Women wield increasing power in workplace
By Gary Kaplan© Pasadena Star-News, March 20, 2010
What's the old saying? "She can bring home the bacon and fry it up in a pan?" This seems particularly timely and true when looking at the great strides women are making in the work force, and particularly, in the current, recession-driven job market.
The New York Times recently reported that "Women are poised to surpass men on the nation's payrolls, taking the majority for the first time in American history."
We can interpret this two ways, either as a positive advancement for women as they are able to gain economic freedom by earning their own wage; or that women have been forced to work to support themselves and their families in our current difficult economy. In either case, women are most definitely a force to be reckoned with, now more than ever.
Although the percentage of women who work is not actually increasing by much, men are taking a much bigger hit during the current recession, as women are generally under-represented in those fields affected most.
According to a recent economic report, from the start of the recession in December 2007 through this past March, 79 percent of the jobs lost were held by men, while 21 percent were held by women. Two male-dominated industries - construction and manufacturing - account for about half of the 6 million jobs lost since the recession started. Given that men account for 87 percent of workers in manufacturing and 71 percent in construction, it's not surprising that men's unemployment is rocketing past women's.
Women tend to be strongly represented in areas like health care and education - 81 percent of health care workers and 61 percent of workers in private education - and so far both fields have proven to be largely recession-proof. Health care logged a net gain of about 542,000 jobs from December 2007 through May, while private education showed a net gain of about 102,000 jobs. Also, government has shown a net job gain of 259,000 in the same period, with 57 percent of government workers comprised of women.
Given how stark and concentrated the job losses are among men, and that women represented a high proportion of the labor force in the beginning of this recession, women are now bearing the burden - or the opportunity, one could say - of being the breadwinners.
There are other positive factors working to women's advantage as well. Compared to men, women executives are younger (47 versus 52); move into executive positions faster (21 years versus 25 years), and are less likely to be lifetime employees (32 percent versus 47 percent).
Additionally, whether a matter of coincidence, or reality, there may be something to the fact a 2005 census of Fortune 500 companies found that companies with the highest percentage of female corporate officers experienced, on average, a 35 percent higher return on equity and a 34 percent higher total return to shareholders than those with the lowest percentage of female corporate officers.
And Goldman Sachs calculates that increasing women's participation in the labor market will boost GDP by 21 percent in Italy, 19 percent in Spain, 16 percentage in Japan, 9 percentage in the US, France and Germany, and by 8 percent in the UK.
But the better job security for women is, it does not necessarily mean they are actually getting somewhere as leaders and managers in equal numbers to men.
In fact, women still tend to earn less money than men - in the second quarter of last year, the weekly median paycheck for women was 80 percent of what men made - and women are also more likely to work at part-time jobs that don't offer extensive benefits. According to "The Gender Debate" currently airing on CNBC, a host of studies, polls, and reports concluded:
Eighty-five percent of consumer purchases are made or influenced by women, yet only 3 percent of advertising directors are women.
Women make up less than 13 percent of board members in America.
Seventy-nine percent of men and 87 percent of women believe in the benefits of gender parity, while only 59 percent of men and 19 percent of women believe their company is actually doing something about it.
Three times as many women as men have taken a career 'detour' for their family.
Only 50 percent of women who undertake MBAs remain in the workplace after childbirth.
The more educated and financially independent a woman is, the more likely she is to stay married - which discounts the argument that working wives are bad for families.
The real untapped issue lies in designing a new workplace that is truly talent oriented and results-led. Flexible work should not be an issue, both men and women should have a work-versus-life sense of balance - working successfully, enjoying their lives after hours, and nurturing the next generation, while not feeling like they are losing the endless battle of juggling all three.
Getting enough women into leadership roles now ensures companies are better matching their expectations when the half billion new women come into the global work force in the next 10 to 20 years. Business leaders increasingly say they want women to bring their different perspectives to the table. They can achieve this by questioning their own perceptions of what a leader should look like. Rather than basing their observations on the past and what corporate leaders have been like, they should open their eyes to the wide variety of untapped talent that is available to them now, and on which they will inevitably rely in the future.
Women have continued to make remarkable professional advancements, despite the worst job market we've ever experienced. Although there are still many issues to be addressed for women in the work force, they deserve their well-earned rewards and should be given their due now more than ever.
Gary Kaplan is founder and president of Gary Kaplan & Associates, a Pasadena-based executive search firm. Visit www.gkasearch.com.
