So what has happened to the great aspiration of the government to have women setting up businesses at the same rate as men? The recent report released in the run up to the Mayoral elections by the Fawcett Society looked at equality between women and men in London and found women experience a full-time pay [...]
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To achieve sustainable change gender inequality needs to be addressed. We are taking steps to change expectations about what it is to be a woman.
“I love to see a young girl go out and grab the world by the lapels. Life’s a b***h. You’ve got to go out and kick a*s”. Maya Angelou
“The critical ingredient is getting off your butt and doing something. It’s as simple as that. The true entrepreneur is a doer, not a dreamer.” Nolan Bushnell
Last May I sat in Eteaket in Edinburgh with around 15 other women. We had come together to explore why there were so few women in the most senior of leadership positions in our large organisations and institutions. Almost all of us had worked in such organisations and had left. Most of us had then set up our own small businesses. For many of us – it appeared – the cost of staying had simply become too great…. to our spirits, our families, the balance in our lives, our integrity, our desire to contribute more purposefully and in more honouring, human-affirming ways. For us, quite simply, there was more to life than working in contexts that, whilst financially beneficial, were not life-enhancing, soul-sustaining. Creating a context in which we could BE more of ourselves became more important than acquiring more money, more status, more power, more influence, more .. more .. more.
As I have reflected on that extraordinary dialogue over the last 12 months, a question kept presenting itself to me: if so many women keep leaving, how will we ever re-dress the imbalance of the constituencies within these monolithic entities? I was working from an assumption that to effect change from within, one would have to work from the inside and so the corollary of that led to a question about how to support women to stay inside them. I have sat with those questions for nearly a year…. And have only just begun to notice these embedded assumptions.
Being part of something where success is defined in one-dimensional terms of BIGGER, MORE, BEST so often leads to distorted judgement, division, separation, rejection, ejection. The assumption propping up what is essentially a distorted capitalist pursuit is that only the brightest, strongest, fastest, biggest, best survive. This mindset is a form of entrapment AND it is NOT true. Darwin is misquoted: what he actually said is …
This view is affirmed by what we now understand through the study of complexity sciences.
Additionally, the more we go for bigger, brighter, stronger the more we can end up driving diversity out of our systems. Lack of diversity in a system is a sure-fire way to ensure its decline and death. We recruit based on assessment protocols that are driven by outdated paradigms – paradigms that are not fit-for-purpose in our complex, unpredictable world. No wonder we have so many monochrome Boards which recruit in their own image which operate on somewhat self-serving, back-scratching ways: e.g. the unspoken, unwritten code that operates undercover in so many, ‘so-called’ independent Remuneration committees – ‘you vote for my pay-rise and I’ll vote for yours…’. Maybe the system is simply too far gone – too broke, to repair?
My previous assumption that we have to change such institutions (e.g. by changing the chemistry of Boards) is of course simply an option; another is that we could encourage – amplify – the exodus and let these organisations drive themselves to extinction. Meanwhile we could celebrate and magnify the transformative powers that are inherent in the DNA of every woman. We are life-giving vessels in which transformation is made possible. What more might be possible if each and every one of us amplified the principles of our creative-force-for-good by bringing to life, new living productive systems. Many of us have already joined in with this movement…. Across the world and its hemispheres, women are making change happen – in our new ‘enterprises’, in our villages and towns and cities. Perhaps our next challenge is how to connect ourselves differently to make more sustainable, life-enhancing change occur to save our world?
© Louie Gardiner © 30th April 2012
‘So are you one of those feminists then Jane?’
This question fills me with dread every time I hear it and it is posed in this way quite often as though a feminist is somehow other and weird.
I always take a step back before answering because I know I am about to be judged. The word is fraught with angst for me as it is so misunderstood and conjures up so many negative images.
Let’s be clear, I am most definitely a feminist, if this is interpreted as believing in equal opportunity and being allowed to celebrate being a woman, however, I am definitely NOT a feminist if this means I am supposed to hate men, behave like one and oppose all things girlie. See my dilemma?
So when women and men ask me this very innocent question it feels seriously personal and I cannot answer with a simple yes or no for fear of being misconstrued. I know the way I answer will define all future relations and positioning with the enquirer. Get it wrong and I may be banished as a tub-thumping, militant man hater or conversely, an ignorant, uneducated girlie with no gumption or recognition of the journey we have been on or the roads still to travel. Arrrgh!
It is a testament to our journey and the battles fought and won that this word evokes such emotion, but we must be proud of feminism and not apologetic. It is time we reclaimed the word in the name of equality and empowerment.
I love being a woman but sometimes feel the pressure, the rules and expectations of feminism overwhelming. There seems to be an unwritten manifesto that says feminists should be ‘full on’ all the time, deride all things girlie and feminine, have a male versus female opinion on everything, take up the campaigning mantle and be pc, serious and awfully intellectual. In fact, feminism sounds like a bore and its little wonder our young women are not queuing up to wear the badge!
It’s also a tough label to live up to. It’s similar to being the token woman around the board table, you feel the pressure of every decision you make, you forsake your personal identity as your every move and decision is put under the microscope and analysed as a ‘gender wide response’ when in reality, you were just being you!
I am a feminist but first and foremost I am a human being and have a right to own my contradictions just like everyone else! Quite often, it is these contradictions that cause havoc for ardent feminists. For example
Now, not all of these statements relate to me, but do you see the complexities? I also reserve the right to NOT have an opinion on everything, I am still not sure if Disney Princesses have a long term damaging effect on girls; I have no idea why young women think hobbling about on orthopaedic shoes looks sexy? And personally, the jury is still out on quotas as a way of increasing women on boards.
Not all feminists are the same and this is OK? Our core, shared message is one of equality of opportunity and mutual respect of the sexes, I would like to think we could keep this in the forefront of the debate and the pioneering still to come!
For the record….
I am strong AND girlie
I am ditzy AND driven
I am a business woman AND a domestic goddess
I am married AND independent
And I am a feminist who loves men! I just don’t want to be one, nor do I want to be subservient to one!
‘So are you one of those feminists then Jane?’ This question fills me with dread every time I hear it and it is posed in this way quite often as though a feminist is somehow other and weird. I always take a step back before answering because I know I am about to be judged. [...]
Last May I sat in Eteaket in Edinburgh with around 15 other women. We had come together to explore why there were so few women in the most senior of leadership positions in our large organisations and institutions. Almost all of us had worked in such organisations and had left. Most of us had then [...]
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Christine has over 25 years experience in public life in Scotland in the fields of the arts, politics, education, public relations and voluntary work. For 12 years she served on the City of Edinburgh District Council and was her Group’s leader for 4 years. Also she has been a Westminster and Holyrood Parliamentary candidate. She [...]
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Traditional approaches suggest that, along with first defining Vision and Purpose, leaders should identify the set of Values they want the team or organisation to uphold. What we believe is that by defining these things, we will be able to control what people in the organisation do and how they do it. In contrast, complexity [...]
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