Disruptive inclusion: Growing women's movement for equity in digital signage, marketing

The statistics are still startling, especially to those outside the digital signage and marketing world. A dedicated DEI panel in Dallas at the Exertis Almo E4 event revealed that 85% of the digital signage/AV industry is male, a pattern that has persisted for some time in the industry, even as recruitment drives at firms like easescreen take aim at what Digital Signage Today has dubbed "disruptive inclusion."

With International Women's Day and Mother's Day drawing attention to women's issues and matters of diversity, equity and inclusion, just how far has the industry come, and just how far remains to go?

From Louisville to Dallas, women speak up

Michelle Montazeri, manager of digital signage at Legrand and board member at Digital Signage Foundation. Image provided.

Digital Signage Today was joined by Michelle Montazeri for an exclusive interview while covering the Digital Signage Federation's annual Meet'n'Greet event at the Kentucky Derby History Museum in Louisville, Kentucky, last month. Montazeri is head of digital signage for Legrand North America as well as a newly elected board member at DSF, a non-profit organization that aims to elevate the industry for all players and to pursue education and progress throughout it. As Montazeri explained it, the goal of DSF is to bridge the gap between AV, digital signage and IT; Montazeri is also a thought-leader who has advocated heavily to elevate women's inclusion in a historically male-dominated industry.

"For me, I've been in this industry for, let's call it 25 years. I was a young woman — was," Montazeri laughed. "Lots of gray now! But there were very few women, there were very few people that looked like me when I walked into the room. And so I think my personal motivation is making sure that when a young woman walks into the room, she feels like there's an opportunity for her to be successful. I don't think that's always been there. And I think we're getting better."

Montazeri hopes to create a world where women can walk into a digital signage event and feel welcome and part of the space, without "shying away in the corner because it's an uncomfortable environment, or looking around the room and going, 'How do I fit here? Nobody looks like me.'" Montazeri hopes that seeing women who have achieve success in that room can help women who are newcomers feel it is a safe space with opportunities. "And maybe reach out to me and say, 'Hey, you know, I'd love a little help in how to be successful in this space."

What are things men can do in this space, from journalists covering it to men working professionally?

"Ally-ship," Montazeri replied. "It's all about ally-ship. So, we think about equity of pay, equity of seats at the table, equity of skill sets. You know, there's a bit of a taboo about the differences in skill sets between men or women.

"But it does exist, so we can help each other. Women are very organized; we can help to be more organized — and this is broad brush-strokes, right? I'm being very general here. But men tend to have more financial skills for example, and if a woman is struggling in that field, reaching out and saying, 'Hey, I'd love to work with you on this,' in a very non-authoritative way, there's a way to be an ally that lifts a woman to success rather than being pushed aside."

With the advent of International Women's Day, consciousness is rising about women in leadership positions, such as the rapid rise of Zuzana Yalcin as an industry thought leader based in Austria; how is the American industry doing with inclusion, and how far does it have to go? What steps should be taken?

"It's a good question, because feel like I'm sometimes a little blind to what is happening in the industry, because Legrand is actually very focused on it, and we talk about it often," Montazeri said. "And I think that's No. 1, right? We've got to talk about it. We don't know what we don't know, we have to have measurables. If we don't have KPIs in place, we don't know what we're working towards.

"And I think the way to do it is, going back to your original question, which was, 'how do we humanize this?' What we present in a room should look exactly like our customer. And if we don't look like our customers, we're not speaking the voice of our customer. And I'm looking around the room [at the event] going, 'We're missing a couple of areas, right?' And so I think about that all the time. And I think about that with age, gender or race, you know, experience, backgrounds and skill sets — everything. I think it's all important. So that's how we can be better."

An industry seeks equilibrium

Curious to hear more about efforts at women's inclusion in the industry, we sought comments at the same event from the Digital Signage Federation's executive director, Brian Gorg.

"On the front of diversity, particularly of gender diversity in our industry, I think we're making strides," Gorg said. "We have — just as an example, not to be pointing to ourselves — but our board of directors is a membership-wide elected board; we have a nominating committee. The people of our industry elected women to our board in numbers that far outpaced what we had traditionally seen in terms of representation of professionals in this industry.

"And these are people in executive positions, leadership positions, thought leadership, they are leading our committees. And what I think that that's reflective of is that our industry is — really, has already — incorporated a lot of these diversity concepts into what we do. And it's not even something we address directly. It's just something that has naturally come from the industry, which is represented by the Digital Signage Federation board. So I'm proud of that, proud to be part of an organization where it's just a natural thing that we have that type of diversity in leadership."

Ask not for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee

It all brought us back to the E4 diversity panel, and a core moment when an audience member asked panelist and industry thought leader Alesia Hendley who bears the responsibility for change. Hendley's response? Each individual working in this space has the ability to contribute to positive change; both empowering and sobering, this agency and responsibility is something a growing number of women and allies have taken to heart in a major industry shift towards inclusion, from the AVIXA Women's Council and the Women in AV/IT to mentorship groups like Australia's "The Aunties."

Panel moderator Melody Craigmyle, VP of marketing and communication at Almo Corp., added that supporting advocacy groups and inclusive recruitment are ways to help, as seen in this video excerpt.

Editor's note: In our ongoing series, we will continue following the growing movement to elevate women's opportunities and inclusion in the industry.