“I was hosting a panel (…) and I opened the talk with a simple question: how many of you dress up to go to the doctor’s? Only the black people raised their hands and then I had to say it out loud that yes for white people this makes no sense but we, as black people, have to appear in a certain way to improve our chance of receiving quality healthcare.”
— Wendee Lee Curtis, emcee
In my 10 years in events and media, I’ve felt quite a few times that I wasn’t treated fairly. I’ve had people question my skills, renegotiate my pay after the job was done, and have also been replaced last minute by famous faces who were known from TV, while I wasn’t. So I definitely know the bitter taste of being dismissed or overlooked.
But I try (and often fail) to appreciate all the great aspects of my professional life. A good way to do that is to look around — and to listen to people. It’s enlightening and humbling to learn of other people’s perspectives on some things I may take for granted. For example, when my associate Aayati reached out to a few emcees on my behalf so we could have a conversation on issues of bias in the industry, I learnt that I had much to be grateful for! Like my “no” being respected or me being considered more easily for some events because of my gender, skin color, nationality…
So over the next few weeks, I’ll share the conversations that Aayati had with emcees such as Wendee Lee Curtis, Eva Saha and Samme Allen and more, and hope that you’ll learn, like I did, about the biases that exist in the events industry and also the possibilities of improvement that those stories can teach us. Diversity and inclusion need not stay as only keywords for the workplace after all.
This week, we’re talking to Wendee Lee Curtis, a veteran news anchor and Broadway performer bringing the art of news-level production, live entertainment, and the magic of connection to events as a host, moderator and emcee.
Would you say that being a woman and an emcee, you had to take your gender and sex into consideration while you were working?
I’m very grateful to be asked to weigh in on this important topic. With that in mind, I have a few thoughts I’d like to share…
First, I feel compelled to begin with the conversation of access and equity in this niche of the speaker industry. Frankly, it’s dominated by men by a very wide margin. In the USA there’s a “baked-in” default setting that prioritizes hiring men to be the face & voice of the event.
Additionally, there’s a huge pay disparity (30% – 50%) between men & women in this niche even when they share comparable work experience. Go online and check out any speaker’s bureau website and you’ll see what I mean.
So the glass ceiling is also present in the events industry.
Yes, I agree with you. Having said that I don’t think it’s unique to our industry but rather an extension of being a woman trying to navigate the “world of men” at large. As a Black woman in this niche of the industry, I’m at the intersection of two marginalized groups (women & African Americans) so the way I experience interactions is layered.
How’s that?
I’m often fronting events that have me in direct contact with corporate CEOs and the C-suite who are overwhelmingly cishet, white men. The optics alone are jarring and our lived experiences are entirely dissimilar. The events industry in the US is widely lacking in racial diversity while being powered in large numbers by white women who answer to predominately white male industry leadership. It’s…complicated…and layered. These are just a few of my thoughts but honestly I could talk about this all day.
Who wins the most gigs?
It’s about who knows whom and whether someone is even being considered for an event. Remember, most of this happens behind closed doors. Even though there are many women emcees, this industry in the US is still predominantly white male-dominated.
But then, when they hire you, are you treated just like anyone else?
It’s layered. There’s bias, no question about it. The way I experience it is primarily racial bias and not gender. There’ve been clients with whom I’ve seen that they are wondering if I’m really capable of doing what I’m there for. For example, at a recent event I didn’t receive the script until I was on location and when we were about to go live, the script was still being tweaked and the producer was pacing about demanding the writer put up the script immediately. I assured him that because of my news reporting experience, I was very used to cold reading. But he ignored me and kept pushing the writer saying that the emcee i.e., me, needed the script! Anyway, I did a cold read-through and then presented it after only one rehearsal and you know what happened? I felt the entire atmosphere of the room change. Pin drop silence and awe. After that, some of them came and asked me if I would be comfortable doing this or that on stage. I told them yes, since it’s what I do and what I’m paid for!
So personally would you say that you have experienced discrimination at the level of race?
You know it’s not easy to say that. Of course, the majority of hosts in the US are white and male, but you know I see changes happening these days as companies try to bring in more diverse people. Sometimes there’s a whiff of tokenisation when that happens—like are you doing this because you understand what diversity and inclusion mean or are you doing it because you want to balance the visual?
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How’s that?
I’m often fronting events that have me in direct contact with corporate CEOs and the C-suite who are overwhelmingly cishet, white men. The optics alone are jarring and our lived experiences are entirely dissimilar. The events industry in the US is widely lacking in racial diversity while being powered in large numbers by white women who answer to predominately white male industry leadership. It’s…complicated…and layered. These are just a few of my thoughts but honestly I could talk about this all day. Who wins the most gigs?
It’s about who knows whom and whether someone is even being considered for an event. Remember, most of this happens behind closed doors. Even though there are many women emcees, this industry in the US is still predominantly white male-dominated.
But then, when they hire you, are you treated just like anyone else?
It’s layered. There’s bias, no question about it. The way I experience it is primarily racial bias and not gender. There’ve been clients with whom I’ve seen that they are wondering if I’m really capable of doing what I’m there for. For example, at a recent event I didn’t receive the script until I was on location and when we were about to go live, the script was still being tweaked and the producer was pacing about demanding the writer put up the script immediately. I assured him that because of my news reporting experience, I was very used to cold reading. But he ignored me and kept pushing the writer saying that the emcee i.e., me, needed the script! Anyway, I did a cold read-through and then presented it after only one rehearsal and you know what happened? I felt the entire atmosphere of the room change. Pin drop silence and awe. After that, some of them came and asked me if I would be comfortable doing this or that on stage. I told them yes, since it’s what I do and what I’m paid for!
So personally would you say that you have experienced discrimination at the level of race?
You know it’s not easy to say that. Of course, the majority of hosts in the US are white and male, but you know I see changes happening these days as companies try to bring in more diverse people. Sometimes there’s a whiff of tokenisation when that happens—like are you doing this because you understand what diversity and inclusion mean or are you doing it because you want to balance the visual? For example, I did a big event a while back and it was a really amusing and eye-opening moment when the speaker windows went live and I could see in front of me, on the screen, four speakers appear—white men perhaps in their 50s with salt and pepper hair, in nearly identical suits— and then me in contrast in my red suit and red lipstick and hair done up. The difference is of course noticeable and it marks not just the difference between them and me but also the similarity between each of them. It’s a marker for the similarity and difference in our lived experiences.
Yes, that really brings the point out.
There was also this other instance of how diversity can only help an event, you know?
I was hosting a panel for a company in the medical industry and I opened the talk with a simple question, how many of you dress up to go to the doctor’s? Only the black people raised their hands and then I had to say it out loud that yes for white people this makes no sense but we, as black people, have to appear in a certain way to access great healthcare.
To be taken seriously?
Yes, to be taken seriously as an upstanding citizen. Not just that, I also started with a personal anecdote for a panel on migraine and asked those attending if they knew that a higher number of women tend to have migraines than men? Again the story, which was about me nearly missing my Broadway debut because of a blinding migraine, along with that question really set the event up for a lot of exchange and communication.
People open up a lot more when you can provide that space for sharing different life experiences and I think that is something companies can focus on. Seeing an emcee who looks like me, whether companies realize it or not, can show a desire to step outside the established norms & discussions. If companies can be more transparent from the outset about what kind of an event they are looking for, that’s how they can find the golden unicorn—the right event host for their event.
I like to say that the best events follow an emotional arc. There’s a specific emotion that you want your event to hinge on and the job of the event host, me, is to embody and maintain that tone.
My Broadway experiences come in handy in my event hosting job and when I reflect on it, I think that the emotional deep-diving that casting directors do has a value-add for companies. They should definitely integrate the emotional aspect into their event consideration.
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That’s a very interesting perspective and I totally get where you are coming from. I didn’t think about how Broadway casting practices can be integrated in a meaningful way into the events industry. And even though I started out with approaching bias in the events industry from a gendered perspective, I think the conversation with you has shown me that it’s not going to stay at that. It’s going to be more about diversity and inclusion and how these words translate on the level of everyday reality in the events industry. So, sort of coming back to where I did start off with the first question—you have mentioned race as a factor, but has there been any moment that made you think that men are getting prioritized for a role that you might easily fill?
There are some established norms in the industry like predominantly male emcees being asked to host tech events. The predominance of men in tech, automobile, and sports events space is reflective of a gender bias in the world at large within those industries. I don’t think the term discrimination is the right descriptor for the propensity the industry has for “bro conferences.” To be clear this isn’t unique to my niche of the speaker world but rather to those niches themselves. Period. Both inside and outside of the events industry.
Its’ rare that I get called for a tech event. There is some notion that women are not right for things like tech, or sports, or automobiles.
I think organizers don’t think about the fact that women, just like men, use a lot of tech. They are curious and willing to learn. And you know in families when a car is being bought, the so-called final decision might be made by a man but there is a lot of input and influence from the women in the families. When I go out with my girlfriends, we speak a lot about cars—each of us has preferred models, functions, and appreciation for a particular aesthetic. What I am saying is that there should be a wider net of consideration for hosts when an organizer is deciding—I would love to do tech, automobile and sports events! There’s tremendous value in thinking outside the box when it comes to women emcees.
[This interview was conducted and edited by Aayati Sengupta.]
