Step one is recognising inequity

While organisations continue to strive for greater gender parity in workplaces, diversification by ethnicity, age and ability cannot be ignored, Leadership New Zealand chief executive Sina WendtMoore says.

The biases that prevent women from rising into leadership roles are twofold for women who belong to other minority groups, WendtMoore said.

‘‘Being in a workplace that is designed based on a Western model that’s hundreds of years old that says leadership looks a certain way and is male and white – even now, with discussion on gender diversity, it might be male and female but it’s predominantly white males and females that are talked about,’’ she said.

‘‘The thinking is institutionalised; it’s that idea that we’re

‘‘Young women need to understand it’s not going to be handed to them. My biggest resource has been other women.’’

Sina Wendt-Moore, Leadership NZ chief executive

comfortable with [hiring] people who look like us.’’

Wendt-Moore said diversity could provide a different lens for organisations to communicate better. ‘‘If people acknowledge disparity exists, then they can have people around the table who can ask the right questions and can challenge ideas,’’ she said.

Wendt-Moore said that, since the 1990s, there has been a shift from hierarchical to more inclusive and supportive leadership.

She said she was excluded from work discussions in the beginning of her career because she wasn’t ‘‘at the right level’’ to contribute.

‘‘Twenty-first-century leaders are more humble; they’re more open to supporting and empowering other people,’’ she said.

‘‘Leadership is not only about bringing people with you but also creating more leaders. We need the voices of younger people to actually help us figure out what we need to do in the future.’’

Wendt-Moore’s advice for young women who have moved from university into the workforce was to be proactive in shaping the rest of their careers.

‘‘Young women need to understand it’s not going to be handed to them. My biggest resource has been other women. We have to be very proactive – that’s the only way we’re going to move together and change the colour and the gender of who’s sitting at the senior leadership table.’’