Best practice in management education: capitalising on gender diversity awareness

Abstract

IntroductionA rapidly expanding female workforce is one of the key features of the changing Australian business environment. Consistent with trends in the US and UK, the last two decades have seen a steady increase in women's participation in paid employment in Australia, and women now constitute 42.5 per cent of the current workforce (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1995). Future projections indicate that by the year 2010 women will constitute half of all Australian workers (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1988), and a multicultural labour force is fast becoming the norm.Despite employment support in the form of affirmative action legislation, women in Australia still face entrenched cultural barriers to their participation in management, particularly at the more senior levels (Still, 1993). Reflecting the significance of demographic changes, however, a diversity of management perspectives makes good business sense (Smith and Hutchinson, 1995). Yet extensive literature confirms that gender diversity is an issue which many Australian organisations have yet to address or accommodate effectively (Burton and Ryall, 1995; Kaplan, 1996).In 1992 the federal government appointed an industry task force on leadership and management skills, to review Australia's management and leadership capabilities and advise on measures to strengthen management practices, in an effort to improve economic performance. An international leadership expert advising the task force alleged that "corporate Australia's Achilles' heel" was its all-male monoculture, whose "rugby-scrum mentality" made it difficult for women -and men who did not fit this particular image -to break in (Mant, 1994, p. 3). Mant emphasised that, because new ideas arise from diversity, Australian management culture needs to embrace a variety of differing perspectives.The final report of the task force (Industry Task Force on Leadership and Management Skills, 1995) -or Karpin Report as it became known, after the name of its chairperson -identified the need for capitalising on the benefits of gender diversity, as one of five key levers for improving business competitiveness. The report also highlighted the strong inter-relationship between the highly gendered nature of both management education and

A tale of the field: reading power and gender in the learning organization

“…Despite this growth, women continue to trail men in pay, where 'on average women's salaries are 25 per cent lower than those of men' (Morley, 2003, p. 3). By extension, women also continue to trail men in promotion, benefits and other economic rewards, and continue to face entrenched barriers to their participation in management, particularly at more senior levels (Acker, 1990;Devos, 1996;Smith, 1998;Bierema, 2001Bierema, , 2003Morley, 2003). Clearly, therefore, presence alone is not equating to a shift in the balance of power.…”

“…The analysis that this story serves highlights both the importance as well as the need for more empirical grounded study of gender in organizations, which in fact see themselves as learning organizations. Organizational theory often tends to perpetuate the silence and state of unconsciousness, of both women and men, and this state of unconsciousness, according to Smith (1998), disadvantages both women's learning and indirectly that of men.…”

“…Monica is labelled as the executor, rather than the author, creator or initiator of these initiatives, where the 'products of her work will become the action of the superior for organisational purposes' (Jackson, 1991, p. 23 Re-reading the rhetoric of the learning organization A rapidly expanding female workforce is one of the key features of the changing Australian business environment, with women constituting 42.5% of the current workforce (Smith, 1998). Future projections indicate that by 2010 women will constitute half of all Australian workers (Smith, 1998). Despite this growth, women continue to trail men in pay, where 'on average women's salaries are 25 per cent lower than those of men' (Morley, 2003, p. 3).…”

Business Education and Gender Bias at the 'C-Level'

“…By the use of specific examples, through female executive guest speakers (Butler, 1997) and teaming of male and female faculty, some business schools have attempted to illustrate the significance of women in business and education. In order to sensitize faculty to the importance of women in the workplace, Catherine Smith of Edith Cowan University in Perth, Western Australia, has created a video to be used by educators for illuminating the gender inequities in a management education (Smith, 1998;. Butler (1997) has developed an assignment specific to addressing and reducing gender bias in the classroom through the use of a female executive guest speaker.…”

“…A large part of this denial stems from socialization and the lack of preparation (and even discrimination) experienced by women in education and the gender discrimination they are likely to encounter professionally (Carr, Ash, Friedman, Szalacha, Barnett, & Palepu, 2000;Carr, Szalacha, Barnett, Caswell, & Inui, 2003;Kelan & Jones, 2010;Van Den Brink & Stobbe, 2009). Unfortunately many faculty members, especially business faculty, deliver education in a fundamentally masculine style (MacLellan & Dobson, 1997;Smith, 1997;1998). Consequently, they do little to draw attention to this bias, frequently not even recognizing gender as a salient factor, even though it continues to be significant (Kelan & Jones, 2010).…”