Writing a "developing women as senior leaders" proposal for my company- advice/suggestions!

[Desperate2012]

So I work for a large, wonderful, extremely family friendly company. However the only senior leader in my department just went on Mat leave and now it's 100% men on the functional board. This concerns me, as at the level down (where I am) it's more like 50/50. And I'm a feminist- this ain't right. But I also think the solution ISN'T quotas or over promoting female candidates.

I don't just want to moan- I want to take a proposal to the company that they create a development program to accelerate women with senior leadership potential.

So, if you were taking female middle/senior managers and accelerating their development to board level... What would you do? External mentoring? Secondment? With who? External courses? Networking opportunities? Where and with who?

Ps- I think I have the kudos to propose this- I have track record.

Do you have any evidence for why the 50% of women at your level aren't being promoted? Are they not as good? Are they not selling themselves and their achievements well? Is there unconscious or deliberate sexism at a higher level (e.g. a "mummy track")? You say your company is "family friendly" -- what does that entail? Do as many men as women take advantage of the "family friendly" policies?

I don't see that you can design an effective development program until you are clear what needs to be developed.

Thanks Debbie- very valid.

Yes, I see men and women taking advantage of he family friendly policies- I know of 2 men who took 6mos pat leave and of 2 senior leaders who regularly leave early to pick their kid up from school (we all get flex-time access). Not as many as the women, true, but i think thats a wider cultural issue in the UK and cant blame the company for that!

I genuinely think they go out of their way to ensure they DO NOT "mummy track" (interesting phrase BTW). I don't feel my career is being limited and know of mums who work 9-5 and have been promoted; they deserved it, they were the best candidate.

I think the board is all men because of history- women at the next level down are relatively new appointments. I also know of someone on this board who actively looks for women who want flex-time/job share/part time on his team and in wider recruitment as he believes its an untapped wealth of knowledge and experience in the industry. So no, I really don't think there is an attitude problem here.

I ALSO think there are some inherent things women do that men do not and vice versa that ensure men progress more quickly.

I think my company would LIKE to have more women leaders, but is a bit stuck in my department - it's sales, and traditionally it's been mostly men. They want women on the board- and I want to give them a proposal on how they can get them there more quickly because the current board is not representative of the company

Does that help?

Have a look at the interventions offered by the Civil Service Crossing Thresholds programme for ideas.

Is there full pay mat leave? If so for how long? Are women coming back from mat leave? Do they come back after one child but not after the second?

Id want to do more analysis of when and why women are 'dropping out' of the company. Do they leave the workplace altogether or get jobs elsewhere?

I think it's telling that you said that Mums who work 9-5 get promoted. this implies that there is a culture of long work hours and presenteeism. so they could look at changing this culture and discourage late working when possible.

They could also so a pay audit to check that salaries at the same level are equal.

Do most of their senior staff come through the ranks or are they recruited from outside?

Do they have written equal opps policies and are these well known to staff?

Are there any training courses that they could sponsor women to go on?

Do they promote based on years of service or is it competency based?

Are training courses and promotions offered to women on mat leave?

How is sexism dealt with in the workplace eg if someone makes a sexist comment, is it seen as banter or treated as a disciplinary matter?

wave thank you for that link! Really interesting. Do you know of any similar program's in the private sector? I thought the scope for career advice and mentoring most interesting. You wouldn't get that with a single-company program.

Weatherall Ok, answers below but to be clear, I believe we need to develop women as leaders in this context, not change the culture of the company, which these questions seem to be implying?

Everyone I know comes back, although some only for the required 6mos- my understanding is this is due to high childcare costs not discrimination. And im not looking to address childcare issues. They are in the process of adding support in this (they already do ccc etc).

I'm not sure this is a dropping out issue necessarily. It's about fast-tracking women up to more senior roles.

Do you have any vacancies?

desperate what's the difference between quotas / targets or "overpromoting" women versus "accelerating development" or "fast-tracking" women to more senior roles?

How much do they encourage men to take paternity leave/work part time? How well do they pay paternity leave (now that men can take 6 months, do they get paid at the same rate as women?), and are they explicitly told they can put in a request to change their hours after they have children (in the same way that every maternity policy will state)? My completely unresearched opinion is that in a good company that women do as well as men until they start having children and then they end up on the mummy track. If that becomes a 'parent track' it gives families more choice.

As far as quotas go, if you think about it in reverse then about half of those men at the next level up shouldn't be there because there is probably a female candidate out there that would be better at the job. At the moment there is male overpromotion, even if it's not done consciously. Actually, does your HR department offer gender awareness training? A bit of education for recruiters about stereotype threat, male over estimation of performance and comparing CVs that are identical apart from the John or Jane at the top might help the people recruiting be aware of their own subconscious biases.

There is a new book out which examines how women have less confidence than men and tend to not push themselves forward at work. There is an interesting take on the premise of the book here:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/23/female-confidence-gap-katty-kay-claire-shipman

Essentially it suggests that it not necessarily women themselves who lack confidence, but that it is borne from the culture we live in, Which is pervasive and hard to get away from (even in the best working environment).

Women fail to push themselves forward at work because they get knocked back in other spheres of their lives on a daily basis. Even with the best will in the world, a good employer is going to find it hard to reinvigorate or encourage women who are already battle weary.

Hi whatdoesit

Really interesting. I think there's been a lot of pushback on this book - and on lean in.

I suppose it depends on what your objective and measurable outcome are. I believe the desired outcome for my company should be for the senior leadership in its sales function to reflect the gender split of its middle management and customers. Therefor I'm really not trying to get EVERY woman to be a senior manager (hey, not every man is either!) but just a reflective cohort.

The book and the pushback is more generalised cultural discourse about what may be a contributing factor to female under-representation and possible cultural action to address this problem in the long or short term (and there's the rub: the book says "do this for a short-term fix" and the pushback is "this doesn't address the long-term issue". This isn't a debate I'm looking to take part in at the moment),

I think (to address someone earlier) the difference between accelerated development and over promotion is that the first aims to give people the skills, experience and knowledge to warrant a promotion in a faster progress trajectory than would be expected without the development program. The latter is promoting someone with potential before they are ready - which can actually detract from personal development and retard career progress.

what skillset are they missing that would bridge the gap between current role and board level and therefore would form the basis of the development programme? (so one woman might need people management training, another might need finance training etc)

it may be different for each (potential) candidate, so would tailored development (encompassing the various options you've outlined as necessary) be an option?

do managers have in-depth career development discussions so that these potential candidates are identified and their development areas highlighted?

Why are men in middle management getting the skills and experience needed for promotion but women aren't?

Is the 50:50 in the same role?

So you have 4 Key account Managers - 2 male, 2 female - doing the same role and getting the same experience but in the last 4 promotional rounds it was ALWAYS the male key account directors who were promoted to Key Account Director? In a 50:50 gender choice it is 100% of the time a man who is chosen?

If that is true then I think you do have a cultural challenge. Somehow the evaluation method for the top jobs has a gender bias.

If women in your company see a male dominated board room, what message does that send to them regardless of how family friendly it is elsewhere ?

You need to be encouraging these women. Are you allowed observers at board meetings ? Can they see what goes on ? Do they know that there is a desire to encourage more of a split ?

Do you have a specific policy that actively encourages women to move to that level because without one, they are going to internalise the fact that your board IS 100% male ? That alone is discouraging.

And without positive discrimination, how are you going to show these women that the company really does want them. A mentor who hasn't been able to achieve board position themselves wouldn't really encourage me but a positive recruitment drive or training course that actively welcomed women would be better. Even better if it was entirely aimed at women. It would show a credible commitment rather than lip service.

And watch that you don't isolate young women who have no intention of having families - they get worried that they'll be sidelined by family friendly policies or expected to have to act like men to get ahead. It can be a lonely place for them as they fit in neither group. I'd rather a company concentrated on a work/life balance for all. Women are just as likely to have caring responsibilities as they get older and their career progresses - is there support for that ?

Have you asked for feedback from other female employees to see if they see the company the same way you do ?

Sorry. The one female board members gone on mat leave and you're just noticing there's an issue....? Just struck me as odd tis all...

You need to do two columns, one showing pro points of working for you. One negative. At mid senior level. People are either noticing there's nowhere to go to or that they lose what they do have if they get higher.

Have you looked at the times top 100? Do they have a form you could bastardise? Recruitment firms might also have useful ideas; try capability Jane, working mums like us or

If you were recruiting from outside what would you offer? And what might you negotiate on? Same should be available inside really, shouldn't it?

Consider this - at my org we have a 'fast track' program. This selects people who show aptitude & past performance & move them into very challenging roles for a fixed period of time eg 1 year or so. They are given 'stretch targets' which will take an extra effort/ attitude to get delivered.

If they succeed they receive fast track promotions.

This is one way to get moving quicker than you otherwise would. But it would take more from the employee & they have to be willing to give that.

Is a mentoring scheme available? I ran one at a bank. I could jot a few ideas if helps.

This smacks of saying that women are not promoted because they don't have the skills or confidence. It seems unlikely to me that this is the problem if you have good representation of women at middle levels. I'd be wary of these schemes as they can divert the attention away from the actual cause of the imbalance and put the onus for solving it on individual women who must undergo further "development programmes" to become "good enough" to promote.

Without knowing your company, I would hazard a guess that the problems are structural and not to do with the skills or talents of the women who are not being promoted. As another poster said, how does your company treat men who want paternity leave or part-time / flexible work?

I think if you have a decent pool of mid-level women, there should be no issue of over-promoting. Women have been at roughly equal numbers at junior / entry levels in most workplaces for at least 20 years. The impact on women in senior level jobs has been relatively negligible compared with the numbers entering most fields. The problem does not lie with women not having skills. I think men should be required to take paternity leave and there should be quotas for women in senior jobs. I can't see any other way of making a meaningful change.

Sunny - that would be incredibly helpful, thank you

Hi, this is a topic I have been doing a lot of reading and research on and spoken recently to a company with 1500 employees who decided to put a program in place ( nothing to do with my job just a desire to improve in my own company)If you pm me I could arrange for some more info and contact details. There'd are lots of ideas , my own thoughts are around the intended outcome and hence target to get there. I am not convicted the posts out show enough evidence gathering to identify the barriers. Anyway happy to help

What training is available for men to give them the opportunity to examine possible unconscious sexism?

As FF says, if you have plenty of female middle managers, it's not the lack of women with the right skills that's the problem. It's the reluctance to promote them.

" I know of a few promotion on mat leave. I'd say generally not, but fair enough. They don't promote people on career breaks in general either"

Maternity leave is not a career break.

Hm I think this is not possible for a single company to fix on its own. I think it's great that your company gives parental leave to men as well (can't remember if it was the same length as paid maternity leave).

That's the key, for me. When women and men are equally likely to take parental leave following the birth of a child, then a massive obstacle will have been removed - women won't be the "risky" option any more.

Unfortunately this is a long game. So to really help all the women in your company, their husbands'/partners' employers need to be offering paid paternity leave to THEM. So the women don't need to be the ones taking the break.
At least your company is setting an example which will (hopefully) eventually become the norm.

I think you need to start with an analysis of what it currently takes to get on the board.

Skills/ qualifications - what education and training have the board members received - do they all have professional qualifications? If so, do the women at your level also have these? Are they working towards them? If not, then a very practical first step is for your company to fund study costs and study leave to help them acquire the qualifications they need.

Experience - what sort of clients were the board working with before they got promoted? What kind of turnover? Are the women at your level getting exposed to the same kind of opportunities? If not, what can the company do to make sure that they do?

Relationships - moving up to board level means thinking more broadly about how your function contributes to the business rather than just about the needs of your function. Are women getting enough exposure to other teams and functions to understand enough about the broader business. What can the company do to facilitate this kind of networking?

Attitude - I hate to say it, but I think it is partially true that women don't step up to board level because they don't want to. What can the company do to challenge limiting beliefs amongst women? It sounds as if it is already very forward thinking in terms of flexibility so what more can it do to challenge the fear that a board level job would be too all consuming and not leave the employee with enough time for the other aspects of their life?

Whatever you do, don't make it all about appearance. I am sick to death of seeing career workshops for women that start with a list of instructions on how to dress.......

Good luck OP - hope it goes well.

If internal promotions are standard, how many promotions have happened from your level to the next one up in say the last 3 years and of those, how many have been men. Based on your comments, I would assume the majority have been men. Which means there is a cultural issue.

In which case I'd suggest that your proposal needs to cover training/mentoring/coaching for those who make the decisions to help them avoid this gender bias. It's all very well saying that there need to be programmes to help women etc, and that's important, but with all the help in the world, if the decision makers aren't going to change their approach, nothing will help.

I only recently realised that the "promotion" I didn't get in my last job (the one where I was already doing the job) had gender bias in it. I thought it was because the decision maker didn't like me. A link to Harriet Harman's speech made me realise with a lightbulb moment that if I had been a man, even though the decision maker didn't like me, he would still have "given" me that job and he and I would have had to find a way round that because everyone else in the organisation would have been happy that I had it (and in fact, in most cases were surprised that it was being advertised as they all assumed that was my job).

still reeling from shock that awful last job was worse than I had even realised