Article in The Economist Dumbfounds Chief of theglasshammer - Building Gender Balanced Business

• Nicki Gilmour, founder and CEO of theglasshammer.com, a site we admire and feature often, was less than thrilled by the way The Economist kicked off 2010, featuring Rosie the Riveter and the claim, “We did it!”

• Introducing a new column with her critique of the article, Gilmour wrote, “What exactly did we do? … A quick look at the Economist’s [own] stats would suggest that gender equality is still a way off.”

20-first CEO Avivah Wittenberg-Cox on The Economist’s cover story

“What The Economist and many companies have not quite integrated is that we are all (men and women) caught in an old paradigm of what leadership and power looks like.”

• Particularly galling to Gilmour was what she called the “out of touch” Schumpeter column: “a call to ignore … ‘the new feminism,’ and what I would consider to be respected academic work done by Alison Maitland and [20-first CEO] Avivah Wittenberg-Cox. Their work encourages recognizing that women are different, and that gains can be made if we stop expecting women to act like men and understand there is more to be gained from diversity of thought.”

• Like Wittenberg-Cox, Gilmour sees the issue as not only unresolved but in need of a more innovative solution than simply assuming market forces can bring gender balance: “The real untapped issue lies with a new design of the workplace that is truly talent orientated and results-led. Flexible work shouldn’t be an issue and both men and women can have work/life fit and a glimpse of balance – to live their lives outside work, nurture the next generation, and, let’s face it, feel like we are not losing our minds in the endless juggle of modern day commitments and desires for leisure time.”

• Gilmour concludes by echoing the below comments from Maitland, co-author with Wittenberg-Cox of the book Why Women Mean Business (Wiley, 2008).

Alison Maitland, whose writings with 20-first CEO Avivah Wittenberg-Cox on the benefits of gender balance were cited imprecisely in the 2010 New Year’s issue of The Economist, told theglasshammer what she thought of the Schumpeter column’s argument that true meritocracy is already the reality at companies:

“The old-fashioned meritocracy in which ‘Schumpeter’ puts such touching faith has unfortunately not delivered. This is evident from the persistent under-representation of women in senior jobs, which the Economist itself bemoans in its coverage.
“As we explain in our book, Why Women Mean Business, companies need to ask why their own systems – which they perceive as being meritocratic – are failing to retain and promote women in larger numbers. Perhaps the ‘meritocracy’ on which they pride themselves is unconsciously skewed towards the dominant male norm. It’s assumed that because men have occupied positions of leadership for so long they are natural leaders – and women are not.
“Business leaders increasingly say they want women to bring their different perspectives to the table, that they don’t want male clones. They could achieve this by questioning their own perceptions of what a leader should look like, which is based on the past, on what corporate leaders have been like, and open their eyes to the untapped talent of all kinds that is available to them and on which they will inevitably rely in the future.”