Lipstick & Politics closed out Women’s History Month with two events! On March 27th, we hosted a happy hour at the Battery as part of the venue’s Celebrate: Women’s March series. Attended by people of all genders, our intimate happy hour was filled with conversations that touched on our admiration for past and present female leaders as well as the progress that still needs to be made to achieve gender equality in our world. It was a delight to converse with everyone who showed up! If you would like to attend L&P events and participate in our ticket giveaways, make sure to sign up for our newsletter.

Following the happy hour, Zero Gap held a panel event called, “Balancing The Conversation” with Mira Veda, CEO and Publisher of Lipstick & Politics, moderating. Inspired by the International Women’s Day theme “#BalanceforBetter,” the conversation focused on gender inequity in our society and how we can work on closing the gap. Joining the conversation was Jonathan Yaffe (CEO of AnyRoad and board member of Zero Gap), Debbie Bernier (Luxury Property Specialist), and Chris Ruhl (Principal at PwC and Co-Chair of the Bay Area Council’s Gender Equity Committee).

According to the World Economic Forum’s most recent Global Gender Gap report, the world has closed 68% of its gender gap based on four different categories: economic opportunity; political empowerment; educational attainment; and health and survival. But at the rate our world is proceeding, it’ll take 108 years to achieve parity.

The panel discussed this further, delving into what aspects of our society need to be improved to allow for more gender equality. For many of us in the conversation, insufficient family care was a major concern and our speakers talked about what was lacking in providing assistance to people juggling both families and careers

The speakers emphasized in their final takeaways that it is important to interact with others and to live our lives with intention. We should live an authentic life that respects and accepts others. If we can cultivate a behavior that is positive and thoughtful amongst ourselves, then perhaps we can make gender equality a reality. We thank all of our speakers for sharing their insight and our audience for participating in a thought-provoking conversation!