INTRODUCTION:
Money is no longer the only decisive factor of production in today’s global economy. It is greatly governed by talented workforce which increasingly determine the economy’s competitive advantage and is less dependent on tangible issues. Modern World is moving from capitalist economy to talent based economy. The future of any country or company lies in its ability to attract, develop and sustain best talent from the market.
Half of world human capital comprises of women. In this competitive world the fundamental elements of succeeding and prospering lies in educating girls, empowering them and leveraging their efforts, talent and leadership skills in economy, politics and society. With talent shortage projected to become more severe in global market, maximizing access to female talent is strategic imperative for business. Thus gender parity can no longer be treated as superfluous. The efficient use of this talent pool is key driver of competitiveness.
The article deals with the present situation of women in labor force and the problems faced by then while climbing the ladder. Women are restricted from being accepted fully in any organization and from getting due deserving recognition for their contribution towards the organization’s success, mainly because of existing notions like they are ruled by heart and not head, their personal life gets more importance etc. Can just being a male employee and not a female employee ensure better excellence? And since the answer is “no” then why such barriers are put in their way?
In this article, first we study about the present condition of women in the labor market with respect to gender parity. Then we try to understand the reasons pertaining to present situation. Finally, we end our study with the few practices from different parts of the globe to reduce the gender parity.
PRESENT SITUATION:
A nation’s progress and competitiveness greatly depends on how significantly a country educates and utilizes its female population, which is one-half of the available talent pool. Major setbacks in growth and success of women employees within an organization are social constraints imposed upon them by society, their family and many a times, women themselves. The world of women where they today share podium with men, right from kitchen to defense is undergoing a dramatic change. Working women are now an integral part of workforce and they have earned their place and respect with great efforts. Women employees are increasing steadily in Indian companies, but in top management positions they are very rare. Only 10 percentage of women comprise of senior managers in Fortune 500 companies, among which not more than 4% are in the uppermost ranks and less than 3% are top corporate earners. In India too, the situation is not very different.
The stunning statistics of Indian labor market elude the shining India Inc. Out of all the listed companies only 26.1 have a woman on their boards. There are only ten women directors out of the 278 total number of directors on the BSE Sensex companies. And to worsen the situation women executive in India earn 40% less than their male counterparts. In comparison to global companies, Indian companies stand far below average. According to Fortune, Over 77% companies in the world had at least one women director on their board as of 2006 while 36% of Indian corporate houses have women holding senior management positions as compared to 91%of companies in China.
According to a survey conducted by World Economic Forum India places at 114th position out of the 134 countries covered in the Global Gender Gap Index 2009, showing how opportunities and resources are being divided between women and men in Indian corporate houses. In the economic participation and opportunity, India was at 127th position, having closed a little over 41% of the gender gap in this category. Women’s labor force participation, at 36%, is less than half of the labor force participation rate of men (85%). A woman’s per estimate earned annual income (approximately Rs. 55,790) is less than a third of a man’s income (approximately Rs.1,74,102). The gap for similar work is narrower, with women’s incomes perceived to be roughly two-thirds of men’s incomes. And women make up only 3% of legislator, senior managers and other senior official
According to United Nations Development Program-sponsored 2010 Asia-Pacific Human Development Report, the less participation of women in labour market costs the region billions of dollars every year. If employment rate among women in countries like India, Malaysia and Indonesia in increased to 70%, which is the rate in most developed countries, the GDP of these countries would grow by 2-3 % annually. According to UNDP report, in countries like India and Pakistan less than 35% of women do paid work.
However, on the brighter side, there has been a rise in number of women graduates opting for technical and mainstream study courses which were once considered male domain. And with the coming up of MNCs, the demand for more jobs for women will increase which will open the doors for women’s participation, as most of them have equal-opportunity work policies.
REASONS OF GENDER PARITY:
The barriers to women’s access to leadership position are due to the prevailing customs and thought process of the country, masculine corporate culture and lack of role models, lack of adequate parental leave and benefits, inadequate labour laws and regulation in country. These are the myths fostered and sustained by preconceived ideas with no evidence, which are a major set back in our society.
Myths applied to women in business:
* Women work only for economic reasons.
* Women can be trusted and usually fall in a crisis.
* Women cannot be trusted with important matters and their main concern is social aspect of job.
* Women have more concerns about working conditions.
* Women are unwilling to travel in general.
* Women are in general too emotional.
Since the last 1-2 decades, the number of women in the workforce has been increasing at a faster rate and will continue to improve in the areas of government services and education, but the increase in the number of women in management and top-notch positions has not kept pace with increase in number of women in workforce. The main reasons are:
- There exist a lot of stereotypes and biases against women when it comes to executive positions. They are underestimated and considered lacking in the qualities like taking strong, quick effective decisions that are considered basic requirement to be effective managers. Traditional masculine nature have been given higher importance and perceived value than feminine traits in management and other top-notch jobs.
- The posts which the individual employees hold within the organization shapes the abilities, traits and the behavior they develop in long run. Women are in general given positions with very limited power, freedom and authority.
- Mentoring plays an important role for growth of any employee into management positions. However mentoring is not available easily which results in a lack of abilities and training that is needed for growth.
- To make situations worse, women often have to tackle the complexities and hardships of the multiple roles as a wife, working women and mother. Women employees with children are looked as less favorable and considered less committed to work.
WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE:
In order to overcome such insurmountable obstacles, women need to seek support. Today’s competitive world organizations require to best utilize available talent to them irrespective of gender. Thus it is the need of hour that barriers to upward mobility for women need to be removed to respond to the dilemmas faced by women managers. Organizations have realized that women offer a wealth of talent that deserves equal support and respect.
Generally companies have followed three approaches when it comes to gender initiatives. Some companies like their women employees to be a part of their existing ‘boys’ culture, expect them to adopt masculine styles of functioning, play golf with seniors, take on tough assignments in factories or do overseas difficult projects and be aggressive leaders just like the men. Some companies realize that women may do the same work but have different needs that needs to be addressed and accommodated at workplace. Hence not only maternity leave if offered to their women employees but also many benefits like flexible working hour, working from home, allowing transfers to women easily (when their husband moves) or even being amenable to women giving them options of choosing alternate career tracks within organization itself. The third set of companies not only accommodate women employees, but recognize that with then comes a difference in work approach and attitude towards the workplace. Hence, they also palace them appropriately, so their interactive style of leadership brings gains to the organization.
However, all three approaches have their limitations. Just being an assertive leader, taking important roles, having flexible working hours or even being praised getting in the ‘feminine’ approach in the company does not makes much difference in terms of the essential gender differences inherent within the system. That needs a larger social change and a drastic shift in perspective. Thus women are aware of these constraints and try their best to deal with the situation. Since they also have greater responsibilities towards home and family, they have greater demand of time outside office which is perceived as their lack of commitment to work. And as they reach the top-level, they bring with them both the many positive and some special needs.
Below are few successful practices adopted by companies across the globe to check gender parity:
1) HCL India
Researchers at HCL found that rise of women in work is often challenged by marriage and mother hood. These can be best solved if women are allowed to speak and can get support of their other co-workers and the management. Thus HCL created platform ‘BlogHer’ for employees to connect, dialogue and come up with gender inclusive practices and policies. The topics can be started by any employee or the diversity team, which is a part of CEO’s office working on strategies, initiatives and programs. Thus on this platform various viewpoints, suggestions and dilemmas are discussed and collectively solutions are found.
Success factors:
-Participation of employees across all levels
-Free and open discussions and peer mentoring
-Equal number of men coming up for gender issues
2)CISCO, United States
The ‘Inclusive advocacy program'(IAP) is designed to develop, engage and retain diverse talent. Under the program juniors are paired to senior officials called Advocate for a year to accelerate exposure, visibility, exposure ,growth and opportunity for advancement.77% of IAP employees are women 30% are multicultural. There was significant increase in engagement measured through more challenging assignments, rotations and promotions.
Success factors:
-Virtually no cost
– Executives were willing to Support
3) Coca Cola, Brazil
In Brazil, Coca-Cola works with around 1 million small shop owners around 30% of which are women owned/ operated.
Under Coletivo Residential Entrepreneurship – many women from low earning families who would like to run small shops out of their house but don’t have required skill sets. The program provides these women opportunity to gain entrepreneurship skills and help them start shops in their home.
Under Colectivo Artesian Entrepreneurship– There are numerous small-scale women artesian who turn recycled coca-cola packages into jewelry, art, hand back and other consumer articles. The program provides business and design training to these and enable them to earn more and greater sustainable incomes.
4) Banco Santander SA, Spain
This company has 3 special programs to identify and develop female talent within the organization. Each of these is addressed to a different moment in their career:
- Enganchate (‘Seize’) – for new generations, to awaken their professional ambition.
- Impulsa (‘Drive’) – for women in middle management positions to help them keep on track and avoid their giving up.
- Supera (‘Exceed’) – for those women already in senior positions, to give them more visibility and help them to rise higher.
The central idea is that those women participating in “enganchate” will be participating in “impulsa” 2 or 3 years later and in “supera” 5 or 6 years later – in parallel with their promotions with time. In all cases, participating women receive guidance and mentorship from an internal guides for a year at each stage . They attend presentation training and meet with top-level executives. After a stage has been completed, those women who have been most promising are catered with an individual development plans, and their growth is monitored. Most women continue to be under the mentorship of these guides even after a year which provides them with an opportunity to interact with senior officials of the company.
CONCLUSION
Women are not getting an equal opportunities from business houses and governments. Women need to speak up, ask for more opportunities and exercise more control especially in areas where they have leverage. Different from the course of mankind’s history in which they have always played role of subordinate, the recent changes regarding the growth of women in almost all realms of life have taken place at an amazing fast rate – and organizations, society and many times women themselves have not been able to always keep pace with these changes.
At the time of first international women day in 1911, one hundred years ago, the women’s movement in Europe and North America was focused mainly on women’s suffrage. Some 50 years ago women came forward demanding equal education opportunities and a new revolution started,which has resulted today in women constitution more than 50% of graduate institutes in most of the developing countries. As a result women’s economic integration has deepened and over the past two decades women have joined the labour markets in large numbers.
But still, women are primarily expected to be responsible for their home, and take care for children, the elderly and other dependents in family and thus changed family structures and social attitudes have not kept pace. Although several decades have passed since women first entered into corporate structures, there is a continuous dearth of women in top leadership positions in most of the world’s biggest companies. Organizational structures, like hiring employees and retaining them, have also not been adapted well. Finally government policies on taxation, availability of childcare, maternal and paternal leave are not adequate. As organizational structures and policy changed sluggishly women feel overstretched and they feel like trying to have it all is not that worth the effort. This is why it is important to women, young women in particular that their efforts are necessary and will be rewarded with more success than previous generation.
Yet this cannot happen unless the corporates and government take an initiative to accelerate the pace of change. It is easily seen that companies which have invested in integrating more women across their full hierarchy get the fruit of their diversity. There is positive relationship between closing gender gap and increasing country’s competitiveness. And yet our country still functions with structures designed decades ago when gender roles were segregated within home and work. Government policies in most of the developing countries, with the exception of Nordic countries, still lack in terms of balancing the demands of home and work between men and women, which is setback for their efficiencies.
Certainly women must realize that they need to take responsibility of their personal success at workplace, but it is also very important that corporate houses and governments need to make sure that this success should be achievable to those who aspire for it and make efforts for the same. It would be bad for our economic growth, business performance and women themselves if there is any reversal or deceleration in the trend of the policy changes needed for gender diversity across the globe.
By: Nitish Srivastava
