Women's Rights at Work Chat (WRAW Chat)
A Women's Rights at Work Chats (WRAW Chat) is a 45-minute structured group conversations that help empower women and gender diverse workers to discuss the challenges we share at work, identify collective solutions to issues and develop concrete plans for action.
Organising through WRAW Chats led to the campaign to end workplace gendered violence. They have been taking place across Victoria since 2016 and have informed countless workplace campaigns across different industries.
Who is it for?
Women and gender-diverse workers from any occupation or industry can participate in a WRAW Chat.
What's the program?
A WRAW chat runs for approximately 45 minutes and covers the following content:
• Pre-survey to reflect on your own experiences at work
• What we like about work: Participants will first be asked to discuss what they like about being a woman at work. Starting with positive experiences also helps free people up to talk about more negative experiences.
• What we don't like about work: Participants will next be asked to discuss challenging things about being a woman at work.
• Prioritise: participants will collectively prioritise issues raised
• Reflect: Participants are asked to reflect on which issues are most common, and whether they think this reflects the experience of other working women. They are encouraged to consider the underlying reasons for each of the issues they voted on as most important and ask them to consider one potential solution each for the three most important issues.
• Act: Participants agree on achievable actions they will take to address the issues raised.
Participants will come together and decide as a group on at least two actions they will take at their workplace to step up their activism. You may provide a specific signup sheet or campaign ask for your group.
WRAW Chat Materials
A WRAW Chat only takes 45 minutes, but participants will come away with agreed actions to take collectively to improve their workplaces and community. WRAW chats can take place in-person or online. Get in touch with the VTHC women's team to organise a WRAW chat or facilitator training for your group [email protected]
Or run your own! Click here for facilitator notes and participant worksheet.
Online WRAW Chat guide
Here are some tips to help run an online WRAW Chat:
Before the WRAW Chat
• Send an email to participants with the WRAW Chat Guide and Making Change sheet.
• Create a google sheet or power point with 3 blank slides, titled Things We Like About Work, Things We Don’t Like About Work and Our Top Issues. Use these slides in place of butchers paper.
Starting the WRAW Chat
• Drop the link to the WRAW Chat survey in the meeting chat room: https://weareunion.typeform.com/to/np4ZaC55
• Ask participants to click the link and fill out the survey.
• Share your screen for steps 2, 3 and 4 on the Facilitator's Guide and update the Google Sheet / Powerpoint as you go.
Voting on the most important issues
• Step 4, Part A: Read out answers from What We Don’t Like About Work and get participants to raise hands for one vote and message chat if they wish to vote multiple times for an issue.
Taking action!
• Take a screenshot of participants agreeing to take action - be sure to send us the photo: [email protected]
• Ask participants to fill out the Making Change sheet with their agreed actions and email to facilitator.
