UN Women Generation Equality Forum
United a global multi-stakeholder group to co-create a transformative vision for gender equality and work together to achieve it
UN Women Generation Equality Forum
United a global multi-stakeholder group to co-create a transformative vision for gender equality and work together to achieve it
Challenge
World leaders pledged at the Fourth World Conference on Women to eliminate gender inequality. Twenty-five years later, these words hadn’t translated into action. UN Women conceived the Generation Equality Forum (GEF) as a landmark global effort to fuel gender equality progress. However, as this global movement built momentum, a pandemic forced a pivot to virtual collaboration.Solution
Pre-pandemic, we designed and facilitated in-person design sprints in Mexico City and Paris, where a diverse group of leaders aligned on six thematic areas requiring urgent action. These became the Action Coalitions: multi-stakeholder groups of leaders selected from various sectors formed to accelerate change. Post-pandemic, we facilitated collaborative virtual workshops where AC leaders worked through fundamental disagreements to co-develop blueprints for action. We supported virtual sessions at the Mexico City and Paris Global Virtual Forums, where this work was showcased.
In addition to visually designing the final Global Acceleration Plan, we supported UN Women’s efforts to inspire and secure funding, policy and advocacy commitments to these blueprints via a global website and pitch decks.
Impact
We believe that human conversations are the most powerful path through complexity. theDifference was viewed as a trusted, neutral partner by all key players. This allowed us to facilitate candid discussions that drove toward alignment/decisions and led to meaningful stakeholder connections.
$40B
committed to advancing gender equality
1K
total commitments
1
Global Acceleration Plan for gender equality,
including 6 blueprints to create gender-equal societies with 24 actions each
1
Global Acceleration Plan for gender equality,
1K
total commitments
$40B
committed to advancing gender equality
including 6 blueprints to create gender-equal societies with 24 actions each
“Generation Equality is our bold collective promise to the world’s women and girls. It will accelerate the world’s progress on the Sustainable Development Goals and transform lives for generations to come.”
Sima Bahous, Executive Director, UN Women
2
global forums
in Mexico and Paris
6
design sprints
that led to the formation of Action Coalitions
11
multi-stakeholder steering committee meetings
that helped shape GEF structure and processes
8
curated discussions
that used storytelling to illuminate thematic focus areas for GEF
38
Action Coalition (AC) workshops
that resulted in 6 AC blueprints
and the Global Acceleration Plan for gender equality
