NEWMEN

Addressing Machismo in the Workplace:

Emotional and Social Intelligence for the development of new masculinities in the workplace.

NEWMEN project addresses the well-known phenomenon of machismo. Machismo is the root of many social conflicts. It is masculinity based on the projection of an external image and gender role sustained by aggressiveness, dominance, competitiveness, and ultimately, inequality as the norm, which mostly affects women, among others in the workplace.

In our project, we recalled men to reformulate the idea of masculinity and advocate for unlearning harmful gender roles acquired over generations.

The project “NEWMEN” explores new masculinities through the use of emotional and social intelligence. It is a new Erasmus plus project, driven by five organisations from Austria, Italy, Spain, Sweden and The Netherlands. NEWMEN is a European project funded under the Erasmus+ framework that addresses the well-known phenomenon of machoism. The vision of the project is to develop a programme that has a positive impact on workplace culture for men and women, supports gender equality and fights against sexism.

IKF Malmo (Sweden), INDEPCIE (Spain), STePS (Italy), VAEV (Austria), and NP2E (The Netherlands) developed a training system and a toolkit on alternative masculinities for employees and managers in companies and organizations of all sizes and sectors, to educate and change behavior in the workplaces. Together, we created a bank of resources and designed a good practice guide plan to impact men in expressing their gender in the workplace without feeling they have to act according to a certain stereotype. Ultimately, NEWMEN supported the fight against sexism, gender-based violence, or any kind of abuse.

The implementation of new laws and regulations aimed at ensuring equal pay and safe workplaces for women often serves as an external catalyst for fostering more egalitarian workplace cultures. However, the vulnerability arises when these protective laws safeguarding women’s human and labor rights are reversed, a historical pattern that cannot be dismissed as unrealistic. The hard-earned rights of women become susceptible and risk being compromised. In contrast, fostering soft skills are highly significant in ensuring sustainable change within organizations. Developing social and emotional intelligence, equips individuals with essential tools like perspective-taking, emphatic listening, etc. These skills create intrinsic motivation, laying the groundwork for sustainable transformations in gendered power dynamics in the workplace.

Our objective with NEWMEN is dual-fold: raising awareness and inspiring action to dismantle the layers of entrenched masculinity prevalent in workplaces. Traits like dominance and power abuse perpetuate environments that are detrimental to women, impeding their equal access to opportunities and, ultimately, their quality of life. By nurturing a culture that values social- en emotional intelligence and rejects harmful norms, we strive to create a more inclusive and empowering environment for everyone.

At NP2E, championing women and enhancing their quality of life stands as a foundational principle. Our mission was to extend the reach of this project’s outcomes and activities to a broad spectrum of individuals, encompassing experts, diverse community representatives, and corporate entities. Within our pursuits, we placed particular emphasis on one crucial sub-theme : Empathy with an Intersectional Lens. Shedding light on an overlooked concern, we highlighted the substantial wage gap experienced by women with migrant backgrounds, a matter that demands urgent attention. To address this, we fortified and certified a core group consisting of HR managers, labor rights advocates, policymakers, and a diverse cohort of women spanning generations within our community. Employing dynamic activities and approaches