Chameleon x Raising The Glass | Building Representation in Technical Teams
Retaining women in supply chain, engineering and operations roles depends less on hiring targets and more on the conditions inside the organisation: whether inclusive practices are embedded before targets are set, whether line managers reflect them, and whether the workplace itself was designed with a diverse workforce in mind.
Those were the practical questions a panel of senior female leaders tackled at The Equity Exchange, hosted by Raising The Glass in partnership with Chameleon International. The panel brought together an engineering leader from Mars, the Global Inclusion and Diversity lead at British American Tobacco, and an operations leader from challenger brand Hip Pop. Four points stood out.
- Inclusion has to come before diversity targets. Representation gains do not survive an environment that is not ready for them. As the Mars engineering leader put it, “If you bring diverse talent into an environment that isn’t ready, you lose them very quickly.” Targets set without the culture to retain people simply raise attrition among the talent you worked hardest to attract [Evolving workplace culture, 23 June 2026].
- Passive support is a choice. Genuine commitment is resourced and owned at senior level; performative support is not. The panel’s test was simple: ask leaders to sponsor a network, fund it, and turn up. “You might get fewer yeses, but the few make a big difference.”
- Conditions decide retention. Barriers accumulate through daily experience rather than single obstacles: facilities, flexibility, and PPE designed around a male-majority workforce. The fixes are frequently inexpensive and frequently invisible from the boardroom. The lesson for HR and Talent leaders is to audit conditions by asking the workforce directly.
- Sponsors, mentors and line managers do different jobs. “The sponsor champions you in the rooms you’re not in. The mentor walks the journey with you,” as BAT’s inclusion lead explained. The role most often overlooked is the line manager, who controls the flexibility and stretch work that decide whether a technical career is sustainable.
Raising The Glass founder Rebecca Oliver-Mooney closed with an account of a woman repeatedly asked in interviews how she would lift a keg. Her answer: you don’t lift kegs, you roll them. Requirements that reflect habit rather than the real demands of a role narrow the talent pool before assessment even begins.
Chameleon International helps HR and Talent leaders understand where technical talent sits, how capability moves and what the conditions inside an organisation mean for retention. Through workforce intelligence, market insight and evidence-led recruitment strategy, we support leaders building inclusive technical teams for the future.
Get the Guide: The CHRO’s 2026 Industrial Talent Intelligence Report