Smash through the glass ceiling. Ask for what you want. Take your seat at the table. Don’t settle for less than you deserve. If you’re a woman in the workplace, you’ll recognise the well-meaning but all-too-familiar platitudes that start to circulate as 8 March – International Women’s Day – approaches.

Of course, there is some truth behind them. Learning how to advocate for yourself, at work and outside of it, is an important skill. But according to a new campaign from female empowerment brand F*ck Being Humble, it’s not women who need empowering to ask for more – it’s men. 

Every year, women are bombarded with campaigns and messaging telling them to push for more, advocate for themselves and speak up. However it’s not encouragement that women are lacking. As cited by Harvard Business Review: “Women do ask just as often as men, they just don’t get.” As a result, the progress that should have been made hasn’t, and as the UN highlights in its 2022 report, it will take 300 years before we reach full gender equality at the current rate of progress.

So in 2024, F*ck Being Humble is no longer telling women to use their voices; it is encouraging men to ask for more instead.

“I know many men in my life who support the work I do to empower women, but don’t actively contribute to supporting gender equality in their own workplace. This is not because they don’t care; it’s usually because they are not aware of how they can individually make a change if they are not in leadership positions,” explains founder Stefanie Sword-Williams.

 “This campaign aims to provide men at any level with the resources they need to ask for more in order to support women’s rights.”

The Men, Ask For More campaign includes a downloadable guide that provides email templates that men can send to their line managers, senior leaders and HR specialists to start the conversation around improving gender equality policies, as well as 25 question prompts to use in everyday workplace conversations that can help to drive positive change. The project also features expertise from The Stack World founder Sharmadean Reid,  wellbeing expert Poonam Dhuffer, self-discovery coach Calyspo Barnum Bobb, founder of diversity and inclusion consultancy We Are Colourful Dee Jas, founder of Still Chill Rose Eskafi, founder of In The Making Heather Elkington, senior communications expert at Deliveroo, Alyssa Jaffer and Seb Randle of The Helpful Space, 

Because gender equality is everyone’s responsibility – and working together is the only way that we can make strides towards it.

Images: F*ck Being Humble; Getty