Women's history month

We are so not ready to stop celebrating Women’s History Month, as the formal celebration wraps up later this week. We’re here for Women’s History Month…year…decade…millennium… whatever it takes to ensure that women are seen, heard, valued, and have plenty of seats at the table.

Making a statement

Alludo continues to celebrate Women’s History Month by recognizing the valuable contributions of women in society. We believe in empowering women to occupy spaces in all aspects of society, and our March Alludo Challenge is dedicated to that cause.

Our employees were invited to share their identities and showcase what they’re proud of as women.  Using a branded International Women’s Day template, participants filled in a blank to complete the phrase “I am a woman and a _______.”

We also invited our male and non-binary allies to join in by shouting out a women in their life.

The Global Communications team got the ball rolling on the challenge, sharing photos with completed cards.

And the signs and statements kept coming in all month. 

I am a woman and a foodie.

I am a woman and help run the local football supporter’s club.

I am a woman and a singer.

My daughter is a woman and an award-winning playwright (and awesome person).

Participants were entered in a raffle to win awesome Alludo swag, but we already feel like winners for getting to read these signs—and occupy some of the same spaces as these amazing Alludians.

A day of appreciation

In addition to the companywide challenge, our Maritius office celebrated Women’s History Month with a day of appreciation for the 42 female employees in that location.  Our male colleagues (led by Director of Support Danil Gonoshilin, Managing Director Avinash Ramtohul, and Chief Product and Technology Officer Prashant Ketkar) organized and hosted a surprise get-together, where they expressed their gratitude to the women for their contributions to the workplace and gifted them flowers and chocolates.

As Alludo promotes a remote-first culture, a number of the female employees in Maritius were working from home that day. For those women who were remote, the local employees recorded a short video with words of appreciation to send to each of them.   

At Alludo, we believe that the impact women make on our personal and professional lives is continuous, not just one month a year. We’re committed to ensuring that women are seen, heard, and valued. Join us in celebrating the rest of Women’s History Month and recognizing the important role that women play in society.

If you were a fly on the wall in an Executive Leadership Team (ELT) meeting at Alludo, first of all, you’d be swatted or escorted outside. We take security seriously around here. But you’d also witness something interesting:

The ELT at Alludo is made up of 43% women. And, of course, we have a female CEO. This should be typical—especially given that women represent more than half of the population and more than half of the current workforce[i]—but it’s not.

Globally, women hold 31% of senior management positions. That statistic masks another gap, because according to Catalyst, women are significantly more likely to be at the helm of HR than they are to be in other top roles such as CEO or Chief Legal Officer.[ii] Only 23% of managing director and CEO roles worldwide are held by women, and that number is less than 10% among the Fortune 500.

Perhaps it’s worth noting, then, that Alludo’s CEO and Chief Legal Officer are both women, and the head of HR—we call it Chief People Officer—is a man.

Women in leadership

CEO Christa Quarles is frequently asked about women in leadership, especially since she’s at the helm of a company in the male-dominated technology space. For Christa, representation is not a “nice to have,” but rather an essential. “You need to see it to be it,” she says. “When women are represented, more women participate. Of course, that’s an inherent Catch-22: in order to have more women represented in the first place, you have to have more women participate.”

That means someone has to show up first. At Alludo, that someone was Christa herself. After she joined, people followed. Many of them were women. They joined because she’s someone they wanted to work for, with a vision and purpose and leadership style worth following. After all, choosing a role based on the person you’re working for and their sense of purpose is often more important than choosing a role based on the company itself.

Working for a female CEO

When I was researching Alludo prior to joining the company as the Chief Marketing Officer, it was clear to me that Christa walks the talk when it comes to pursuing diversity in the C-suite. In addition to a little less than half of the Alludo executives being women, I knew that Christa had built a diverse team in her previous CEO role. In my mind, Christa demonstrates very tangible support for woman in executive positions.

Becca Chambers, Alludo’s SVP of Global Brand and Communications says,  “I understand the power of representation. I came from the cybersecurity industry, where there are only a handful of female CEOs in the entire industry.  I had never been able to envision myself comfortably seated at the table, so to speak. Christa is the kind of person who pulls the chair out to offer you the seat at the table, and I knew it from the first time I met her.”

Importance of gender diversity

Christa has spoken at length about the power of diversity in the ELT. She’s serious about elevating women, and it’s not just because it’s the right thing to do. It’s also smart business. As she says, “Diversity and inclusion aren’t just nice to have—they’re fundamental.” The stats back her up: A McKinsey report found that companies in the top quartile for gender diversity are 15% more likely to have financial returns above their respective national industry medians.

And the importance of gender diversity and representation in our organization goes well beyond just the ELT.  At the end of 2022, we launched our first Employee Resource Group (ERG): the Alludo Women’s Empowerment (AWE) group. As the executive sponsor of the group, we meet monthly to raise awareness of women’s rights and support female representation in all areas of our organization.  More than 26% of our global female employees are members of this active group.

A diverse leadership team is a business asset

This ability to show up fully, with innovative ideas that challenge the status quo and draw on your whole bank of experiences and skills, is a clear business asset. After all, a leadership team characterized by homogeneous identity and ways of thinking won’t get very far. In business, particularly in tech, inertia is fatal.

With that in mind, it’s important to note that Christa’s power of a CEO isn’t only in her identity as a woman, nor does she have the same perspective and skill set as other women CEOs. And that’s kind of the point. As she’d tell you, there’s no one way to be a woman CEO, and there’s no one way that leadership should look overall. Diversity and inclusion are exponential. Again, the more you see it, the more there’s an opportunity to add to it.

Let’s keep adding.

---

[i] US Dept. of Labor
[ii] Catalyst

At Alludo, we know that diversity drives outcomes. 

We know that having more perspectives to draw from fuels innovation. 

You don’t have to take our word for it.  

Companies with more than 30% women executives are 48% more likely to outperform companies with the least gender diversity, according to McKinsey research. 

And yet, women are still underrepresented in a wide range of industries—especially women in tech and other STEM-related fields.  

When women don’t have a seat at the table, the company’s leaving a lot on the table. 

Women’s History Month seems like a good time to point out that we’re pretty darn proud of our table at Alludo: 

• Our CEOis a woman.  
• Our SVP of Engineering is a woman. 
• 43% of our Executive Leadership Team identify as women. 
• 34% of our people managers are women. 

• 33% of our employees are women. 
• 9 women have titles of VP or higher. 
• 21% of technical positions are held by women. 

To put those stats in perspective, fact-checked 2022 research from Zippia found that women hold fewer than 20%of leadership roles in the tech industry overall. Overall STEM stats are skewed by the exceptionally high level of women in health-related fields (more than 70%). The story is very different in technology. The tech industry has a long way to go, and while we’re proud of what we’ve accomplished, we know there is still room to grow—and room for us to serve as a leader in elevation of women in tech. 

Is the industry improving? 

In a word (okay, two words): not really. Women dominated computer and technology-related fields during World War II as their male counterparts were sent to the front lines. In 1960, they held onto more than 25% of programming jobs (just one of many tech roles), according to the New York Times. To be fair, it wasn’t considered “high-status work,” and women were rarely promoted into leadership. Still, women weren’t rare in tech and weren’t discouraged from pursuing it. 

Zippia reports that 40 years ago, women held 35% of tech roles. That number had dropped by 2018. Not the direction we want to be going in. Part of the problem is that, even if women enter the tech industry, many of them don’t feel comfortable sticking around. Half of all womenin tech drop out by age 35, compared with only 20% in other fields. Women leave tech jobs at a rate 45% higher than men. At 37%, “company culture” is the largest contributor.  

Looking up 

It’s easy to be doom-and-gloom about the representation, experience, and tenure of women in tech. But this Women’s History Month we have a lot of reason to be optimistic. There is a ton of momentum around getting girls interested in STEM, like the National Girls Collaborative Project, Carnegie STEM Girls, the Girls STEM Academy at the Space Center in Houston, Million Women Mentors, and many more. 

There are also companies like ours, where women are heavily represented all the way to top. We already shared some highlights, but we’re celebrating this Women’s History Month, and we can’t help sharing more. We’re a global organization, so here’s a look at our stats by country: 

US:  

• Women People Managers: 44%  
• Women employees: 42%  

Canada:  

• Women People Managers: 46%  
• Women employees: 42%  

Germany:  

• Women People Managers: 44%  
• Women employees: 49%  

We’re not only optimistic, but we feel an obligation—make that an honor—to lead the way, and do so vocally. We’re genuinely excited about where we’re going and the people and organizations we can inspire along the way. It takes all of us. 

Throughout this Women’s History Month, we’ll be sharing more content to celebrate the women of Alludo and all the women who inspire us. We’re glad you’re part of it.