--- title: How to Support Women's Careers As DEI Programs Decline description: Breaking news and analysis from time.com. Politics, world news, photos, video, tech reviews, health, science, and entertainment news. canonical: https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7334224/how-to-support-womens-careers-as-dei-programs-decline/ author: Michelle Peng article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2025-11-16T11:30:18.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-28T07:07:33.124Z article:section: Charter og:title: How to Support Women's Careers As DEI Programs Decline og:description: Breaking news and analysis from time.com. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription.  by [Michelle Peng](https://time.com/author/michelle-peng/) Nov 16, 2025 11:30 AM UTC  Art: Charter  by [Michelle Peng](https://time.com/author/michelle-peng/) Nov 16, 2025 11:30 AM UTC Last week, a [conversation](https://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000010490292/did-women-ruin-the-workplace.html) published in The New York Times between one of its columnists and two conservative writers originally titled “Did Women Ruin the Workplace?” sparked predictable backlash online, landing amid a broader corporate retreat from diversity initiatives and increased scrutiny of workplace equity programs. For [Wendy Murphy](https://www.babson.edu/about/our-leaders-and-scholars/faculty-and-academic-divisions/faculty-profiles/wendy-murphy.php), a professor of management at Babson College, the original headline asked the wrong question entirely. (The headline of the piece has since been changed.) Murphy, whose research focuses on leadership, mentorship, and gender, says that 74% of mothers with children under 18 work outside the home, with many households reliant on women’s income. “The question should really be about why the workplace was inhospitable to women in the first place,” she says, “and how the structure and policies of working impact families of all kinds.” Since the original article was published, its critics have pointed to the widening gender gaps in [wages](https://www.cnbc.com/2025/09/11/for-the-first-time-in-over-60-years-the-gender-pay-gap-widened-2-years-in-a-row.html), [workforce participation](https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/17/economy/us-women-workforce-shecession-return), and [leadership representation](https://www.challengergray.com/blog/september-ceo-turnover-report-exits-slow-new-women-ceos-continue-decline/#:~:text=The%20rate%20of%20new%20CEOs,of%20new%20CEOs%20were%20women.), which persist as companies have responded to attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies by deemphasizing internal supports for women. Some have [opened up programs to applicants](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-09-17/leanin-mckinsey-see-dei-backlash-hurting-programs-for-women) of all genders, while others have [ended them altogether](https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/23/tech/google-diversity-programs-women-techmakers). To make sense of these trends and identify the best ways for individuals, managers, and organizations to continue supporting women’s career advancement, we spoke with Murphy. Here are excerpts from our conversation, edited for length and clarity: **What does your research tell us about the most effective programs for closing the gender gap in career advancement?** Mentoring programs have historically been one of the most effective because for women, there's two types of challenges: structural and perceptual. The structural challenges are objective. When we look at relationships and we do network analyses, you see that women have a lack of access to key influencers in the broader network compared to their male colleagues, on balance. \[You see\] that women have fewer people in the role of sponsors, or people in senior positions willing to raise their names for promotion and to push that this person is ready for the next challenge. Women have fewer role models and fewer people they identify with, not just because of lack of gender, but because of differences in style and background. When we get to the perceptual challenges, women are evaluated against male leadership \[norms\], which do look different. Men can—and do—do things differently than women in the workplace based on our gendered expectations. For example, one of the most common things we know about is the double-bind dilemma for women, where they're constantly balancing this paradox of being liked versus being seen as competent. Competency is associated with masculine behaviors historically, and to be liked, women have to conform to gender expectations of being warm, kind, friendly, and supportive in the workplace. If you're assertive and challenging, it's perceived as aggressive and negative instead of ambitious. **What do you recommend organizations do to help women navigate those organizations amid heightened legal and reputational risk from anti-DEI sentiment?** One of the most straightforward things to do during onboarding and orientation is to provide some training around mentoring networks. We all need a personal board of advisors. An organization can provide newcomers an opportunity to meet people from different parts of the organization and start to build their own career mentoring network and emphasize that that development is important. Provide \[current employees\] with some sort of reward for developing others, particularly people who are moving into managerial roles or are leaders in the company already. **If their organizations or managers aren’t investing in these kinds of initiatives, what can individual women do to advance their careers?** Here's the thing: Development has shifted from the organization to the individual person. Nobody else is going to develop your career. You are in charge. You are the only one living your career. Part of that responsibility is making sure you get the support you need, especially at inflection points, at decision points, at transitions when you're looking for new opportunities. Building relationships can't just start when you need a new job or a promotion. It has to be a gradual process and something that you're trying to do along the way because you learn in those conversations. That learning helps you in your day-to-day work, not just when you need a change. So make that a priority as part of your workweek. Every couple of weeks, schedule a coffee with someone you find really interesting who is doing something different from you. One of the most effective relationships for a lot of people is what I'd call a step-ahead mentor, someone who's just a level above you in their career. You can learn how they're navigating, what sort of problems they're facing, and ask them good questions about the projects they're working on and how they got to where they are. **What are your thoughts on some of these newer tools that offer AI coaching?** It's fascinating, isn't it, that a robot could be as good of a coach as a person? There is some evidence that some of the coaching is really effective, but we do have to be careful that the human connection still matters in the actual workplace. Certainly, if you're just doing personal skill development, I think that \[AI\] coaching is really helpful, but that AI coach is not going to help you navigate the politics of your organization because it's going to be impossible to have that data. So there's limitations. Definitely use it, but use it wisely. **Read our** [**guide**](https://www.charterworks.com/how-to-set-up-a-peer-mentoring-program/) **to setting up a peer-mentorship program.** **Download our** [**playbook**](https://www.charterworks.com/intergenerational-fluency-playbook-toolkit-medley/) **on leading multigenerational workforces, which includes advice on different approaches to mentorship, including reverse mentorship, mentorship circles, and traditional mentorship.** --- ## Read more from Charter [READ MORE](https://time.com/partner-content/charter/) [Open article: What Gloria Steinem Says Still Needs to Change for Women at Work](https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7383056/what-gloria-steinem-says-still-needs-to-change-for-women-at-work/)  ### What Gloria Steinem Says Still Needs to Change for Women at Work [READ MORE](https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7383056/what-gloria-steinem-says-still-needs-to-change-for-women-at-work/) [Open article: How Leaders Should Rethink Their Approach to DEI](https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7380209/how-leaders-should-rethink-their-approach-to-dei/)  ### How Leaders Should Rethink Their Approach to DEI [READ MORE](https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7380209/how-leaders-should-rethink-their-approach-to-dei/) [Open article: How DEI Must Change in 2026 to Survive](https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7347036/how-dei-must-change-in-2026-to-survive/)  ### How DEI Must Change in 2026 to Survive [READ MORE](https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7347036/how-dei-must-change-in-2026-to-survive/) --- ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7334224/how-to-support-womens-careers-as-dei-programs-decline/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7334224/how-to-support-womens-careers-as-dei-programs-decline/"},"headline":"How to Support Women's Careers As DEI Programs Decline","datePublished":"2025-11-16T11:30:18.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-28T07:07:33.124Z","description":"Research-backed strategies for supporting women’s career advancement from Babson College's Wendy Murphy.","url":"https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7334224/how-to-support-womens-careers-as-dei-programs-decline/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2d16a9e17062f342/6998cba9a97fc0d457a74e09/charter-wendy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Michelle Peng","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/michelle-peng/"}],"articleSection":"Charter","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2d16a9e17062f342/6998cba9a97fc0d457a74e09/charter-wendy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"charter-wendy","caption":"","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/partner-content/charter/7334224/how-to-support-womens-careers-as-dei-programs-decline/","name":"How to Support Women's Careers As DEI Programs Decline"}}]}] ```