Why aren’t more women in leadership positions? Why is it, despite there being more women in the workforce than men, there are so few at the top of the corporate ladder? Women on Boards, an organisation that champions the advancement of women into leadership and board positions recently held a breakfast at which this subject was the topic of discussion. One of the speakers, Catherine Fox, Deputy Editor of Australian Financial Review’s BOSS magazine presented on the 7 Career Myths. Below are two parts of a video interview in which we explore these myths and look at why they continue to justify the less-than-equitable state of business in Australia.
Part 1
Part 2
And, below you’ll find a summary of her 7 career myths.
See Catherine Fox Speak at Nice Girls Finish Second Catherine is part of the panel of speakers at the Nice Girls Finish Second debate which will be held in Sydney on Friday, 27 August. Presented by AIM NSW, the event is a light-hearted and irreverent clash of the minds over fine wine and great food with some of Australia’s leading businesswomen (and a couple of men). Call AIM NSW on 1300 551 776 to register, and quote AIMABN when you book to receive a special ABN price. You can find more details here.
7 Career Myths
1. Work hard and you will be rewarded – workplaces are meritocracies
Most of our business senior ranks are men of a certain age. Meritocracies are made up of people who are the best of what they do. While a natural level of talent exists, it’s not across our business. It remains, though unfair, that:
- Women are often excluded from informal networks within companies
- Women put more importance on building relationships than men
2. The gender pay gap is grossly exaggerated
The gender gap is at 18% and has not changed in 20 years (calculated on hourly earnings of people doing the same jobs). It broadens the further up you go. Part of this is due to the types of work, the roles that women take on as their expertise. 50% of women work in just three areas.
3. Women have children and choose to lose their jobs or lose interest in their careers
This is a handy way of fibbing off problems about gender. US study shows maternity leave takes up only a couple of years for most women. We still don’t have a viable market of party time jobs so you get off the career track, unfortunately. “The motherhood penalty” is a situation where mothers are rated as less competent, less committed and less favourable as hires. Catherine talked about a US study where applications for senior roles were discriminated against when the applications had two items changed on them. a) the gender and b) the parental status. That is, when the applicants seemed to be women who were mothers they were overlooked as suitable candidates.
4. If women just behaved more like men at work and stopped being so emotional they would succeed.
Not a good piece of advice. And if it had worked, would we not all be doing it? Women are typically penalised for being aggressive.
5. Programs and targets for women in the workplace are unnecessary and unfair
This is informally rife. We don’t have an equal paying field. What we do when we come together (as women) in this way learn how we can support each other.
6. Women are scarce at the top because there’s not enough of them in the pipeline.
60% of women of working age are employed. More women graduates coming out of schools. We need to look at why educated women are not going up in the ranks.
7. Time will heal all
That has not been proven. And, the longer that we fail to see women in leadership positions the more convinced some will be that women are not suitable for those positions. Advice: Sharpen your pins and puncture the myths. Set the record straight.
