Combatting Workplace Gender Discrimination with Virtual Reality

Any of you lucky enough to have been at Oslo Innovation Week, last September, will hopefully have had the chance to meet the wonderful scientist, Yasmine Boudiaf. She presented her work on how she is using virtual reality for positive behavior change to mitigate workplace gender discrimination. 

Working in collaboration with Mercer, following an introduction by PWN Global's Co-President, Rob Baker, Yasmine project gained traction and her presentation documented her story.

In the audience that day was a long standing PWN Oslo member, I found out that she based Jennifer Varino. Fascinated by Yasmine's work, Jennifer was lucky to be able to speak with Yasmine after her presentation.  She commented to Yasmine that the VR films, whilst impactful, represented a rather geographically limited input -- primarily people she met in the London area -- likely many from Mercer!

Jennifer and Yasmine excitedly discussed how films could be created that resonated with a wider audience (there has been feedback that Scandinavians need subtler situations portrayed). Jennifer immediately made the connection that the PWN Community would be a natural resource for a campaign to gather more stories from a more global geographical spread. 

Following this conversation, Yasmine  created a Google form for people to submit experiences. It allows participants to be anonymous and has an introduction to explain to people the purpose of the exercise so that they can contribute in safety and confidence. 

We encourage you to share this link so that we can continue gatherng stories that help Yasmine and her team to continue this pioneering work.

Date: Jan 2018