How Sponsorship Can Help Senior Women Break the Marzipan Ceiling

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iStock_000015225139XSmallBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

What’s keeping women from reaching the highest echelon of today’s top corporations? If you ask Sylvia Ann Hewlett, Founding President and Chairman of the Center for Worklife Policy, it’s certainly not a dearth of women’s initiatives, mentoring programs, and networking. Nor is it related to performance.

According to a new study produced by the CWLP in conjunction with the Harvard Business Group, a lack of sponsorship for women may be to blame. At a recent event hosted by American Express, Hewlett said, “34% of the marzipan layer, that layer just below senior leadership, is made up of women.” On the other hand, she said, only about 21% of senior leadership is female. And that number hasn’t increased in years.

“It’s about relationship capital,” said Hewlett.

Authored by Hewlett, with Kerrie Peraino, Chief Diversity Officer of Amex; Laura Sherbin Ph.D., Vice President, Director of Research at CWLP; and Karen Sumberg, Vice President, Director of Projects and Communications at CWLP, “The Sponsor Effect: Breaking Through the Last Glass Ceiling” outlines the ways in which women are missing out when it comes to sponsorship.

But more importantly, it is a detailed study into the sponsorship-protege relationship. It explains the urgent need for stronger sponsorship of women and how we can get it.

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The Cost of the Corporate Closet

iStock_000008050157XSmallThis article originally appeared on EvolvedEmployer.com, our new website about innovative workplaces – corporate diversity, sustainability, and responsibility.

By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

The United States has finally repealed its infamous military “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy regarding gay men and women in uniform. Yet many LGBT individuals within America’s corporate space are still under similar DADT duress. The corporate closet drives individuals to keep mum on their personal life, which has real, tangible consequences for firms whose cultures aren’t “open.”

In today’s leading workplaces, the cost of the closet negatively impacts team relationships, employee retention and recruitment, and even client interaction.

Chris Crespo, Director of Diversity & Inclusiveness at Ernst and Young, said, “In our business, which is a business built on relationships, if you can’t be open and honest about yourself, it creates trust issues.”

Particularly in those industries where business is based on client relationships, like accounting, law, sales, etc., trust is a key ingredient for success. For example, law firm Shearman & Sterling recently released its own “It Gets Better” video, featuring some of its own gay employees. Only in a truly inclusive culture would the level of trust required to produce this kind of outreach be possible.

“We are very proud of our creative contribution to the ‘It Gets Better’ project,” said Anna Brown, Shearman & Sterling’s Director of Diversity. “Our lawyers and administrative staff members spoke candidly and from their heart, and I think that is why the video has been so very well received. The project is another example of our continued commitment, as a firm, to leadership in the LGBT community in this case as well as a broader commitment to global diversity and inclusion initiatives.”

As global competition for high performing employees increases, companies literally can’t afford to keep their LGBT employees closeted – they will leave for more progressive companies where they can be open and honest about themselves. Building an inclusive corporate culture has become a business imperative in the corporate space, and is likely to only grow in importance in the next few years. Here’s why.

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Studies Suggest a Different Career Outcome for Women

Alicia Morga-2Contributed by Alicia Morga, creator of www.GottaFeeling.com and one of FastCompany‘s 2009 Most Powerful Women in Technology

Business writer Kevin Lewis does a daily round up of academic studies for National Affairs. I’m tempted to start one for studies about women in the workplace. Suddenly, the results are popping up everywhere and it’s clear: for women at work, it ain’t easy.

First, it seems, women are challenged even getting the job. That was the outcome of research conducted by Rice University Professor Michelle Hebl and her colleagues, fellow psychology professor Randi Martin and Juan Madera, an assistant professor at the University of Houston. In their study, “Gender and Letters of Recommendation for Academia: Agentive and Communal Differences,” published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, they analyzed 624 letters of recommendation on behalf of 194 applicants for eight junior faculty positions at a university.

They discovered that letters of recommendation for women were more likely to contain words such as “caring,” “sensitive,” and “compassionate,” but letters of recommendation for men were more likely to contain words like “aggressive,” “confident,” and “independent.”

Further, when the researchers concealed the identity of the recommended individual and controlled for academic criteria, those recommendation letters that contained words with feminine associations, like “nurturing” were ranked lower.

Dr. Hebl notes that, “When you use communal terminology, it is linking people to a feminine type, and they are not seen as credible and they don’t get hired. It’s not just men doing this to women, and it’s not just women being hurt, but it hurts women more.”

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Why are Women Execs Twice as Likely to Leave a Job?

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3 Professional WomenBy Tina Vasquez (Los Angeles)

A new study conducted by professors at Oregon State University’s College of Business found that female executives are more than twice as likely to leave their jobs – voluntarily and involuntarily – as men. This is true despite the fact that women now dominate the ranks of university graduates across nearly all fields and that most women, before the age of 30, are not only experiencing more success than their male counterparts, but they’re also making more money than them. The October study, which appeared in the journal Economic Inquiry and analyzed data from Standard & Poor’s 1500 firms, has left many wondering: what gives?

The study found that about 7.2 percent of women executives left their jobs, compared to 3.8 percent of men and both the voluntary rates (4.3 percent versus 2.8 percent for men) and the involuntary rates (2.9 versus 0.9 percent) were higher for women executives. Despite systemic evidence that women are more likely to depart from their positions, the researchers did not find a smoking gun.

“The evidence suggests that women are being drawn out and forced out at higher rates; however, we don’t see too much evidence of a systematic pattern in the types of firms that are forcing or having women drawn out,” said John Becker-Blease, lead author of the study and assistant professor of finance at Oregon State University. “So in a sense, it seems the playing field is uniformly tilted against women across firms.”

The study also found that women are more likely to leave smaller firms and firms with more male-dominated boards. Consistent with past research, the Becker-Blease’s research also indicates that women are more likely to leave a job due to domestic or social responsibilities than men, which explains the higher voluntary departure rate. When it comes to being dismissed from a job, Becker-Blease’s research just confirms something that we’ve known for a long time: women at the mid-levels of management may not be getting the kind of opportunities and professional support that they need to advance successfully to the top ranks.

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The Other Side of Performance Metrics?

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iStock_000004944174XSmallBy Elizabeth Harrin (London)

If you complete timesheets, you’ll know how important it is to make sure the numbers at the end of the month look good. After all, you’re judged as much on the time you spend at work – which might even be billed to clients – as you are on what you actually do.

But what would happen if we scrapped the insistence on measuring time spent at the desk and focused solely on results? Surely the working world would be a happier place, with employees judged and rewarded on their contributions, and able to go home early if they meet their objectives before 5pm. Unfortunately, there are also issues that come with adopting this type of working culture. Employees could focus on their targets to the detriment of being a team player. It could increase competition in the office and have a damaging effect on morale. These are some of the reasons that managers fail to embrace an organisational culture that looks at performance metrics as more than just hours chained to your laptop.

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Culture, Law, or Corporate Policy: What Change Comes First?

iStock_000004512689XSmallBy Elizabeth Harrin (London)

Bringing gender parity in the office requires an effort across multiple facets of corporate life. There needs to be legislative efforts to ensure women can compete on a level playing field at the most basic level. There needs to be adequate corporate policies to promote an environment where women want to work and can be successful working. And finally there needs to be a cultural acceptance of the value that working women bring to the wider society.

All three are needed to bring gender parity into the office, and all three build upon one another. As individuals, it can be hard to work out how we can make a difference and in particular which of these three should take our focus first. The Glass Hammer spoke to 4 women to find out what they thought about these three elements, and where we should be start.

You can’t change corporate policy, so work around it

“We need all three of those things but ultimately it is up to women to master the art of negotiating to get what they want and need in corporate America,” says Lee E. Miller, a former Fortune 1000 head of HR and co-author, with her daughter Jessica, of A Woman’s Guide to Successful Negotiating. She believes that women need to realise that they can’t influence corporate policy as individuals. “The corporate culture is the corporate culture. Until they become a C-level executive there is precious little anyone can do. Trying to do so will likely result in some superficial changes to make it look like the issue is being addressed. Unless executives in the C-suite see the issue as a bottom line business issue nothing significant will happen.”

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What Does Being Your ‘Authentic Self’ Really Mean?

young business womanBy Tina Vasquez (Los Angeles)

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, chances are you’ve heard the buzz phrase “authentic self.” From diversity efforts and communication, to making those in the LGBT community feel more at ease in the workplace, this phrase du jour has come to encompass everything under the sun, especially as it relates to women in the business world. At this point, what does the “your authentic self” even mean?

Many motivational speakers would have us believe that tapping into our authentic selves is as simple as having an understanding of who we want to be and doing what we truly want. In other words, we just have to be ourselves and the rest will fall in place, but is it that simple?

In a recent column, Marcia Reynolds, author of the book Wander Woman: How High-Achieving Women Find Contentment and Direction, discussed many of the questions that arise when women begin seeking out their authentic selves. “Women should be real, but what does this mean, really?” Reynolds wrote. “If you adapt to a situation so your ideas will be heard, are you being inauthentic? If you refrain from telling people details of your personal life, are you living a lie? If you are learning new skills but feel awkward when trying them out, are you being a fake? Or are you being an authentic human trying to fit into various social situations?”

How should women go about tackling these difficult questions? After speaking to women from around the country, it became clear that there is no singular path; one size does not fit all.

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Gender Discrimination: We’re Having the Wrong Conversations

tannerkelly_6291_5x75-200x300By Kelly Tanner (New York City)

When it comes to gender discrimination in the workplace, we’re having the wrong conversations.

Three former employees of Goldman Sachs have filed individual and joint lawsuits alleging systemic gender discrimination and sexual harassment that resulted in a loss of pay and promotion opportunities, as well as humiliation and inappropriate behavior from fellow employees. In coverage of the case, which prosecutors are attempting to convert to a class action suit, the “salacious” nature of the unwelcome sexual advances detailed in the claim make for good entertainment, and allow bloggers and commenters alike to play the home-game version of judge and jury.

“Wow, 1997 — that’s a long time ago”, says David Lat, implying that the claim is irrelevant years later, and setting up his commenters nicely to write off the former Goldman’s employees as “whiny bitches.” These articles nearly all list the full names and former titles of the accusers and no identifying information regarding the discriminatory managers and harassers who created a hostile work environment in the first place. While they serve for great water-cooler gossip fodder in the current climate of news-as-entertainment, the coverage does little to address the question of why companies such as Goldman Sachs, that have invested time, money, and energy in diversity initiatives and recruitment and retention plans for women professionals, are still seen as environments women describe as “untenable,” as stated in the most recent suit.

Given the backlash, career-ending repudiation, and heckling media circus that results in such high profile cases such as these, should women even pursue sexual discrimination complaints in the first place? I suspect we may get closer to the answers by shifting the focus.

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Are Lawsuits the Right Way to Achieve Gender Equality in the Workplace?

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Nicki HeadshotBy Nicki Gilmour, Founder and CEO of The Glass Hammer

Theglasshammer.com is in Norway this week reporting on gender parity and how Norway  is working to achieve critical mass for women in leadership positions. Legislation resulting in quotas has furthered progress there, read us next week to see the full findings. Back on home turf, we have media speculation that a gender discrimination lawsuit against Goldman Sachs may become a class action suit stating that Goldman Sachs promotes all men over all women categorically.

I would like to point out that Goldman Sachs was the first company to back the launch of The Glass Hammer and was also the first large financial firm to create internal women’s advancement programs – including the Returnship and annual events like Brokering Change – Multicultural Women on Wall Street. Let’s not pick one bank to crucify, when it is the industry that needs to re-evaluate its appeal to female talent. Instead, let’s make sure that we give credit to companies who are making progress towards critical mass and fair systems to keep women in the game at a time when we are dwindling in numbers.

I believe that very little can be gained from litigation in the workplace and class action suits were surely invented for a different purpose (think Erin Brockovich). Does it actually change the treatment of women in the workplace? Does it advance the mission of creating a meritocracy? In my opinion, no, it achieves neither of these objectives.

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Innovation – The Key to Workforce Engagement

asian business woman writing on screenBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

This article originally appeared on our new corporate citizenship site Evolved Employer.

Should companies encourage their workforce to innovate? Innovation is a big buzz word lately, with companies striving to embed it within their cultures and looking within their ranks for new ideas rather than outsourcing or working with consultants to find the next big product. But all the clamor has left some to ask – is innovation a distraction?

According to Businessweek contributor and founder and president of the Table Group Pat Lencioni, employees are being asked to do far too much innovating. He writes, “[business leaders] should stop overhyping innovation to the masses and come to the realization that only a limited number of people in any company really needs to be innovative.”

He continues:

“…even the most innovative and creative organizations need far more people to be dutiful, enthusiastic, and consistent in their work than innovative or creative.” Employees need to do their jobs – not devote time and energy to innovative solutions or creative new ideas that will likely go unnoticed anyway, he says.

Lencioni believes the relatively recent hyperfocus on innovation is causing business leaders to be seen as hypocritical – which actually decreases employee engagement. He writes:

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