Greece: Gender Equality in Business! Transfer of Practices in a Cooperation between Greece, Norway and Iceland
The cooperation is a bilateral initiative funded by Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein through the EEA Grants Business Innovation Greece Programme.
This bilateral initiative is implemented by Women On Top, and aims at identifying and sharing best practices from Norway and Iceland, and supporting Greek businesses in leveraging this knowledge to produce its own set of policies, strategies and tools.
In late February, the partners held an "Open Day Conference" where good practices on equality and inclusion in Greek businesses were discussed.
The bilateral initiative is finalising their work now. We look forward to seeing the impact of the cooperation and to follow what the partners will do next!
Women on Top!
Women On Top is a Greek NGO working to enhance the professional empowerment of women and to ensure equality at work. The NGO empowers individual women with mentoring, training and community-building initiatives. They also help women to gradually transform their educational, professional and social environment.
Stella Kasdagli, co-founder of Women on Top, states that:
"It has been an amazing learning experience for us to gather all the important insights our research yielded on the gender equality and inclusion practices of Norway and Iceland. It has been an even more rewarding one to come together with great speakers and changemakers from Greece and the Nordic countries to look closer at how we can put those principles in practice in our own ecosystem. We feel grateful for the support of the EEA and Norway Grants by Innovation Norway that has allowed us to better support Greek corporate actors who want to become more equal and inclusive as employers and as providers of goods and services."
Open Day Conference in February 2022
On 23 February 2022, Women on Top organised a hybrid conference in Athens. It gathered business leaders of large organisations established in Greece, Norway and Iceland, Greek politicians, the Chairwoman of the Hellenic Capital Market Commission, Professors and other notables.
The conference focused on exploring how to implement good practices adopted by companies and organisations in Norway and Iceland in Greek businesses with the aim to support equality and inclusion in Greek businesses. The topics discussed ranged from women's representation in positions of responsibility and the role of quotas, parental leave, and girls' participation in stem careers.
See the recording of various parts of the conference on the Women on Top YouTube channel.
Transfer of Best Practices in Norway, Iceland and Greece
Anita Krohn Traaseth is a renowned business woman and a writer on the topic of leadership in Norway. She has held several top positions in Norwegian businesses, and she is the previous CEO of Innovation Norway. Ms Krohn Traaseth participated at the Open day Conference and shared her experience:
“Choosing the leadership path is a personal choice. A good leader should not only be concerned with the bottom line, diversity is also key to being a good leader. Women have to apply for the jobs even though they are uncertain that they can meet the objectives (the requirements of the job). (…) Training to be a good leader is also important.”
Workshop on the Exchange of Good Practices
In December 2021, a workshop took place at the Norwegian Institute of Athens where 13 leaders and business managers from Greek and multinational companies gathered and shared their experiences and initiatives which have already been successfully implemented within their companies. Among the speakers were Magnus Hardarson, the President of Nasdaq, participated with his perspective on how equality and inclusion can be incorporated in the corporate world.
The workshop discussed the practices in Norway and Iceland, which have brought these countries at the top of the Gender Equality Indicators in Europe, as well as how the practices and concrete tools can be adapted to Greek businesses.
Report with best practices
Women on Top wrote a report in which they gathered the good practices adopted by businesses in Norway and Iceland, and also presented tools that could be implemented by Greek businesses in order to support gender equality and inclusion in the workplace. Read the report here.
Bilateral activities in the EEA and Norway Grants by Innovation Norway
The activity implemented by Women on Top is an example of a bilateral initiative financed by the EEA and Norway Grants. The bilateral activities are not projects but activities focused on bilateral cooperation and the exchange of experience, expertise and ideas across borders.
There are travel funds available in order to facilitate the establishment of bilateral business partnerships between the Donor States and Greece.
Read more about all of our Calls for proposals here.
The Business Innovation Programme in Greece
The project is supported by Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein through the EEA Grants. See more opportunities under the Business Innovation Programme in Greece.