This being Woman’s Month, I pay special tribute to a special woman whom I have come to admire over the past ten years. She is a colleague who I served with at the National Skills Authority, have worked with on a project with the Human Resource Development Council under the then Deputy President Mr. Cyril Ramaphosa when we engaged with labour organisations when developing the Worker Education Framework, and an individual whom I reach out to when I need advice on gender issues.
I introduce Ms Lulama Nare who is currently the Chairperson of the Commission for Gender Equality in South Africa.
Over the years, I have personally witnessed Ms Nare’s personal growth, leadership skills, passion and capabilities that play a critical role in striving to promote and radically transform our sectors towards the realisation of an equal society.
Whilst we salute the achievements of Ms Nare let us not forget the plight of thousands of women in our country that play vital roles in being single mums and breadwinners with very little acknowledgement and support.
Studies conducted by Business Women Association of South Africa and Deloitte Centre for Corporate Governance found that only 9.2% of women hold Chairpersonship positions, 19.5% of board seats are held by women and only 2.9% CEOs are women.
Statistics South Africa also confirms that women are still underrepresented in positions of authority and power. Only one company had a female CEO on the Top 40 JSE listed companies.
Whilst the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996, commits the state to achieve gender equality and gender equality forms part of the country’s integral system of human rights intended to ensure equality for all citizens, workplaces do not seem to be paying particular attention to supporting women sufficiently but are instead displaying tokenism in their appointments.
Several studies have been conducted to understand the plight of women in the workplace and in a majority of cases HR managers are aware of the challenges women face as employees. It is therefore disappointing to note how little is done by organisations to commit to providing women with a supportive and conducive work environment.
So what are some of the strategies that can support women in the workplace?
Research by Claudia Goldman reveals that “one of the reasons women earn less money than men do is that they strongly prefer temporal flexibility over salary. That is, they are willing to turn down higher-paying jobs because those jobs come with more demanding hours or less predictable hours.” Therefore, a recommendation for organisations is to implement policies in the workplace that promote flexibility as related to either working from home or opting to work certain schedules.
According to Onley (2016) feedback from more than 15 000 women, indicate they wanted sufficient paid leave, satisfactory remuneration and supportive co-workers.
Professor Mariette Coetzee recommends that organisational strategies aimed at empowering and treating women in an equal manner should consider the following:
- The leadership style of managers and supervisors should display a relationship-oriented style
- Organisations should offer women a chance to develop within the workplace, addressing barriers such as work-life difficulties and acceptance of women by male counterparts
- Organisations must cater specifically for unique needs of women
Professor Coetzee emphasises that women are not asking for favouritism or preferential treatment. Women are asking to be treated fairly and differently, because they are different.
What are your views on this?
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