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Quotas are a girl’s best friend …

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Businesswoman-standing-on-the-rooftop-of-a-skyscraperIt was my first day in a new company – a big company – and the 300 staff in the corporate head office had gathered in the auditorium. I was one of three employees and we were all asked to stand: a former partner in a major legal firm, an innovative thinker forging the way in the new field of knowledge management and myself, joining corporate affairs.

“See,” said the HR Manager, “They can’t tell us we have a women problem, we just hired three of them.”

The company had just started a quota system to ‘improve its gender balance’, and as it turned out, a condition to continue to receive tax concessions from the government.

There were no women in the executive offices, no women on the board; in fact, women were asked to sit behind their male counterparts when strategic papers were presented to the board – papers they had prepared.

It was ‘job done – we hired women’. Next.

“I was a partner in a law firm and they told me I would have a bright future here, but this is a rock ceiling. I’m just going to have a baby and make the most of the perks,” said the lawyer one day, and then we all started thinking…

Do we stay and watch any career aspirations die? Make up the numbers? Keep the balance? Or do we leave?

Saying something wasn’t an option. The culture was – even with quotas – male dominated and to speak up was a fast track to being branded troublesome.

And troublesome is worse than talented and never going to the top.

So I left.

It wasn’t the quota; it was the culture.

For quotas to be a best friend you have to have an environment where that friendship can flourish.

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The company I worked in thought quotas would solve the gender problem. They certainly got women in the door and to the table but vital cultural ingredients were missing making the ‘quota’ more a heavy handbag on the shoulder of every woman.

No girl can career on quotas alone.

If we want women in our companies, on our boards, in our parliament or given equal opportunities then first we need to really accept why diversity is a benefit, a competitive advantage even, not an obligation.

It’s a productivity benefit – if the culture alienates women from your workforce even with quotas then what happens? – Women go out as entrepreneurs and make their own mark.  Just look at the mumpreneneur wave of success that is in part due to the hostile, inflexible male dominated cultures where women and their aspirations just don’t fit.

It’s a perspective benefit – women are different from men – in general – we multitask effectively, we bring emotional intelligence, we are the natural ‘keepers of stories’ – the indelible memory banks that bind cultures and networks together.

Companies who have embraced the quotas as a cultural tool are flourishing.

We need quotas to open more doors to opportunities but we need cultures that realise the promise of those opportunities.

Sure we can point to plenty of women who have made it through without a quota but I guarantee it wasn’t easy.

For every one career ascended woman there are 20 men who have done the same.

It is likely no one asked those men to change their shoes because they were too noisy and distracting. Or asked them to wear ‘that top’ to an important meeting, or felt them up, or openly stole their work, or told them their voice was too male for this kind of announcement.

I’m sure plenty of fellas have had their fantasy moments as a politician, an athlete on the podium, a spy.

But they have had more of a chance to make those fantasies a reality.

Lets get real and open more doors for women –  quotas are a start, culture is the thing that makes them a friend for everyone.

“Quotas are a Girl’s Best Friend” is the topic for the Australian Institute of Management’s (AIM) Women in Management: Great Debate on Friday 8 August. Want to join the conversation? Details are below…

The essentials 

What: AIM Great Debate 2014 – Quotas are a Girl’s Best Friend
When: 11:30am – 2pm Friday 8 August 2014
Where: National Convention Centre
How much: Member $140.00; Non-Member $190.00; Member table of 10 $125.00 Non-Member table of 10 $175.00
Tickets: www.aim.com.au/debate

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