The Great Debate UK

The future is female? A re-traditionalisation of gender

Ruth Simpson is professor in management at Brunel Business School in West London and founding member of the Centre for Research in Emotion Work and Employment Studies. The opinions expressed are her own. Thomson Reuters is hosting a live blog for the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day on March 8, 2011.

Are we in a post-feminist era or are conventional images of masculinity and femininity re-surfacing in society? I argue that rather than gender disadvantage being a thing of the past, as captured in understandings of post-feminism, gender is becoming more entrenched. In fact post-feminism itself – the belief that sexism is over – has allowed renewed disadvantage to emerge.

Post-feminism can be identified in a range of social trends. It can be seen in representations, common in the media, of the “Future is Female” celebrating the supposed assets that women bring into organizations. Women are thus seen to be the new “winners” – bringing crucial “emotional skills” to an economy characterised by attention to customer service and to “modern” organizations that are based on managing horizontal relationships rather than vertical ones and on a need for team-working rather than old-fashioned command and control.

Women are seen to have the right skills and mindset for this new working environment – to be adept at listening and communication, to be risk-aware rather than risk-taking and to be charismatic and visionary leaders. These celebratory visions are associated with Generation Y – the younger generation born after 1977 and who are just entering or who have recently enrolled in the labour market.

Members of this generation are confident, independent and seek challenging enjoyable work as well as time for play. They believe they can author their own lives through the choices they make, have a faith in meritocracy and, in terms of gender, believe that discrimination is a thing of the past.

The glass ceiling has been broken and feminism is an issue for their parents’ generation, not their own, with young women, particularly in the context of education, outperforming men. But a post-feminist faith in meritocracy and choice may mean we have become blind to issues of gender so that a new traditionalisation has crept in. A feminist consciousness has been replaced by a belief in merit, empowerment and choice. But notions of merit are not gender free.

Girl power? Reality, fantasy or chimera?

Susan Buckingham is a Professor in the Centre for Human Geography and Director of Social Work, at Brunel University in West London. The opinions expressed are her own. Thomson Reuters is hosting a live blog on March 8, 2011, to mark International Women’s Day.

In a recent public lecture on “Changing Britain” at Brunel University, I explored the proposition that society is becoming feminised. I examined current pay and employment data to argue that, while some statistics can be used to argue that some women are becoming more equal with men in some areas, the failure of women to significantly penetrate key decision making bodies, and continuing horizontal job segregation means that “girl power” is more a chimera than reality in the UK today.

Drawing from my own research in the environmental sector, I propose that this is not only problematic for women, as they continue to earn less than their male counterparts and face additional barriers to career progression and being appointed in key decision making roles, but that the failure of the country to capitalise on a significant share of its experience, expertise and intellect limits society as a whole.

A cursory glance at education figures for the UK may suggest that gender equality is being achieved. More women students are entering higher education, and now outnumber men (59 percent of all students in 2008 – 2009). They outperform their male colleagues, with 64 percent of women students achieving 1st and upper second degrees in 2008 – 2009, compared with 59 percent of men.

However, it is instructive to consider how women and men students are distributed. It is clear that women gravitate strongly to particular disciplines, and that these can be linked to lower pay.

For example, between 76 percent to 85 percent of social work, nursing, occupational therapy and physiotherapy students are women, where the average advertised pay for these jobs ranges between 26,000 – 29,900 pounds.

Time to turn our attention to the needs of the bully?

- Libby Payne is an executive committee member of the Employee Assistance Professionals Association and clinical director of CiC.  She has more than 20 years experience in the provision of workplace counselling and psychological support, specialising in the management of crisis interventions and complex personnel issues within organisations. The opinions expressed are her own. -

Bullying is a fact of life in many organisations, regardless of size or industry sector. And in recent days – for the right or the wrong reasons – the subject of workplace bullying has been thrust into the media and public spotlight. But beyond the headlines, bullying is a problem that organisations need to address and do so in a way that focuses on a positive solution, not a public battle to attribute blame.

To achieve this, greater consideration needs to be given to the bullies themselves. All too often they are positioned as the ‘evil perpetrators, reeking fear and havoc on their team or department without a thought or care for the impact they’re having on their victims’ personal or professional lives.

In most cases of workplace bullying, though, the opposite is true. The bully is often a victim of his or her unmanageable stress and pressure that causes their behaviour to cross the line. Such realisation doesn’t make their behaviour right, tolerable or acceptable, but it does start to offer some explanation for the circumstances victims find themselves in.

Employee assistance programmes are often the first port of call for managers who find themselves accused of bullying their people or have a ‘light bulb moment’ that they need to change their management style and behaviour.

The support available from this type of intervention – as well as other techniques such as workplace coaching – enables the bully to finally realise that their management style and behaviour is not acceptable and needs to change.

Perhaps the bully has never received any formal management training or has come from an industry where ‘command and control’, dictatorial leadership is the unchallenged and accepted norm. Or, as floated earlier, they may feel powerless in their role and as a victim of stress themselves find their only means of coping is interpreted by others as bullying.

The long term unemployed – an untapped workforce

- Chris Melvin is Chief Executive of Reed in Partnership. Any views expressed are his own -

The latest employment figures from the Government today confirm analyst predictions that despite the number of people claiming Jobseekers Allowance beginning to level out, pay is down and the number of people recently out of work has increased.

In a climate such as this, with an ongoing influx of the newly unemployed into the market, it’s vital that we maintain help for the long-term unemployed to ensure they are not left behind, with an increased focus on getting them back into work.

There is a danger that people on benefits who have been out of work for some time, could end up being ‘parked’ in favour of those who are closer to the labour market and considered more ‘work ready’. We need to make a concerted effort to ensure that support services, such as re-skilling, confidence-building and training courses are widely available to the long-term unemployed so that when the economy does improve, this group of people will be in a good position to move into work.

A recent report from our ‘Keep Britain Working’ campaign called Meeting the People Challenge showed that when the upturn comes, employers will be looking to replace the staff they have made redundant, and also taking on more skilled staff once recovery begins. This shows a need to maintain the re-skilling and, more importantly, the up-skilling of the long-term unemployed to ensure we are not left with a huge skills gap once more jobs become available again.

The untapped potential of the long-term unemployed is too often overlooked, especially during an economic downturn. This is compounded by the influx of white-collar workers entering the job market for the first time, after finding themselves the victims of mass redundancies.