Description

It is not often that you get to talk to an international author and accomplished practitioner in tackling harmful gender norms and promoting positive social change. But in this episode we do as we are talking to Kate Mangino, PhD. Kate is the author of Equal Partners: Improving Gender Equality at Home, which addresses the social norms that underpin household gender inequality - and offers practical advice as to what each of us can do to change them. (Yes, part of our gender problem is structural, which requires policy change. But much of our gender problem is social – which requires US to change.) Kate has also published in Time, Slate, Harvard Business Review and Good Housekeeping. Equal Partners has been featured in The Atlantic, CNN, BBC World News and The Guardian, as well as dozens of podcasts, including We Can Do Hard Things and What Fresh Hell. You can read more about Kate's work at www.katemangino.com. 

We speak about:

• The beginning of Kate’s career where she worked in women’s empowerment and  management training but had a realisatation that this was not  what was holding women back. 
• How care giving is coded as women’s work. This is not tied to our biology. But there are unspoken cultural norms. The media has had a massive role in it. 
• There is a price to pay when you become a mum and that includes a risk of sacrificing your health and your time. 
• There are challenges for dads to find a space to talk to other dads. 
• How we don’t even really know what being an equal partner means and the influence of what we saw our parents do. 
• What to do if you feel like you are a control freak about how things are done at home. 
• Why it is not helpful for one partner to say “just write me a list?”
• Kate’s magic wand to increase understanding that there is so much to be gained from dads being equal partners at home. 

Resources Discussed

• “Equal Partners” by Kate Mangino 
• “Untamed” by Glennon Doyle
• We Can Do Hard Things podcast
• “Unfinished Business” by Anne-Marie Slaughter 

Connect with Emma

This podcast was funded and created by Emma Mclean, the founder of Works for Everyone.

Emma Mclean is a mum of three and founder of Works for Everyone, a professional development business that partners with NZ's leading corporates to help them retain and grow their working parent talent. She does this through innovative leadership programmes, executive coaching and keynote speaking. She founded her business in 2019 following a 20-year career in corporate strategy where she experienced first-hand how hard it was to have a career and a family. 

As an impatient optimist when it comes to system change, she launched her successful podcast “How to Smash the Motherhood Penalty” in 2023 where she talks to humans who are actively working to change the system that creates financial penalties that only mothers pay. And in 2024 she launched the first NZ Part Time Power List – to shine a light on those senior roles in NZ that are career building, not side stepping."

To work with Emma or enquire about speaking – emma@worksforeveryone.co.nz