Women in Leadership Roadshow – Observations

I live for the day that we want the best for the person not their classification, category or physical appearance.
Denise Gibbons

I had the privilege of having a small part in the Public Sector Network Women in Leadership Roadshow in Brisbane and Sydney over the past week.

When I was asked by Mike Cullen the Director of the Roadshow to be a part of it (thanks to LinkedIn), I jumped at the chance.  I wanted to experience first hand discussions about what is happening for women in leadership in the public sector.  I wanted to know if my research and theories were still current, relevant and appropriate.  I also wanted to see what women leaders are doing in this sector.

It was truly a memorable two days for me.  There were over 100 women at each venue and the women and men speakers were amazing to watch, listen and learn from.

I thought I would share some of my observations about the women’s leadership space from my two-day involvement.

• There are some amazing women at the top of some of the public sector organisations and bodies.  The statistics for some of the pipelines and executive levels though are still gender skewed to men.

• The public sector is very aware of the gender imbalance at the senior management level and are looking at lots of different ways of addressing this issue.  

• The public sector appears to be slightly ahead of the private sector in terms of addressing this issue.  Jackie Woods, Engagement Executive Manager, Workplace Gender Equality Agency in NSW shared the observation that the private sector is catching up with the public sector in terms of innovation though.  She said that the public sector needed to look at what the private sector are doing and learn from their experience.
• Flexibility in workplaces is the key for the parenting piece. The challenges that were discussed with this concept are
  – Part-time work is not valued to the same extent as full-time work, so people are left out or inhibited in their careers because of this.
  – Job sharing creates another level of organisation and management that still needs to be addressed.
  – People who go on parental leave are often left out of the pipeline process so do not feel valued.  This can lead to people dropping out or changing career direction.
  – Affordable, easily accessible and excellent child-care is essential and not just for the younger years.  Childcare needs to be available at all hours and for before and after school care as well as holiday care.  Saveria Dimasi Deputy Chief Operating Officer, The University of Qld shared the childcare and day care system they are designing for this university.
  – Workplaces need to value and encourage men taking parenting time not just women.

• Implicit bias in terms of remuneration is stark for gender differences.  The statistic quoted was that females are paid 22% less than the male for the equivalent position.

• Implicit bias will only change culturally as we see and observe more effective women leaders.

One interesting observation from Cheryl Vardon Chief Executive and Principal Commissioner, Qld Family and Child Commission was that women are being distracted by thinking that they need to fix themselves rather than the system.  She said that Women’s Leadership courses were being offered as a diversion and the courses are not the answer.

Of course, this challenged my thinking since I’ve developed a Women’s Empowerment and Leadership Program.  I’m passionate in my belief that it will help with the change.  I agree that the cultural norms need to be challenged and changed.  My belief is that women need to have the tools so that they can be courageous and demand that change.  It needs to be a two-prong approach.

After many years of being involved in a male dominated profession and building a business there, I know how weary you become at having to justify who you are and what you are doing just because of your gender.  This justification is required for both genders as well which makes it even more frustrating.  I live for the day that we want the best for the person not their classification, category or physical appearance.

There were lots of discussion and comment about men being involved in helping with the change.  I observed that it’s still considered odd that women have a separate leadership roadshow with limited involvement from men. Again, I believe this is necessary so that we can have solidarity.

There was also discussion around targets verses quotas.  Lots of division on this of course.  I personally believe that targets will not work unless there is some penalty process for failure to meet targets.   The change will be too slow otherwise.

It’s important that we don’t get distracted though.  It is a human system issue.

One human issue that I observed is the level of stress being experienced especially for frontline government services.  There needs to be more discussion, I believe, on this important issue too.  We are burning people out with the work demands that are being made.

Lots of food for thought from the two days.  I would really appreciate any comments or observations.  Robust discussion is needed for any cultural change.

Remember all of this and much, much more is provided in my Women’s Empowerment and Leadership Program.  The next program is on 5th and 6th July 2018.