Corporate Boardroom: Understanding the Place of Women
Ugo Aliogo writes on the need for more women at managerial positions in organisations
In the African society, when a woman rises to the zenith of her career in either the public or private sector, it is seen as a record-breaking achievement because women’s progress in business and corporate leadership is still patchy, within and between countries.
The Special Envoy on Gender, African Development Bank, (AfDF) Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi, in a 2015 study, said unlocking the potential of Africa’s successful transformation requires concurrently removing barriers to women’s leadership and participation, adding that the development of the continent is inherently interlinked with the progress of its women.
She explained that despite the sincere efforts of major corporations, the proportion of women falls in the corporate hierarchy, noting that the number has not increased over the years, we must bring women on corporate boards through programmes to fast track women through middle and senior management in the private sector for us to break the glass ceiling.
She also stated that Kenya and South Africa have government mandates for women’s representation on the boards of state-owned companies, while the private sector in Kenya, Morocco, Malawi, Nigeria and South Africa have integrated gender diversity into principles of good corporate governance.
Fraser-Moleketi posited that the private sector can ensure that they improve their bottom line, if they invest more strategically in women leadership, adding that talent is critical to staying competitive, “but despite the growing number of qualified women in the workforce in all areas, the female talent pool continues to remain underutilized which is a worldwide phenomenon.” She added: “A McKinsey study showed that women in business continue to face a formidable gender gap in senior-leadership positions. The barriers too are well known: a mix of cultural factors, ingrained mind-sets, and stubborn forms of behaviour, including a tendency to tap a much narrower band of women leaders than is possible given the available talent pool.
“The African continent comes third after the US and Europe, and first amongst other emerging regions in terms of women’s representation on boardrooms of top listed companies. If we are to talk about changing the narrative of women’s economic empowerment on the continent, we need to start by understanding, and making the linkages necessary for the transformation Africa requires. “At a time when private sector growth in the continent is reaching unprecedented levels, we must dig deeper to explore how women are involved – all the way from providing tertiary services to being at the decision-making tables. Knowing what we know about the role of women in driving macroeconomic growth and how women can contribute to sustainable growth and development, it is clear that the Africa must make far women board directors of Africa’s top listed companies - 4 - better use of women in the workforce especially in corporate board rooms.”
According to Africa Renewal Magazine, a United Nations publication, it was noted that countries with the highest percentage of women board members are Kenya (19.8%), Ghana (17.7%), South Africa (17.4%), Botswana (16.9%) and Zambia (16.9%). Companies that have seated more than a small handful of women include the Kenya-based East African Breweries Limited (EABL) with a board that’s 45.5% women, followed by South Africa’s Impala Platinum Holdings Limited at 38.5% and Woolworths Holdings Limited at 30.8%.
It also noted that on the downside, the country with the lowest percentage of women on boards is Côte d’Ivoire (5.1%), followed by Morocco (5.9%), Tunisia (7.9%) and Egypt (8.2%). Uganda hangs around the continent’s average of 12.7%, according to the report.
The magazine also stated that Norway adopted a gender quota policy in 2003, requiring firms operating in the country to increase the percentage of women on their boards to at least 40%, from an average at the time of 7%.
It explained that the Norway government warned it would deregister companies not complying with the regulation, adding that at 40.1% currently, Norway has the world’s highest percentage of women on company boards, “the global average is 15%.”
“Unlike in Norway, African countries adopting policies that support women’s leadership in companies are not necessarily enforcing those policies. The Kenyan constitution requires that of the elective or appointive bodies of a company, no more than two-thirds of the members are of the same gender,” magazine noted.
From a sociological point, the issue takes a different twist. According to a senior lecturer in the Department of Sociology, University of Lagos, Dr. Franca Attoh, that despite giant strides made by women in education, there is still a dearth of women in the corporate world, particularly at top-level positions such as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. She stated that the reason cannot be attributed to lack of experience, as there are a number of social factors and some of these social factors include domestic responsibilities.”
She noted that when a career-driven woman has a family, there is a tendency for her upward mobility to be hampered, adding that there is hardly a way a woman in her childbearing age would want to pursue a career; because there would be a kind of challenge for her, especially the need to take care of the children and pursue her career simultaneously.
Attoh argued that culture is another challenge confronting women, noting that the Nigeria society is patriarchal in nature; and that the socialisation process makes women subordinate and tends to foist on the society the fact that the place of the woman is not in the public sphere. She further stated that there have been a number of such utterances and narratives even from people who are occupying very high profile positions in government, noting that the society still sees the place of the women to be the domestic sphere, which she noted imposes an impediment to female upward mobility especially in the cooperate world.
The University Don further stated that in the world of work, for a woman to prove herself, she would need to do three or four times the amount of work a man would do.
Attoh added that there are number of platforms that enable men to move up and get to the top, noting that these issues are real impediments confronting women. Therefore, she remarked that women are going to School, but they don’t have those platforms that can enable them get to the peak of their career.
According to her, “There are some potent cultural issues for instance, a woman who wants to pursue career most of the times would be thinking in pursuing the career, what would be the feeling of the husband? Would the husband not feel threatened if she gets to the very top? These are little challenges that women always find a way of balancing them and in the process they lose out. The conclusion is that in all ratification women hold the short end of the stick.
“Most of the countries that tried to do this, tries to bridge the gap through policy but then for me the most fundamental in addition to policy is socialization. Society is of the view women socialize the children, but the truth is that women are the ones who reinforce those cultural notions that the place of the woman is in the domestic sphere. Most times without realising it, they too have been socialised into such notions, so you find them passing on those socialisation to their children. So socialization is fundamental but policy is also key.
“There is need for a conscious policy in addressing the issue. A number of regimes have tried to address it. Former Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan tried to address it. You recall that the present regime did not set out to address it until there were a lot of hues and cry, but even at that it is still insignificant because how many women are actually occupying top positions in government and is not as if there is a dearth of qualified women. We have a number of women who are holding their own in all professions. There is no profession that you won’t find women who have actually made a lot of strides.”
Another individual who lend her voice to the issue is the Executive Vice-Chairman, ENL Consortium Limited, Dr. Vicky Haastrup, who stated that it is time for women to rise up and put themselves in strategy position in all sectors of the economy.
She also noted that there is nothing women cannot achieve and the President’s Wife, Mrs. Aisha Buhari suggestion of having appointments allocation on the basis of 70: 30 ratios of men to women, is not enough, “because women are more in number than men in population.”
“So why are we asking for 30 percent. I think 50 percent is fair enough. I think 50: 50 sharing formulae will be something that will be fair to us. Unfortunately, in Nigeria, we have very few women, either as Ministers or Permanent Secretaries or Directors in Government. But I think that is not fair. Women should do enough to prove themselves by building a solid track record,” she noted. Also shedding light on the issue is the Director of Administration and Human Resources, Lagos State Internal Revenue Service, Mrs. Arinola Kola-Daisi, who opined that the reason there is a small handful of women occupying key positions in Corporate boards and in many instances men and women are in equal number at the entry point; but as women get to the middle management level they begin to leave to pursue their own businesses that give them more flexibility with their time.
She also noted that though things have improved, but the primary responsibility of child bearing and domestic matters is reserved for the woman, adding that many cannot handle these pressures with the challenge of living in busy cities. Kola-Daisi explained that in terms of women occupying top management positions such as CEO in corporate organisations, they are not yet there, but that there is remarkable improvement. “It is pertinent to note however that although we are not yet there the level of women’s representation is on the increase,” she observed.
She added: “To promote gender equity in public and private institutions a proportion of these spaces must be reserved for women. This is being done in some instances. These must of course be women with the capacity to do the job and can match their male counterparts in competence levels. Secondly, it is very important that corporate organizations and public sector institutions provide an enabling environment for female staff. For example, where possible, they should be provision of crèches. Also, flexible working hours within reasonable bounds will also be a great help. In Lagos state for example staffs are permitted 6 months maternity leave. In conclusion increasing the number of women at top most level is a continuous process.”
The Glass Ceiling Theory
According to studies, the general-case glass ceiling theory states that not only is it more difficult for women than for men to be promoted up to levels of authority in hierarchy at workplaces, but also that the obstacles women face in relation to men become greater as they move up the hierarchy. The theory implies that there is the existence of an impermeable barrier that blocks the vertical mobility of women: Below this barrier, women are able to get promoted; beyond this barrier, they are not. The theory states that the obstacles women face to promotion relative to men systematically increase as they move up the hierarchy, adding that obstacles to promotion may also increase for men as they move up the hierarchy, but the idea of a glass ceiling implies that barriers to promotion intensify more for women than for men.
Theory further noted: “Employers and top managers may be willing to let women occupy the lower reaches of the managerial structure, but the argument goes that they obstruct the access of women to positions of ‘real’ power. As a result, women are largely denied promotions to the higher levels of management. Many different concrete mechanisms may be responsible for this obstruction: old fashioned sexism, women managers’ isolation from important informal networks, or more subtle sexist attitudes that place women at a disadvantage. But whatever the specific mechanism, the glass ceiling theory argues that the relative disadvantages women face in getting jobs and promotions are greater in the upper levels of managerial hierarchies than at the bottom.”