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A recent study, 'The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness'
said that women are unhappier now, after 40 years of feminism, than they have ever been before. It received a lot of media attention in the popular press giving a platform for the old chauvinists to surface with remarks from the like of Stuart Rose, (C.E.O. Marks and Spencer,). He claimed that the 'girls' in his company have no glass ceiling to worry about. I think the clue is in the disrespectful and patronising use of the term 'girls'!
Sir Stuart's comments were made in the Observer newspaper (UK)but they are contradicted by The Fawcett's Society's (an organisation campaigning for equality) Dr Katherine Rake.
She said there was still no flexibility for women at higher levels of business and that the top strata is generally white and male and does not encourage women's participation by being more flexible in their working styles.
Women Must Be Like Men to Succeed?
I think educated women are rejecting the idea of equality currently on offer. On the surface it looks like we have been offered equality; in fact, we have been offered places at a table designed and set by men for men.
Think about it, in my lifetime (I'm in my early 50s) workplaces were inhabited almost exclusively by men. Women had very secondary roles, in a supportive capacity. My school primarily offered girls secretarial and teaching options and the concept of equal pay was laughable. Just ask any group of working women how many of their mothers had careers, by which I mean worked full time for a significant period of time. There will be a few, I suspect, maybe as many as half in any office.
Then ask how many of their grandmothers had careers. I suspect that there will be hardly any.
Three Generations
In just three generations the gender make up of the world of work has changed dramatically. But women are still making their way in a world designed by and for men.
And we're in a catch 22 because if women do behave like men
they are often described as aggressive and unfeminine, but if they exhibit their more feminine side it is generally not valued in the male dominated world of work. Male characteristics and styles are still more highly valued. Is it any wonder than many of us are opting out and the highest number of small business start ups are coming from women?
On Being Gender Bilingual
It is true that equal opportunities legislation has meant that most companies now have an equalities policy in place. And some of them are fantastic. There is a huge trend towards diversity training and most large organisations use this term to mean a wide range of areas, covering complex issues of difference in the workplace, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, physical difference, cultural diversity, and in this they also put gender.
It is interesting to note that over half the population is put into this category with women being incorporated within the diversity tag. The implicit assumption is that women need help in becoming more like the dominant class, (white males) in an organisation, and if we can be coached/assisted to behave like the dominant culture all will be well. The expectation is that women must change, not the organisation.
But women are not a minority culture and we don't need
diversity support. We need to be in organisations that treat women like women and men like men, of whatever diverse background they come from. We need organisations that value the contributions from both genders equally and are not implementing policies to 'allow' women to behave like men.
The Economic Case
Women and men have differing leadership styles. It stands to reason. We are different in so many other ways so why not in leadership styles? (See this article for an account of differences in communication). Organisations that enable both genders to flourish will be the organisations that thrive.
For example, women make 80% of all purchasing decisions. And women do not respond to the same marketing strategies that men do. And they do not respond to the one dimensional approach of ‘let's do it the same as we usually do but use a lot of pink‘!
Responsive companies are adapting their style of working to e gender bilingual. The car manufacturer Volvo is a case in point. They used an all female team to research and design a concept car based on what women wanted, and their CEO said,
'meeting women's expectations makes us exceed the
expectations of men'.
If women are underrepresented at a senior level in your own organisation maybe it's time to ask the following questions:
At what grade or level do women stop applying for/being
promoted to senior jobs?
Has an analysis been made of the reasons why?
Is there a clear, non gender specific, ideal leadership profile
for the organisation?
Is there succession planning with a pool of both gender high
potential employees?
Is the progress of women monitored and questions asked of
managers when there is an discrepancy in numbers of female
employees and numbers of female managers?
Recommended reading, available from Amazon or your local library:
Women Mean Business by Wittenburg-Cox & Maitland.
Women, Men & Language by J. Coates.
This article appeared in my regular newsletter. If you would like to receive a free copy (and I never do anything else with your email address), please click here
And I’d love to know what YOU think!
Regards
Jane
Wow! What a great article! You bring up many important points.
I think it’s high time women were valued as women and the female way of doing things should be valued as well. Look at the wars and environmental destruction men have wrought; I doubt such degradations would have gotten to the extremes they have if women had been in charge, doing things in their own way.
I think men respond and accept female authority when a woman acts like a woman. I don’t mean when she wears make-up or high heels or that sort of thing; I mean that men respond favorably when women don’t try to act like men but they let their power as mothers come through. It doesn’t matter if the woman isn’t actually a mother; she has the mother power within her even if she has never given birth to a baby.
When women try to act like men and try to beat them at their own game, men feel threatened. They suddenly feel they have to compete with women. But when women promote the female way of doing things, men will respond because they’ve been responding all their lives to their mothers.
Mother is everything to a baby. She is our first deity, our first protector, our first caretaker. Mother is a baby’s whole world. Mother’s heartbeat is the first sound baby ever hears.
When women claim their power and value as women, men will respond favorably to female power and authority, because unless men lost their mother very early on, they remember that their first experience of power was female. As men grow, they accept that they will never have the type of power a woman has because they will never bring life into the world through their own bodies. They have an important role as fathers, but that’s far different from the Mother Power. I should say, men accept this if they are well adjusted. In our imbalanced society, women are so often treated as less important, second class citizens that it can be difficult for men to be well-adjusted enough to have such realizations. Only by empowering women and valuing their true power can we bring society back into balance.
When women are denied their natural power, that is when a society degrades and becomes dysfunctional. One way to get women back in touch with their inherent power is through empowerment. Imagine what it would be like to grow up hearing God referred to as She. I can’t think of anything more empowering! Imagine a world where women’s contributions and style of doing things are valued every bit as much as men’s. That’s empowerment.
MB
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http://www.starbringergallery.com/
“We all come from the Goddess and to Her we shall return like a drop of rain flowing to the ocean.”—Z. Budapest
“‘If God is male, then the male is god.’ . . . if our only images of the sacred are male . . . inevitably women will be devalued.”—Starhawk quoting Mary Daly
you have hit the nail on the head and i have read alot of articles but i think this one is my favorite!!!!!
What a lovely compliment, thank you. Would you mind if I quoted you on the web site? Thank you.
i think women have always taken second all of their lives in one way or another, and i feel that is sad, but it is the truth...
either from husbands,jobs,children,etc...
but what some fail to see or truly understand is the power of self preservation that most women really have!
we are very strong whether we see it or not...
LJ
I was working in the press room, as a stacker. There where two of us. Me and a man. We took turns working 3 ten hour days one week and 4 the other. We were both going for the job on the press. He got it because the boss did not want at women on the press. The new man ended up getting several fingers cut off because of carelessness. After that they gave me a chance on the press. I still have all of my fingers (thank God) and did very well setting inks and such. I never got on full time even though I did well. The man who doesn't like women moving up is still there but I'm not. Go figure. I am obtaining my education, maybe that will give me a little more to work with. We can hope.
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