AIBU to be disappointed that the new CEO of the NCT is a man?

[ArcheryAnnie]

The new CEO of the NCT is due to start work shortly - a man, Nick Wilkie.

The NCT's mission is to support parents during pregnancy, birth and early childhood. Their line re the new CEO is that men can be parents, but my line is that it's only women who get pregnant and give birth.

There are many, many senior, suitably qualified women in the UK who could perform this role. Furthermore, from my experience with the NCT, all the events I went to, it was women who do most of the work. I'm tired of organisations where women make up the majority of the volunteers, or the workers, but where a man is the CEO. I didn't expect it of the NCT.

AIBU to feel massively disappointed that the NCT are putting a man in charge?

[ArcheryAnnie]

(This is the first AIBU I've ever started. Wee bit nervous.)

[MrsHathaway]

If it means they've got rid of Belinda Phipps I'm all for him. She has been terrible.

[dominogocatgo]

Perhaps no women applied.

[MabelSideswipe]

I am torn. It needed a new CEO but I fear it's another sign that the organisation is moving away from its focus on birth and concentrating more and more on parenting.

[FraggleHair]

I think I agree with you. It's a similar situation with primary school teaching and nursing. Most primary school teachers and most nurses are female but men who enter these professions seem to be fast-tracked to management positions.

[Sansarya]

MrsHathaway, she left a while ago and it's been an interim CEO for several months now. Agree that she was a dreadful woman who was despised by most who worked for her.

[MorrisZapp]

Maybe he was the strongest applicant?

[Pumpkinpositive]

Wolud you have a similar issue if the CEO, male or female, wasn't a parent?

[ArcheryAnnie]

Seriously, dominogo? I've been on appointment panels. If I'd had no women applying then I'd wonder what we were doing wrong, that no women wanted to work for us.

(But I don't believe that for a second, that no suitably qualified women applied.)

[RonaldosAbs]

How sexist. Maybe he has an excellent track record and is good at his job?

[WinterOfOurDiscountTents15]

I would hope that they put the best available candidate in the job. What genitals they have should be irrelevant, thats kind of the point women have been trying to make for the last century.

[Sansarya]

Gosh, just seen that the interim CEO died earlier this month

[100redballoons]

No you're not BU Annie. I am too, for all the reasons you've stated.

[FraggleHair]

But were his genitals irrelevant? Did his genitals help get him the job?

[FraggleHair]

I'm googling this Belinda Phipps, had never heard of her till now.

[morage]

That is terrible. Of course the CEO should be a woman.

[ArcheryAnnie]

Did his genitals help get him the job?

Probably, Fraggle, if you take into account the gender differences in the ways boys and girls are educated and socialised, and the differences in the ways men and women apply for jobs and are perceived by appointment panels.

[FraggleHair]

Yes, that's what I mean.

[QuintShhhhhh]

So, we are all for equality, and women can do all sorts of jobs and should do any job even in traditionally male oriented workplaces. But men cant?

[ArcheryAnnie]

(Already got my "no, YOU'RE the real sexist!" square marked off on the bingo card for this thread.)

[ArcheryAnnie]

It's not a level playing field, yet, Quint.

[FraggleHair]

Is it not a bit like a white person being appointed as head of an organisation representing black or Asian people?

I know it's a parenting charity and obviously men are parents but at its core is its primary focus not childbirth?

[helsbels1978]

you aren't being unreasonable. assuming you don't think that Durex should employ women in management positions. i assume that we shouldn't have female prison wardens in male prisons?! and certainly no female headteacher's in boys' schools.

[QuintShhhhhh]

But men can be midwives?

[SirChenjin]

Is this one of those "AIBU - but actually I know I'm not"?

I'm guessing that they chose him for his skills in leading an organisation (as opposed to conforming to the notion that they are incapable of employing the right person for the job and will only employ someone if he has a willy).