Johannesburg - Women are still underrepresented in business and academics, but choose to prevail despite negative perceptions from male counterparts.
According to managing director at Enele Consulting, Edith Leeuta, women managers are perceived not to have critical management competencies such as negotiation, influencing and decision making skills.
She said this perception is mainly fuelled by the notion that women have more important priorities than their careers, such as starting and raising families.
"Some organisations we engage with, from a human capital development perspective, are not willing to invest the time and money needed for the development of female competencies," said Leeuta.
As a result, when key management vacancies arise, men are more likely to fill vacancies because historically men have had more opportunities to grow and develop critical leadership skills, she said.
A former academic who joined the private sector said "it does not matter where you are, as a woman, you have to fight extra hard for everything that you want".
President of Women in Business, Rebecca Wakeford, said the number of female company directors is considerably lower than that of males in similar positions.
Data made public by the Employment Equity Commission last Monday showed 70.8% of top management positions are held by men. In addition, men enjoy 60.6% of recruitments and 57.4% of promotions to this level.
The cause for under-representation of women is not a lack of qualifications.
"White males in mining usually have a complex and tend to frustrate females by downplaying their qualifications, among other things," said CE of the South African Women in Mining Association (Sawima), Smangele Mngomezulu.
She said the organisation is aiming for a 10% representation of women in top mining management positions by 2009, but "mining companies use delay tactics".
"We want to enforce what's in the mining charter, including employment equity," said Mongomezulu.
The mining industry is especially a tough industry to crack. Anglo American's former deputy chairperson Graham Boustred was quoted in Business Day earlier this year as having said incumbent CEO Cynthia Carroll is "hopeless" and "it is difficult to find a female CEO because most women are sexually frustrated."
Just as relevant as BEE
According to Wakeford, gender empowerment within large corporations should have as much relevance as black economic empowerment.
Some organisations designed programmes aimed at accelerating the development of female employees into managerial positions.
According to Leeuta, these programmes are not without challenges.
"These include long periods away from home for the participants, causing pressure and stress on their families, especially for women with younger children who want to further their careers.
"We have engaged many women who have participated in these programmes. Most of them have said finding the balance between work and home is difficult and many have feelings of guilt for not spending enough time with their families," said Leeuta.
Academics no exception
Director at the National Advisory Council on Innovation (Naci), Thiambi Netshiluvhi, said studies commissioned by Naci showed gender discrimination is a problem in various academic fields.
He said males tend to doubt the abilities and judgements of women in science, engineering and technology (Set).
"The doubts come as a result of persisting with gender stereotyping and misperceptions regarding the potential of women in the sector," he said. "Even gender policies and strategies do not seem to be implemented or enforced enough to bring about gender parity."
Although women who graduated in the field represented 56% and 59% of graduates in 2000 and 2005, there is still under-representation in research and development (senior lecturers, professors and associate professors) and engineering sciences and applied technologies.
"So much has to be done by both the public and private sectors to fast-track the numbers of women, particularly at higher levels in workplaces and academia," said Netshiluvhi.
Wakeford said gender discrimination is the reason why many female corporate workers start their own enterprises.
"In their own way they challenge the face of smaller business with expertise, skills and knowledge," she said.
- Fin24.com