Gender equality

Published Date: 23 Mar 2015

Over the years there has been great effort made with respect to gender equality. Societies have slowly but changed their views on women working alongside men in various public and private companies which had been a male dominated territory previously. Due to various civil rights organizations, women's role in the work place has increased and that is not only in developed countries but also in developing countries which is good to see. "In America due to the enactment of title VII, the wage income of women has increased by $22billion and more than four million were working in higher job categories" (Raymond F. Gregory, 2003).

Although there has been a major improvement with respect to the working conditions for women, there is still need further improvements if we have fair and equal gender equality. Employment discrimination against women still exists in the work place. In the United States women occupy 40% of all manager positions. Only 6% of the fortune 500's top executives are female and just 2% of those firms have women CEOs (Alice H. Eagly and Linda L. Carli, September 2007). Let's look at an example of an American insurance company called Reserve Life Insurance Company in Ft. Lauderdale. The regional manager of this company once said that "we can't have women in management because women are like Jews and niggers; they hire like themselves and the trouble with that is that when they leave they take (the workers they hired) with them" (Raymond F. Gregory, 2003). Real life examples like these and many experience results from various magazines tell us that gender discrimination still exists especially when it comes to choose the CEO of a company or higher position in a company which need to be decide immediately. So the question is why are women discriminated against? What might be the possible reasons?

First of all there seems to be discriminate against women, it means men are promoted more quickly than women with equivalent qualifications and experience. There is also a lot of resistance to female leadership because people think that successful female managers are more pushy and selfish compared to successful male managers. On the other hand, there is also a problem of leadership style. Many leading females like to struggle to strike a balance, it means women have a nature of showing compassion to others, as a leader need to be confident and in control of their emotions and surroundings. One last major reason why women might be discriminated against in the work place is that of family demands. Women interrupt their careers to start a family, hence juggle work with family. This does not give them time to join the social network process which is essential to advancement (Alice H. Eagly and Linda L. Carli, September 2007). A study published in the Harvard business review in 1965 reported that more than 32% of respondents believe that a woman's biological makeup makes them unsuitable for manager or CEO roles. In this study respondents considered a good manager to possess so called masculine traits which is another reason why women are often discriminated in climbing up the hierarchy of a company (A. Nichols and Rosabeth Moss Kanter, 1996). Now let's look at the steps companies can take to help its female employees have equal opportunity with men to reach its highest positions.

First of all companies should send a message directly from the top. Almost all companies who have achieved a high level of gender diversity are because the CEO of the company is personally committed to the cause. Leaders at the top have to be committed to help females achieve higher positions in a company. On the other hand, another step companies should take is to rethink their human resource policies. This means that companies which penalize women for taking maternity leave should be changed so that women have a fair and equal chance of competing with men. A woman's tenure with the company should not be shortened due to this particular reason as this leads to gender discrimination, hence it should be removed. Another step companies should take is to make mentoring a priority. Even though every young person can benefit from this, it is even more helpful for a woman as she will be working in a male dominated corporate environment. Therefore the need for mentoring is essential.

"According to McKinsey, companies with three or more women in senior management scored higher on measures of organizational excellence than companies with no women at the top"(http://finance.alphatrade.com/story/20091019/PRN/200910190001PR_NEWS_USPR_____DE94359.html). Companies can further help women in getting to higher positions in a company by introducing a flexible hours scheme for women who have to take care of a family as well. Large corporations can also invest in facilities like child care nurseries/day care. If such facilities are introduced to help women then sky will be the limit for them and we will see more and more women as CEO's (www.hrlaw.co.uk, April 2009). Basically if companies and organizations take steps to provide equal opportunity policies, prevention of sexual harassment policies, diversity management and track and monitor the progress of both men and women on equal grounds then the corporate world will be one step closer to achieving the goals of gender equality (Linda Wirth, February 2002). Further steps which can be taken by companies who want more women leaders need to introduce the following ideas. "Evaluate and reward women's productivity by objective results, not by the number of hours at work" (Alice H. Eagly and Linda L. Carli, September 2007).

If the steps mentioned in the previous paragraph are implemented by companies and organizations we will see greater number of women growth up in manager and CEO levels. This process is not a short term and will need time to produce results but at least if such measures are taken by companies we know that we will be heading in the right direction to achieve gender diversity within corporations.

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