Concrete ceilings for intersectional female leaders

My speech for the #WomenEd Global Unconference 2023

Leadership, particularly Educational Leadership is challenging, complex yet rewarding. 

Let's be honest though: it's harder when you look like me.

Let me tell you a bit about me. I'm a visibly Muslim woman; I'm British Bangladeshi, I love my family and food, I enjoy reading and talking about education, I LOVE travelling and I'm a beach babe, I'm born and bred in Tower Hamlets, deemed one of the poorest boroughs in the country, I am dyslexic and dyspraxic, I'm silly and goofy and more recently, I wear a hearing aid.

Out of all of those things, which one of those aspects of me do you think people notice the most? My hijab? My skin colour? The fact that I'm a woman? My height? 

My intersectional identity means that I cannot separate my protected characteristics or explore them in isolation when explaining my identity, and I don't think organisations should separate them either.

As an intersectional female leader, I've come to notice my own inner critic and it's role in hindering my own success. Part of this is because there are only 0.7% of Bangladeshi heritage Assistant Head Teachers in the country.

When I first got the job at my current school as Assistant Headteacher, I was the first hijab wearing Muslim female Assistant Headteacher. It was a proud moment, not just for me, but for those around me it seemed. I didn't realise how much it meant to others until I received messages from colleagues and beyond, not only congratulating me but saying they were proud that I'd done it, I'd smashed/ drilled through that concrete ceiling.

When I arrived, it was great to be in the room where it happens but in spaces where I was either the only one or one of a minority of those with intersectional identities around the SLT table, I struggled to be the brave and bold AHT I had been in my previous school. Around this new SLT table, I was muted again, quiet and cautious. I would look around me and feel fear to speak in case I said the wrong thing. I placed a pressure and burden on myself to be the best version of myself because while I was the first hijab wearing Asian female leader (phew), I didn't want to be the reason why I was the last.

I did feel disillusioned and lonely in the room. I was however very lucky to have my wonderful friend and ally Becky Griffiths who noticed this and would sit next to me in the meetings and sometimes even hold my hand.

It was only through coaching with the incredible Angela Browne who made me realise that I had lots of allies in that room and had advocates who supported me and my success. She also told me that by trying to be the flawless AHT, I was unknowingly also filtering down that same pressure to others who looked like me, who may feel that the only way to be a senior leader, was to be perfect or superwoman.

After that, I decided to focus on being an authentic leader, leaning into my values and living by values. I stopped shrinking and I decided to connect and lean on my allies and advocates to support me when I felt scared or anxious around the SLT table.

As a leader, I needed to do some of the inner groundwork.

So how can one smash through the concrete ceilings as an intersectional female leader? It's not easy and it takes time, advocates, and lots of courage.

Here are some things that I did that helped me:

1. Knowledge is power: build your domain specific knowledge and expertise so even when you're unsure about something in practice, you have some thoughts/understanding based on your reading and research.
2. Map out where you want to be and work backwards to identify the steps to get you there.
3. Find your advocates and sponsors: who are the people around you who value you and open doors for you, who say your name in a room full of opportunities?
4. Insist on effective line management so that you are supported and mentored to succeed in your role.
5. Leverage your networks: organisations like #WomenEd and DiverseEd help you connect with others in similar positions and circumstances like you so ask them for support.

And for the leaders in the room who have the power and responsibility, we need to disrupt and dismantle the systems which tell us that intersectional identities don't matter. They do. The longer it takes for leaders at the top of organisations to address this, the weaker our organisations will become.

If we want to support women, then we must support all women by understanding, dissecting and analysing how intersectional identities face bias and discrimination and work together to disrupt and dismantle these biases.

Let's work together to smash, drill, or whatever else we need to do to get rid of those concrete ceilings for intersectional female leaders.