Hosted by HKU President Peter Mathieson, the programme kicked off last Friday with a student ideation to elicit students' views and ideas for gender equity solutions. According to UN Women's Elizabeth Nyamayaro who was visiting Hong Kong, UN Women will be initiating campus ideathons across the globe to ensure HeForShe is engaging the energy and perspectives of the next generation to create a more gender equal world.
 
Yesterday, an audience of almost 200 attendees enjoyed a town hall discussion moderated by Peter Mathieson during which speakers from academia, corporates and NGOs shared their insights and experiences. This was followed by a panel on Dual Career Challenges moderated by Dr Staci Ford/HKU and a presentation by Dr Jane Horan/Horan & Associates on recent dual career research. Finally, attendees split into 17 micro-mentoring groups for small group discussions.
 
Elizabeth Nyamayaro also spoke about the successful launch of HeForShe's 10X10X10 Impact Champions at Davos earlier this year comprising 30 heads of state, university leaders and corporate CEOs who have pledged to champion change and have inspired 1.3 billion men (so far) around the world to follow their example. Congratulations to Peter Mathieson for being one of the 10 Global University Leader Impact Champions which is a also wonderful affirmation for Hong Kong's importance as a regional centre for best practice and a source for innovative ideas.
 
While a lot of progress has already been achieved, in a day full of memorable observations, I was particularly struck by Dr Jason Coe's comment that we don't just need men to be there at the start of the HeForShe movement, they need to still be there at the finishing line - particularly since in my micro-mentoring group, there was a strong sense that presenteeism driven organisational policies and cultures are lagging behind the inspirational rhetoric from the top. Other group members commented on the seeming lack of government and political party presence at the HKU event and questioned how we can arrive at new laws and policies to drive systemic change.
 
At The Women's Foundation, we have long believed in the importance of HeForShe. This is what led us to launch the Hong Kong chapter of the 30% Club in 2012 and earlier this year, the TWF Male Allies cohort. While we are encouraged by the progress we have made to enlist male leaders as champions, at the other end of the spectrum, we know from our work in schools that while girls respond very positively to our empowerment programmes and demonstrate long-lasting change in their confidence and aspirations, boys are less malleable and hold more entrenched gender stereotypical views due to a combination of factors including cultural attitudes, family expectations, peer pressure and the media's promotion of narrow and conformist definitions of masculinity. It seems more work needs to be done to help men and boys in Hong Kong feel comfortable having conversations about gender issues and to show them how they can support gender equality.
 
Kudos to HKU for engaging the broader community in finding solutions for Hong Kong.