Moving towards greater female work participation and leadership

Off the back of International Women’s Day — a movement celebrated on 8 March, this year focusing on global pay parity (#PledgeForParity) — government and business have made encouraging announcements regarding the promotion of greater female workforce participation and leadership across all industries.

Acknowledging #PledgeForParity, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) has launched the 2016 Women in Broadcast Technology (WIBT) Scholarships.

The ABC said because women are underrepresented in technology teams across Australia, it is offering eight women studying a technology-related discipline a chance at paid work experience alongside technical engineers to learn more about broadcast media.

Airservices Australia is also focused on increasing female workforce participation, urging women around the country to consider a career in aviation as part of the internationally recognised Women of Aviation Worldwide Week.

Andrew Boyd, executive general manager people and culture, said Airservices is committed to raising awareness of diversity within the workplace and encouraging women into traditional male-dominated roles.

“We are focused on attracting women to operational areas of the organisation such as air traffic control, technical and engineering roles, and aviation rescue firefighting,” Boyd said.

“This week provides us with an opportunity to encourage women to consider a role in aviation... it is also a timely reminder to young women that there are varied and interesting career options available in an organisation where it is possible to make a significant contribution to the economy, community and helping others.”

According to Minister for Women Senator Michaelia Cash, the magnitude of benefits that would flow from female participation in the workforce matching male participation is becoming much better understood by business, government and the broader community.

“If we are to fully harness the potential of our human capital and ensure as Australians we really are the best we can be, we need to unlock 100% of our workforce,” said Senator Cash.

“Australian women are some of the most highly educated in the world. Yet our female workforce participation rate for 15- to 64-year-olds (as reported by the OECD) is 70.5%, compared with men at 82.2%.”

However, she pointed out that in the start-up sector, more women innovators are increasingly emerging.

“Start-up Muster’s latest report reveals that in 2014, 24% of start-up businesses were founded by women, 5% more than the previous year,” she said.

Currently, however, only one in four IT graduates and less than one in eight engineering graduates are women.

To address this, the government has announced a commitment of $13 million to encourage more women into the Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) industries over the next five years.

Promoting female leadership, Minister Cash also announced that the government will commit to increasing the target to 50% female representation across all Australian Government boards, with a minimum of 40% on each board.

“Credit Suisse found that from 2005 to 2014, boards with a higher-than-average percentage of women outperformed those with fewer than average by 36%,” said Senator Cash.

“Although many female leaders are making their mark, we still have a long way to go before women in positions of leadership are the norm, rather than the exception to the rule.”

The 2010 Gender Equality Blueprint identified women in leadership as one of five key priority areas in achieving gender equality, since in virtually all sectors of the paid workforce, women are underrepresented in leadership positions.

According to the Human Rights Commission, gender disparity in Australian workplaces perpetuates stereotypes about the role of women, both at work and in wider society, and therefore exacerbates gender pay inequity. The commission said current gender bias means that women are often employed in roles where their productivity is not maximised, although if this was minimised, for example, by increasing the number of women in leadership positions, the level of economic activity in Australia could be boosted by 20%.

Analysis by Goldman Sachs suggests closing the equity gap could also increase Australia’s GDP by as much as 11%.

The commission said economic incentives such as these would also have flow-on effects for wider society, including assisting the problem of pension sustainability by reducing the dependency ratio, lifting household savings rates and increasing tax received by the government.

Minister Cash, however, believes boosting women’s workforce participation is not just about our nation’s bottom line.

“It is about empowering men and women to make the choices they want, rather than the choices they feel they have to make because of cultural, structural and institutional barriers that still exist,” she said.

Image courtesy of Cuatrecasas Goncalves Pereira under CC-BY-2.0