It’s International Woman’s Day and a chance to celebrate the role that women play in all our lives.
It’s also becoming a chance for organisations to celebrate and also, frankly, try and change our ideas.
When it works best its planting a flag in the ground to say that women can do any job they want.
In 2019, the sad thing is that we still have a way to go to make everyone see this.
Me? I’m a feminist and I became a feminist when my daughter was born. Why the heck shouldn’t she have the same chance as someone else’s son?
Here are some pieces of content that caught my eye.
At their best, they show the organisation up in a better light.
South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue’s school visit video – YouTube
A video with a twist. Three women go into school. They ask the children to draw the job they’d like to do when they grow up. They ask them to guess what they are and then the big reveal.
At two minutes 20 seconds this is good YouTube length, there is a big reveal when jaws hit the flaw and they show IT staff as well as firefighter. The length is slightly long for Facebook.
Manchester Survivors Choir – Twitter
A post that simply photographs members who are all girls. By focusing on the members they show a pride in them. That there is a choir at all based on survivors of the Manchester attack just fills my heart.
If you include real people those real people and their friends and families will share the content.
We are blessed with many amazing women in our choir. Together we share our message of love and hope ❤️🐝#InternationalWomansDay2019 pic.twitter.com/HLS6ZRbgMo
— Manchester Survivors Choir (@SurvivorsChoir) March 8, 2019
Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue – Twitter
A quirky picture that shows a fire appliance not with a red nose but with a mock-up bra. Wry and witty it shows a sense of humour to put across the fact that women can be firefighters, too.
I also love the fact that it is shared by a senior firefighter on their own profile.
What a brilliant way to celebrate #InternationalWomansDay2019! @totnestimes @BBCSpotlight @KathrynBilling @sallenonfire @sarahwollaston #Totnes fire engine wears a bra! pic.twitter.com/B9nil43yYS
— AM Gerald Taylor (@GCGeraldTaylor) March 8, 2019
University of Padova – Instagram
An image of artwork that celebrates the first ever female University graduate in the world. If anyone female has been through University you are standing on her shoulders. What determination she must have needed.
An image works best on Instagram and this combination of artwork and text works. I’d love to see how they could include female graduates past and present in next year’s content.
Journalist Vicki Turk – Twitter
There’s a serious danger that events such as International Woman’s Day can fall into box ticking. This tweet from the Wired editor Vicki Turk calls out such tokenism. This is a brilliant reminder that it is not what you say but what you do that makes good PR. If you wheel out your token women on this day you’re hugely missing the point.
To the tech companies trying to get me to cover you for International Women’s Day because you have this one exceptional woman on your team: I’m sure she’s amazing. Now come back to me when she’s *not* the exception.
— Vicki Turk (@VickiTurk) March 7, 2019
On a wider perspective, good content shouldn’t be a one-off. I dearly wish people generally would be more creative the whole year round.
Women are for life and not just International Woman’s Day.
So is creativity.
Full disclosure: I’ve trained South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue and Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue.
Picture credit: US National Archive / Flickr