76: Activate Yourself with Geeta Sidhu Robb - Episode 7676: Activate Yourself with Geeta Sidhu Robb - Episode 76
UK Health Radio Podcast
Geeta Sidhu Robb talks with consultant Sharon Peek about how a serious car crash led her to question gendered design and workplace systems. Sharon shares research on structural barriers facing women and outlines practical steps organisations can take to create fairer, more inclusive cultures.
35:58•11 Apr 2026
From Car Crash to Culture Change: Sharon Peek on Gender Equity at Work
Episode Overview
- Sharon links her severe car crash injuries to seatbelts designed around male bodies, illustrating how everyday design can disadvantage women.
- Research from her firm identifies 17 key barriers to women’s progression, mainly rooted in organisational systems and wider societal norms rather than individual shortcomings.
- Data often reveals hidden patterns: women are promoted less, paid less and rated lower in performance reviews across multiple locations and business units.
- Women face a "likeability penalty" for showing confidence or ambition, and while they negotiate as effectively as men, they are penalised when doing so for themselves.
- Sharon outlines five essentials for gender-inclusive cultures: clear diagnostics, senior buy-in, de-biased processes, engaging and educating employees about bias, and targeted women-only development programmes.
“When I saw that data, I could not unsee that.”
What can we learn from those who have battled inequality at work? This conversation on UK Health Radio’s “Activate Yourself” follows that thread through one woman’s near-fatal car crash and into the boardrooms of global companies. Host Geeta Sidhu Robb chats with gender equity consultant Sharon Peek, whose life was changed at 23 when a “relatively minor accident” left her with a ruptured bowel, broken bones and months of recovery.
Years later, reading *Invisible Women*, Sharon realised her injuries were linked to seatbelts designed around the male body: “On a woman, it sits above the hips… where your organs are.” That moment helped crystallise her commitment to gender equity. Sharon now runs Shape Talent, working with multinationals to push for gender balance in leadership within this generation, not “four or five generations away”.
She explains the 17 barriers her research has identified, grouped into three big buckets: organisational (biased systems, lack of access to networks, always-on cultures), societal (deep-rooted gender stereotypes) and personal (how women negotiate at home and at work).
You’ll hear her unpack why pointing to a few successful women misses the systemic picture, why women pay a “likeability penalty” for being ambitious, and why research shows women are just as good at negotiating as men – but get penalised when they negotiate for themselves. Sharon’s five-step approach for companies includes solid diagnostics, leadership buy-in, de-biasing processes, raising awareness of unconscious bias, and running women-only development programmes to help level the playing field.
The tone stays calm, practical and quietly hopeful, even as they discuss backlash against diversity efforts and stalled progress post-Covid. If you’ve ever felt that “if only they were good enough” doesn’t quite explain the imbalance you see at work, this conversation might give you language, data and a little spark of hope. What hidden barriers might still be shaping your own path?
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