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Review of the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Act 1999 – Submission

Diana Ryall & Katie Spearritt

About us

Diana Ryall and Katie Spearritt work closely with private-sector organisations in Australia to support the advancement of women.

Diana Ryall was Managing Director at Apple Computer Australia from 1997 to 2001. While holding this position, the company was recognised by Hewitt Associates as 'Employer of the Year'. Diana stepped down from that position at the end of 2001 to expand her involvement in those areas in which she is passionate: inspiring leadership, supportive workplace cultures and the success of women.

Since leaving Apple, Diana founded the company "Xplore for Success" which offers services to organisations to support talented men and women to achieve personal success. Since 2005, Diana has also led the Chief Executive Women's (CEW) Talent Development Program.

Dr Katie Spearritt is the Managing Director of Diversity Partners, a boutique consultancy working with organisations on the systemic changes required to promote diversity at all levels of their workforce.

Katie is one of the most experienced diversity and change practitioners in Australia, having led significant cultural change and diversity strategies in Australia and Asia/Pacific over the past fifteen years. She has held senior roles across a range of industry sectors including retail, technology and financial services. Katie has worked with many large organisations including Hewlett-Packard, Coles Group, NAB, BHP, Goldman Sachs, and Origin Energy.

Key Themes and Questions

Theme 1: The value and impact of equal employment opportunity for women

1.1 What factors and measures have contributed to improving employment opportunities and outcomes for women?

1.2 What are the obstacles that may impede further progress towards equal employment opportunity within organisations and in Australia generally?

The most significant barrier in many organisations is an exclusive corporate culture that promotes working long hours, extensive travel demands, 7 x 24 mentality, leadership ‘sameness’ and ‘clubby’ social networking. These generate expectations and behaviours that tend to privilege men and employees without family responsibilities and have a negative impact on community and family life. This has worsened over the past decade as hours of work have continued to rise to record levels in Australia.

These cultural norms are not deliberate strategies to exclude others, but they doubtlessly provide certain advantages for men seeking to rise up the career ladder.

An associated barrier is the devaluing of women’s different styles, particularly women’s general preference for collaboration and negotiation. Aggressive exclusionary behaviour is often condoned; while behaviours that emphasise shared leadership and inclusiveness are often overlooked.

Other barriers include the lack of reasonably priced childcare in Australia and limited options for flexible working particularly at senior levels. Few executives openly challenge traditional work practices, assuming that part-time work, working from home and job-sharing are not viable options. This limited view must be challenged for organisations to retain talented women and/or to recruit senior women into management positions in Australia.

1.3 Should there be a greater focus on enabling men and women to share paid work and caring responsibilities more equally? How can men be provided with better opportunities to participate in the care of their children and other dependents?

Yes, we need to make it much more acceptable for men to work flexible hours. This is a critical success factor for enabling more diversity in our organisations. Flexible work options remain on the periphery of work practices and are often seen as ‘career death’ by both employees and their managers. Flexibility will have a much higher level of organizational credibility when more senior men work flexible work hours.

New requirements and targets for flexible work hours for both men and women within organisations is one way of enabling shared work and care.

1.4 What regulatory role should government play to achieve equal employment opportunity for women?

Theme 2: Objects and coverage of the EOWW Act

2.1 Are the objects of the EOWW Act appropriate and relevant to today’s workplaces?

Yes, we believe that the objects, particularly the employment matters including recruitment, development, succession planning, promotion and remuneration, need ongoing high-level focus with clear target expectations for improving gender diversity.

2.2 Has the EOWW Act been effective in meeting its objects?

Although the Act has been partially effective in raising awareness within Australian organizations of the need to promote diversity, our metrics are significantly behind most other Western countries. Therefore we feel it is important that the Act remains separate and gains increased focus.

2.3 Has the EOWW Act contributed to improving women’s employment opportunities? If not, why not? If so, how?

Yes, the Act has been a major lever for change. It has created a disciplined annual process by which organizations must review existing practices and set goals for future initiatives. However, it has not led to deep cultural change. In order for systemic change, we believe in setting goals for each 5-10 year period.

2.4 Should the role of men as fathers and carers be acknowledged in the EOWW Act?

Yes, this should be acknowledged given our earlier comments about the importance of men in taking up flexible work practices.

2.5 Is the current coverage of the Act appropriate? Should the current coverage of organisations or employees be expanded or decreased? Why?

We believe the current coverage is adequate.

2.6 Is the self-identification and disclosure of organisations appropriate? Is there another way that organisations should or could be identified?

Yes.

Theme 3: Workplace programs, reporting and compliance

3.1 How are organisations responding to the barriers to women’s employment? What programs and policies are the most effective levers for change in organisations (e.g. work processes, organizational culture, and/or workplace relations and human resources practice)?

In general, organisations respond only as required to prevent being named and shamed in public. Those organisations with the greatest success tend to have deeply integrated diversity with the cultural values and are working towards hardwiring diversity into recruitment, promotion, remuneration, development programs, succession planning and the broader business strategy. More progressive organisations also ensure that opportunities for hiring and promotion, particularly at management levels, are transparent.

There tends to be strong advocacy for diversity from the CEO and Board members and willingness for perceived ‘risk-taking’ by promoting women to senior levels or creating additional roles on senior leadership teams for women only. Cultural changes interventions include both top-down and bottom-up focus in progressive organizations.

Diversity Councils led by the CEO with senior executive participation are also a critical success factor. Regular Council meetings ensure that key organisational metrics are tabled and actions identified to address particular areas of concern. Diversity Councils also provide an opportunity for experiential learning at the highest level. The outcomes from a Diversity Council are further strengthened with the inclusion of an external participant.

Programs that build the ‘mindfulness’ of leaders to lead inclusively are also critical to changing the mindset of managers. This is often done through experiential programs that challenge traditional mindsets. The changes required to provide more inclusive workplaces require increased awareness of styles and acknowledgement of deeply held beliefs and bias.

Development programs are also levers for change. Women gain confidence through programs that support self-awareness, self-confidence, communication styles and leadership styles. There has been a wealth of research on the style differences between men and women and where these are translated into pragmatic and experiential learning women gain the confidence to take build their organizational presence. In organizations where often 90% of the leadership team is male this provides a worthwhile investment in their women. Women also need champions and mentors in the senior levels who provide support and encouragement.

3.2 Are the EOWW Act’s requirements regarding the content of workplace programs, including the specified ‘employment matters’, useful and appropriate? If not, how could they be improved?

Requiring organizations to set 3-5 year targets for the representation of women at all levels of the workforce and making these targets publicly known would improve the requirements. We think it would be helpful if organisations required all senior managers to undertake diversity awareness training, and all high-potential women were provided with training or coaching to build their line management skills and networks. We also believe that organisations would benefit from setting a three-year strategic program of works to avoid simplistic and tokenistic, short-term responses.

3.3 Is the process for developing workplace programs useful and appropriate? If not, why not?

The current process for developing workplace programs varies between organisations. However, there are various inadequacies with the process as programs may not be delivered as reported, and program evaluation is very loose. Programs may be disbanded at any time. There needs to be a clear definition of outcomes which are made publicly available on each reporting company’s website. Some organisations undertake superficial programs such as women’s networking groups with few objectives. The development of a three-year rolling plan would reduce the likelihood of these occurrences.

3.4 Has the development of workplace programs contributed to improved employment opportunities for women within reporting organisations? If so, can you provide examples from your experience?

Yes, many organisations have improved the representation of women when they have set a long-term diversity strategy with clear objectives and unwavering leadership support. We have worked with organisations that have reported quarterly to their top leadership team and Board on progress for women, thereby ensuring diversity is a key performance indicator of their organisation. This leads to increasing accountability across the organization.

3.5 Are the EOWW Act’s requirements regarding the content of reports clear and useful? If not, how could they be improved?

3.6 Is the frequency of reporting optimal? Are the provisions for waiving reporting requirements effective? If not, what changes do you think are necessary?

Each organisation should be required to report annually. There is little gained from the waiving requirements, as many progressive organizations still report internally at least yearly on their programs and metrics. Waiving often allows those organizations less committed to real change to neglect their commitments and lose momentum.

3.7 How resource intensive are the reporting requirements for organisations? Can you provide examples of the costs of reporting from your experience?

Although the reporting process can be resource-intensive, it remains essential to implement change. Research conducted by McKinsey has shown that those organizations that focus on developing an inclusive culture and diversity have a better bottom line and were less affected by the GFC.

3.8 How useful are the reporting requirements to organisations? That is, what benefits can be attributed to the reporting process for the organisation and for women workers?

As organisations are not required to share the report internally, many women remain unaware of their organisation’s position in terms of gender diversity. This is sometimes intentional, as they do not want the situation to be apparent to their employees.

3.9 Are the enforcement mechanisms currently in place sufficient to ensure that the objectives of the legislation are met? If so, how? If not, why not?

No, there is little follow up from the submission of the annual report regardless of the quality or results of the submitted report. The one-on-one feedback from Agency staff is helpful, albeit limited, in offering targeted advice and coaching. We believe there should be an option for targeted reviewing or auditing of particular industry segments to ensure compliance is more than tokenistic.

3.10 Are there alternative enforcement mechanisms that would effectively and efficiently ensure compliance? Can you provide examples? What additional benefits would they bring?

See 3.9 above. Auditing would provide organizations with more information on best practice and drive a culture of continuous improvement.

3.11 Has your organisation undertaken any analysis of the costs and benefits of compliance with the EOWW Act? What were the key findings?

Not Applicable.

Theme 4: Role and activities of EOWA

4.1 Are the role and functions of EOWA appropriate to achieving the objects of the Act? Which functions of EOWA are most valuable and effective? Why?

4.2 Is the role of EOWA in monitoring and enforcing compliance of reporting organisations under the EOWW Act adequate and appropriate? If not, how should it be changed?

There is an opportunity to strengthen the monitoring and enforcement role of the Agency by undertaking targeted reviews or audits following submission of the annual report. This would include detailed company review through various data collection, such as focus groups, interviews with CEO and senior executives and/or surveys. This practice could reduce tokenistic reporting and ensure real outcomes are achieved. Each year a particular industry segment may be the focus for review. Organisations would benefit through the provision of best-practice advice tailored to their company strategy and culture.

A model for consideration is the Hewitt Associates Global Best Employers Model, in which the CEO, HR Director and a statistically significant number of employers are required to provide input on their company’s programs and culture. This further highlights how more junior employees are able to express their views on the inclusiveness of the culture in which they work.

4.3 Is the role of EOWA in promoting understanding and acceptance, and public discussion of equal opportunity for women in the workplace adequate and appropriate? If not, how should it be changed?

We believe the CEO of EOWA should have significant business experience and be able to command the attention of CEO’s and challenge traditional Australian workplace culture.

Theme 5: Relationship with other legislation and institutions

5.1 Does the EOWW Act complement or overlap with other legislation? How could the relationship of the EOWW Act to other legislation be clarified or improved?

We maintain the importance of keeping the Act separate to ensure a continued focus on equal opportunity. Australia currently lags behind most western countries in the outcomes from gender diversity initiatives. Without clear focus this situation is likely to continue and Australia’s reputation in the global employment sphere diminished.

5.2 Is there potential duplication between workplace reporting under the EOWW Act and any other obligations such as, for example, the enforcement obligations of the new Fair Work Ombudsman?

We believe that Australia’s metrics on success of women are so low that the focus needs to be independent from general fair work legislation or human rights legislation at this time.

With the falling percentage of women in senior positions and the increasing gender gap in remuneration, we believe gender diversity will require critical focus over the next 5-10 years to achieve a workplace of which Australia can be proud.

Once Australia is ranked significantly more highly in the Global Gender Gap Index, consideration should be given to the development of an Employment Equity Act that has a broader focus on traditionally disadvantaged groups, such as people with a disability and indigenous employees, as well as gender.

5.3 Should EOWA remain as an independent statutory authority or should the role and functions of EOWA be combined with those of another entity that also holds responsibilities related to achieving equal employment opportunity for women? If you think the role and functions of EOWA should be combined, with which entity and why?

This is a major issue for Australia as we rank poorly on the Global Gender Gap Index of the World Economic Forum (21st place in 2008). This is in radical contrast to our progress in educating our women where we are ranked 5th. We believe the EOWA Agency should remain independent and be linked with the Government’s business or economic portfolios. Resourcing for the Agency should be strengthened to enable additional review/auditing and consulting functions.

Theme 6: Measuring the success of the EOWW Act and EOWA

6.1 Are the mechanisms for measuring the effectiveness of the legislation and EOWA adequate? If not, how should they be improved?

No, there is inadequate data on targets for the representation of women at all levels of the workforce. There is insufficient granularity of data from within organizations to determine turnover at all levels of the workforce and the movement (or lack of movement) of women into line-management roles. It should also be a requirement that the CEO and Board are regularly briefed on the organisation’s efforts and progress on diversity.

6.2 Is the EOWA data set adequate to measure changes in women’s participation and equality in employment? Could it be improved? If so, how?

We believe the key metrics should include:

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