating a culture of diversity and inclusion. It’s been encouraging to see the progress we’ve made so far.

Unfortunately, in our industry as a whole, there just isn’t enough forward movement. So, by sharing my personal experiences, I hope to create a force-multiplier effect, where we can harness collective power to make change and ultimately bring gender equity to technology. But if we don’t act fast, we’re in trouble.

When I started in the technology industry in 1991, 36% of the computing workforce was women. In 2019, that number had fallen to 27%. We’re going the wrong direction, and it will soon get even worse.

The jobs being displaced through digital transformation disproportionately impact women and people of color. And that creates a perfect storm: by percentage, there are fewer women in technology, there are more jobs in technology, and yet there are more women being displaced by the technology. This is truly a crisis.

The good news is, we have the collective power to do something about it. Through technology democratization, purpose-driven leadership and male allyship, we can close the gap of inequity and create a new narrative. 

We need to add 8 million women to the technology workforce in order to achieve gender equity in the industry. With roughly 4 million in tech today, we have a long way to go. But with your help, we can create access and opportunity. We can #BeCOME agents of change by embracing four simple actions.

Connect | Make intentional connections with women in your network. Reach out and give women access to you and everyone in your community.

Outreach | Examine recruiting practices, hiring practices, and supplier selection practices. When you post a job, do you screen out candidates or do you screen in for diversity?

 Mentor | I would not be where I am today without the many men and women who have mentored me along the way. When you mentor, you blaze a trail for others to follow.

 Empower | The most impactful thing you can do for another human being is to empower them—to lift them up and create an inclusive environment that gives voice to everyone and allows people to be heard and seen for who they are.

In my TEDx talk I share examples of people I know who are walking the walk, like @Jennifer Didier who is the President and founder of our partner @Directions Training. Tired of seeing only men in her training programs, she set aside profit and created a scholarship program to bring free technical training and technical certification to women. And through her single intentional act, she has fundamentally changed the career trajectory for 70 women.

Another example is @Mal McHutchinson from @Interactive IT in Australia. He helped sponsor an organization called Male Champions for Change, which is dedicated to driving for gender diversity in high-tech.  And within his own organization, he has made a commitment to make his cyber security practice 50% women. That’s intentional leadership.

Through connection, outreach, mentorship, and empowerment, we can build healthier workplace cultures. We can attract new employees, customers, and investors. We can increase opportunities for all women and build a new generation of leaders that understand the value of equity.

We can do it. But it will take intentional action. I hope you’ll join me on this journey.

Over the next four weeks, I’ll be posting articles here on LinkedIn about each of the four actions we can take to #BeCOME agents of change and help women take off their invisibility cloak.

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