Gender discrimination in HK: How can brands ensure bias doesn't creep in?

The complaint filed by a secondary school boy last month dominated local headlines after he described his school as “unreasonable” for disallowing male students to keep long hair. The 17-year-old school boy, Nathan Lam Chak Chun, took to social media and uploaded a video on his Instagram on 19 July 2022, claiming that he had lodged an official complaint with the Equal Opportunities Commission against Tung Wah Group of Hospitals Wong Fut Nam College. This came after the school allegedly told the male students to cut their long hair or face being barred from school activities or possible suspension.

Lam said in the video that such a move possibly has breached the Sex Discrimination Ordinance and the equality watchdog accepted their complaint. The teenager further added that he wanted raise awareness to gender equality via the incident and emphasised that banning male students from having long hair was “unreasonable.”The video drew over 646,000 views on Instagram with more than 2,700 comments on the very next day, with many expressing support and encouraging Lam for “speaking out.”

The conversation on gender identity and discrimination has come to the forefront in recent years. In the workforce arena, conversations around gender wage gap are also common as seen by a recent report by Ranstad which found that the gender wage gap in Hong Kong SAR currently stands at 22%, significantly wider than its closest competitor at APAC hub Singapore which is at 6%. Moreover, a Financial Times article revealed that women make up less than 15% of board positions among the 50 Hang Seng index constituent companies.

While gender inequality and barriers is still a common phenomenon in companies, brands are actively taking steps to rectify this in Hong Kong, said Wilson Wong, marketing director at Price.com.hk, adding that the route to healing starts with a simple understanding. "A simple method for employees is by creating a survey to rate their working environment, including their views about gender equality and sexual harassment in the workplace," he said. 

Meanwhile, Ivan Zeng, general manager of The LEGO Group for Hong Kong and Taiwan, said that gender diversity is not only about trying to market more to girls and women, but how are brands able to celebrate the achievements of ladies, celebrate more different people, hence the company introduced 'Leadership Playground' to celebrate everyone is unique in the workplace, "we believe that we could only truly promote diversity and inclusion if we are able to start within ourselves, if we don't truly embrace it or communicate more about it, we cannot bring energy in our marketing and bring genuine energy to customers," Zeng added. 

How can marketing teams encourage equality?

On the marketing front, David Ko, managing director of RFI Asia said brands can also work with internal DEI advisors, or external parties such as PR agencies to ensure that their campaigns are socially aware, and respect and accommodate different gender identities. “Understanding gender identity is not that different from understanding the harm that sexism, racism, misogyny, homophobia, and the likes, can cause to society. Taking active measures to prevent bias inadvertently creeping in should be the groundwork of any campaign,” Ko added.

He also took reference from the incident of the school boy, “If not allowing long hair is to adhere to rules of appearance, or even industrial safety such as it getting in the way of machinery, then, that is understandable. However if long hair does not impair that person’s ability to conduct their normal duties, then curtailing it can be seen as limiting their personal freedom,” Ko said.

Desmond Ku, founder and director of The Bridge Agency said that gender equality is universal value, brands could show their support by filtering stereotypes when developing PR campaigns, “For example men are stronger than women, men can do better than women, the marketing for PR campaign is very important.”  While internally, Ku suggested that HR management of brands could conduct more internal communications on scope of work, salary, etc, with employees to maintain gender equality.

Meanwhile, some local brands are also taking inclusivity into consideration when developing new products. For example, virtual insurer OneDegree Hong Kong’s GM Emily Chow said that using technology, the company caters different products for its customers - especially those from the gap market, serving the underserved.

Chow added that to further build and inclusive culture in workplace, OneDegree encourages everyone to be open-minded and does not adopt dress code policy. “Our colleagues, regardless of gender, can wear whatever that will make them comfortable – even shorts and flip flops – to work. We also support equality to create an enjoyable, friendly workplace culture. For instance, we have extended our staff family benefits to cover also LGBTQ+ families,” she added.

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