Gender Analytics: Gender Equity through Inclusive Design Specialization

Gender Analytics is a way to analyze your products, services, processes and policies with a gender lens to uncover hidden opportunities for innovation and effectiveness.

We'll answer questions such as: Why are women 47% more likely than men to be injured when they get in a car accident? Why do financial products fail to meet women’s needs across their life cycles? Why will automation and AI be more likely to impact women than men? Why are gender-neutral policies are not necessarily gender-equal? This is the introductory course in the 5-course Gender Analytics Specialization offered by the Institute for Gender and the Economy (GATE) at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management. In this course, you will build the foundations for conducting Gender Analytics. You will get comfortable with the concepts and terms associated with Gender Analytics, including sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation and intersectionality. You will examine how policies, products, services and processes may have unintentionally gendered outcomes that miss out on opportunities or create needless risks. You will learn to uncover assumptions underlying these policies, products, services and processes, and to break social, cultural, and or organizational norms that perpetuate exclusion and inequality. You will see how Gender Analytics can lead to transformational innovations. You will also evaluate your own competencies and start your Self Development Plan and begin your journey to build a workplan for your own Gender Analytics project.

Many policies, products, services or processes that we think of as gender-neutral actually have gendered outcomes. Everything from snow plowing to car safety to investment advising to infrastructure investment has impacts that differ by gender. These outcomes can be even more biased if we look at important intersections with race, indigeneity, differences in ability, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and other identities. The question is, what can you do to change this? And, how can you avoid the risks of bias or create innovative new offerings using gender-based insights?

Inclusive Analytics Techniques will provide you with the tools and analytical techniques to uncover these intersectional insights. The course covers both quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis, including basic statistical techniques and practical instructions for working with customers, beneficiaries and other stakeholders. You will learn to incorporate multiple sources of rich evidence in order to develop innovative insights into how policies, products, services and processes can be made more equitable or serve unique communities. This is the second course of the Gender Analytics Specialization offered by the Institute for Gender and the Economy (GATE) at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management. It's great on its own, and you will get even more out of it if you take it as part of the Specialization.

This course introduces the principles and practices of human-centered design (also sometimes called “design thinking”) which are essential for developing innovative and inclusive products, services, processes and policies. You will learn by doing, experiencing the design process through exercises and a mini-bootcamp.

In this course, you will learn about and experience key human-centered design practices: empathize, reframe, ideate, prototype and test. You will learn why human-centered design is a central component of Gender Analytics. You will develop skills in problem finding (and not just problem solving) by understanding users', stakeholders’ and beneficiaries' lived experiences. You will learn to co-create with diverse stakeholders, develop prototypes, and iterate to develop more innovative solutions. This is the third course of the Gender Analytics Specialization offered by the Institute for Gender and the Economy (GATE) at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management. It's great on its own, and you will get even more out of it if you take it as part of the Specialization.

Gender Analytics underpins inclusive innovation, and inclusive innovation will require organizational transformation. The missing link between insights and actions is change leadership. How can you get people to collaborate? How can you overcome resistance to change? How can you embed intersectional, gender-based insights in everything an organization does?

In this course, you will learn to be an inspiring and effective change agent by developing a toolbox of leadership skills for building and managing diverse teams. You will hear from experts who have led Gender Analytics in various settings from companies, to non-profits, to the government. In short, this course will help you develop skills to be a transformational leader as you work towards creating inclusive products, services, processes and policies. This is the fourth course of the Gender Analytics Specialization offered by the Institute for Gender and the Economy (GATE) at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management. It is great on its own, and you will get even more out of it if you take it as part of the Specialization.