Gender and leadership

Margaret HallockDirector Wayne Morse Center for Law and Politics

Barbara PocockDirectorCentre for Work + LifeUniversity of South Australia

Leadership – is it gendered?Some useful concepts

Gendered organisations The ‘ideal worker’ norm

How women lead – is it different?Lessons for women who lead?

Is leadership gendered?

As an empirical fact, yes: While women make up almost one in two workers in the US

and Australia They make up small proportions of all kinds of leaders Less than 10% of the world’s leaders are women (UN stats) Less than one in five members of parliament globally are

women Women reach ‘critical mass’ of 30% of members of

parliament in only 28 countries

In the US

In 2012 women make up: 16.8% of Congress (535 seats) (3% in 1979; 13.6% in 2001)

In US state legislatures Women make up 23.6% of legislators

Women make up 16% of US Fortune 500 companies’ boards Barely changed from 14.6% in 2006 (Catalyst)

14.1% of Chief executives in US Fortune 500 companies in 2010

Australia?

3% of CEOs of top 200 companies are women (2010) 2% in 2008

8.4% Board directors of top 200 companies 8.3% in 2008

Federal parliamentarians – 30% 29.6% in 2008

Julia Gillard – first Prime Minister – 1 year

In Professions

Women have been rapidly increasing their share of qualifications and experience…but

In 2009/10 in the US women made up 47.2% of law students

Only 31.5% of lawyers were womenAnd they made up only 19.5% of partners

Labour market is gendered

Occupational segregation Women and men do different jobs

Unpaid labour is also gendered

Men and women do different unpaid tasks Men to garbage, women do care, cooking cleaning Women do twice as many hours as men – in most countries In Australia, in 2006, women spent an average of two hours

and 52 minutes per day on domestic activities, compared to one hour and 37 minutes for men

Even when both work full-time, women spend on average 46 minutes a day more than men on domestic activities

And it has hardly changed since 1987

A theory of gendered organisations

Organizations and gender

Organizations are not gender neutral Women do not step into organizations that treat men and

women in gender-neutral waysThey are gendered, and they enact processes

which make and remake gendered hierarchies Joan Acker (1990) ‘Hierarchies, Jobs, Bodies: A Theory of

Gendered Organizations’ Gender and Society, Vol. 4, No. 2 (Jun., 1990), pp. 139-158

How does this gendering happen?

The way jobs are organised and valuedThe way jobs fit with the rest of life, especially care

(sometimes called the division of labour between work in the labour market, or in the home)

the construction of symbols and images – eg dressThe ways people interact – in conversation, interruptionThe ways in which people construct their (gendered)

identitiesIn the fundamental, ongoing processes of work and

workplaces eg written work rules, labor contracts, managerial directives, and other

documentary tools for running large organizations, including systems of job evaluation

The ‘ideal’ worker/leader

The ‘worker’ of labour law and workplace norms has a gender: He is male, he is assumed to be ‘care-free’ He is assumed to be supported at home – a breadwinner with a

partner at home He is the ‘ideal’ worker who sets the norms for working

patterns This is not most women

Who must adapt and morph around the established norms Eg in Australia – 50% women work part-time and take a life-long

pay cut to do so. This is a ‘choice’ around the male norm Joan Williams (2001) Unbending gender: why family and work

conflict and what to do about it, Oxford University Press

When women step into institutions made in the image of the ‘ideal worker’

They are – not infrequently - viewed as differentAffected by their reproductive differences

Pregnancy, the assumption of pregnancy Childcaring and domestic work Other types of caring – for aged, infirm, disability

Closely scrutinized about how they lookSexually harassedDiscriminated against

Leadership takes place within:

Gendered institutions, like the labour marketGendered organizations, like the workplaceSO

Women leaders look different to the established norms of leaders

They behave differently (often) to the gendered norm Reflecting how they are different to men (whether socialised

that way or innately different) Because of their reproductive roles and concerns

They are (often) negatively affected by their ‘difference’ Sexualised, objectified

They lead differently

Being a woman leader

Took me a while…‘My turn’ to be out frontA life-cycle approach to leadership – the right

timeKey things I’ve learned:

1. Vision – being clear about where we are going2. Behaving ethically – all the time3. Managing people well – biggest challenge, always (a

craft to learn)4. Admitting and learning from mistakes5. Trying not to care about people too much….