Between the publicity around the gender pay gap, the Me Too campaign and the centenary of women getting the vote in the UK earlier this year, the issue of women's careers is very much on my mind. Arguments are sometimes made that there isn't really a problem with sexism in the UK, and that women have all the opportunities that men have, if only they chose to take advantage of them. But I think that's far too simplistic a reading of the situation.
In truth, it's a really complex and deeply entrenched situation. I have tried below to identify some of the different strands of arguments. I have simplified the arguments greatly to make my points clearly, and I talk in broad generalisations. The ideas of course do not apply to all in all contexts, but I think the claims I am making are widespread enough to make each of them problematic.
So how do we know there is a problem?
1.) Positions of power and influence. Although women make up 50% of the workforce, they make up a far smaller proportion of the jobs which carry the most influence: board members, cabinet officers, newspaper editors, CEOs of large companies, directors, conductors, partners etc.. This is problematic because i) diverse teams perform better, so these functions will be more effective if women as well as men are contributing to decisions and cultures, ii) because women are probably not being given the opportunities to fulfill their potential, and iii) because having one demographic group having power over another isn't likely to lead to decisions which offer the best opportunities to people in all demographic groups.
2.) Types of work. There are many jobs which are dominated by either men or women: nurses are predominantly women, software engineers are mostly men. This is potentially problematic because i) these jobs would probably be done better if there were a more diverse mix in the workforce and ii) the statistics might imply that men and women don't actually have enough free choice to pursue the most fulfilling job for them.
3.) Unpaid work. Our nation relies on a considerable amount of unpaid work in the home to function effectively: children need to be looked after, ageing parents cared for, meals cooked, laundry washed and homes cleaned. Women do a disproportionate amount of this work, and as a result of these responsibilities, women's paid work outside the home often takes second place. Because we live in the kind of society which values what it pays for, women end up undervalued both in their unpaid domestic work, and in their lower paid employment.
So if those are the symptoms, what are the causes? What has led to women and men opting for or being forced into different paths?
Social norms
1.) Parenting. Our culture has certain expectations which are deeply ingrained in us all. We have a clear sense of what makes a 'good mother' - warmth, nurturing, home baking, picking up from school at 3.30. And of what makes a 'good father' - fun, sport and earning a decent wage to provide for his family. It's hard for us to deviate from these social norms - it takes a lot of commitment and individual determination to convince yourself that you are a good mother when you don't conform to society's stereotypes.
2.) Work role stereotypes: we also have assumptions about what kind of person excels in different kinds of occupations. We expect senior leaders to be men, and nurses to be women. These stereotypes have an influence on people making their career choices; on the people making the hiring decisions, and on our colleagues, customers and managers.
3.) Gendered behaviour: we expect men and women to behave differently, and we like people more when they behave in line with our expectations. For women wanting to move up in their careers, this is a particular challenge, as they find themselves caught in a double bind: to be liked they need to be feminine and to be respected as leaders, they need to be masculine.
Biology
1.) Parenting. Women are the only ones who can give birth and breast feed. This should not be an insurmountable issue for us to address, but it does mean that the easy default position places women at the heart of child rearing whilst the men earn the wages. Women's propensity to give birth can also lead employers to feel that a 28 year old recently married man is more likely to be a better long term investment than his wife.
2.) Physiological differences. It's tricky to know exactly how much is down to social norms, and how much is down to biological differences, but it seems that there are some biological differences which could plausibly influence the kinds of jobs we are drawn to and the kinds of jobs we are good at. Men are generally stronger than women, so there are some jobs they will be more naturally capable of - this doesn't apply to that many jobs, and with technology, it's becoming less and less of an issue. Men are also generally more competitive than women and this I think poses more of a challenge: a competitive style will tend to win out over a collaborate one, because the competitive person wants to win.
Psychology
1.) Attraction. Women who want to be nurturing mothers are attracted to men who want to and are capable of providing for an protecting their families. This means that the family decision as to who goes out to work and who earns the money is likely to be compounded by both parents: both the mother and the father want the mother to fulfill the key nurturing role and the father to fulfill the key bread winning role. The other side of this coin is that women are aware that they are more likely to be attractive to men if they behave in a traditionally feminine way and so this behaviour is rewarded.
2.) Confidence. Men tend to have more confidence in their abilities than women. We tend to have confidence in people who are confident about themselves. So men find it easier to convince employers, voters, customers and interviewers of their abilities.
3.) Masculinity has higher status. Things associated with men tend to have a higher status than things associated with women. There is far more talk about wanting women to access the opportunities that men have, than the other way round: society seems to think it's more problematic that women aren't CEOs than that men don't get to be stay-at-home dads. This is because traditionally masculine roles have higher status than traditionally feminine ones. This can be quite clearly seen in children, where girls are often seen wearing blue trousers and playing with cars, but boys are rarely seen wearing pink dresses and playing with dolls. In adult life too, men are assumed to be more capable than women - women need to be better than men to be judged as equal.
4) Similarity bias. We tend to feel comfortable surrounded by people like us. This means that girls who are interested in computer coding might not study it because they might fear that they will be massively outnumbered by boys, and that stay at home dads are likely to feel less comfortable at the school gates. It also means that employers in male dominated fields are less likely to want to employ women.
Experience
1.) Social circles. Your first and most powerful careers education comes from those you see around you. The jobs you can see within your social circle have a significant impact on your understanding of what jobs there are, and what kind of people do them.
2.) Role models. If you can't see 'women like you' in particular roles, it is difficult to imagine that you could make it, and it's hard to work out the best path. Role models can be real people or fictional characters.
3.) Structures. Many of the systems within our society have been developed either by men, or to suit men. This can make them less attractive to women and can lead women to believe that they would be unlikely to find success in these fields. Our adversarial system of the Houses of Parliament is one example of a structure that is very masculine. It plays to the strengths of the competitive and combative of many men and there seems to be no obvious place for the more typically cooperative and collaborative female approach. Women listening to Prime Minister's Questions from Parliament might well feel that they would not fit in and could not succeed in this kind of environment. Job applications highlight the importance of confidence, as jobs are more likely to be given to candidates who present confident versions of themselves, and this is more likely to be seen in men than women. Women therefore see time and time again that men are more likely to succeed, and this inevitably and erroneously erodes their belief in their own abilities.
These factors combine to lead to a number of different outcomes:
1) Individual choices: society has moved on to allowing women access to almost anything they want to go for, but women choose not to take advantage of the opportunities available. This is because: i) they want to be nurturing mothers and it's hard to combine this with being a successful worker; ii) they want to be likeable and attractive and it's hard to be a successful women if you are likeable and attractive iii) they find that they lack the competitive edge which could get them to the top iv) their partners are in demanding jobs and someone needs to be able to drop the kids at school v) they don't like feeling out of place in a masculine environment, vi) their husbands' do actually have greater earning potential than they do, so it makes economic sense for the family to support his career and vii) they don't believe they can make it.
2) Discrimination: If women decide to pursue their careers, they then are met with barriers all along the way. These barriers are often unconscious, so can be very difficult to combat. Barriers include that i) women sound less confident about themselves, so are assumed to be less competent; ii) women are likely to be judged as either competent or likeable - not both, and people are generally looking for a recruit who is both competent and likeable ; iii) employers assume that women will leave to have children and come back less committed to their work; iv) employers assume that part timer workers and mothers are less committed to their work than full timers and fathers; v) women are generally judged to be inferior to men; vi) women can't see many other women succeeding in some arenas which means that it is more difficult for them to imagine succeeding and don't have a template for how it's done.
I've tried to express this in the most simplistic, straightforward way, and the picture still looks incredibly complicated. And this is why it's proving so hard to solve. The challenges are biological and unconscious and centre on our identities and these are three tough cookies to crack. The messages we get are consistent, pervasive and they come at us from the moment we are born. I'm sure there are solutions, but I might save them for another post.
