The Davos Plan

I devised a plan for our Davos debate this week, although you can guarantee the title and format will change as I work with the forum and the gender equality project to tweak and re-tweak. Here are some excerpts from the summary document. Ideas welcomed! (This picture is from last year's CNBC Davos debate with Maria Bartiromo, of whom I'm a huge fan.)

NEW LEADERSHIP DNA: Could women be the next decade’s profit playbook?

• I'm told a UN report concludes that if we progress towards gender equality at the current rate we will reach it just beyond the year 4000. I'm not that patient.


• Asking organisations to address the problem because it’s the right thing to do hasn’t worked. We need a new strategy.


• Women often distance themselves from gender discussions in the workplace because they’re considered distractions from the company’s critical mission. It’s time to change the conversation.
  

CNBC, the World Economic Forum’s Gender Parity Programme and the Gender Equality Project co-founded by Nicole Schwab and Aniela Unguresan are joining forces in Davos 2010 to prove parity equals profits. We’re challenging two talented debating teams to pitch their best ideas for convincing CEOs that gender equality pays dividends and we’re encouraging them to inspire and entertain delegates in the process. CNBC will televise the debate as a half-hour Davos special, air it globally, stream it on CNBC.com and rotate highlights in primetime for a fortnight after the event. The debate will be energetic, enjoyable and inclusive: We’ll approach the subject from a profit-seeking perspective and dispel the myth that gender equality is simply a woman’s issue.

The Format

CNBC is compiling two teams of business and political leaders – one all female and the other all male - and challenging them to try to convince CEO delegates that gender parity delivers profits. We’ll also ask them to devise game changing ideas for popularising gender equality within the workplace. We want strategies for making gender equality an exciting top priority and making ‘more women in the boardroom’ the enlightened new innovation of high-performing corporations.

While the male team presents its ideas, the female team will sit in a sound-proofed room then the female team will have its turn.

Throughout the challenge, our high-powered jury and opinionated audience will question, critique and applaud the ideas and eventually vote on which of them should be adopted by global corporations.