Ireland's WorkEqual Campaign

Agency: Dress for Success Dublin

Ireland's WorkEqual campaign aims to raise awareness of gender inequalities in the workplace and develop solutions to address them. Since 2016, the campaign has centred around a month of activities each November, including Equal Pay Day - the date on which women effectively stop earning, relative to men, because of the gender pay gap.

In 2020, key objectives for WorkEqual included: increasing engagement with members of the Irish Parliament to secure policy and legislative developments to address gender inequalities; developing links with other countries to ensure the campaign develops in line with international best practice; and building awareness of WorkEqual amongst target audiences, namely politicians, policymakers, employers, trade unions and NGOs.

Thanks to a creative and strategic communications campaign, delivered by Alice PR & Events, WorkEqual 2020 featured 28 expert speakers from eight different countries in a series of highly successful campaign events; achieved an increase of 197% on event attendance figures from the previous year; directly engaged 35 members of the Irish Parliament; and reached an audience of over 28 million through media relations and digital marketing.

The success of the campaign has led to tangible legislative developments and greater awareness of workplace gender inequalities. In March 2021, the Irish Government approved a Gender Pay Gap Information Bill to introduce mandatory gender pay gap reporting. Significantly, WorkEqual has now evolved from being a month of focused activities to a year-long programme of work, and the campaign is establishing partnerships not only in Ireland but also overseas.