Women still struggle to

make it to the top

leadership posts in
academe
Where are the women?
By ROSANNA TAMBURRI | OCT 05 2016

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Canada’s liberal government was officially sworn in last year on a bright and
unseasonably warm November day. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau emerged
from Rideau Hall to present his new cabinet to the cheering crowd that had
gathered on the grounds of the Governor General’s residence. With 15 men and
15 women, he boasted it was the first gender-balanced ministerial team in the
country’s history and “a cabinet that looks like Canada.” When asked why gender
parity was important, the prime minister replied with his now famous quip:
“Because it’s 2015.”
Despite the positive gesture, gender parity remains a concern in the political
arena and indeed in most other spheres. In the corporate world, women hold
only a third of senior management positions and account for one-fifth of board
seats at major Canadian corporations, according to Catalyst Canada, a research
and advocacy organization that promotes the advancement of women in the
workplace.
The halls of academia are no exception, although at some levels women’s
advancement in higher education has been a success story. Gender parity in
student enrolment at Canadian universities was reached in the late 1980s and
since then women have come to outnumber men in undergraduate and master’s
studies; at the PhD level, women account for nearly half of students. Women also
represent half of sessional instructors and more than 42 percent of assistant
professors, according to a 2012 report on gender by the Council of Canadian
Academies.
Where are the women?
But go higher up the ladder and the story takes a different and all-too-familiar
turn. Only 36 percent of associate professors and about 22 percent of full
professors are women, the same study notes. Over the 133-year history of the
prestigious Royal Society of Canada, only three of its 113 presidents have been
women. And the number of women who have led the three major research
granting councils can be counted on one hand.
The numbers are equally bleak in the ranks of senior administrators. A study on
university leadership by David Turpin, president of the University of Alberta,
found that the proportion of women university presidents rose to about 20
percent in the mid-1990s. Since then, despite some minor fluctuations up and
down, that level has held more or less steady ever since. As of September 1, 19 of
the 97 member universities of Universities Canada are led by women (19.6
percent).
The figures are no better outside Canada’s borders. Data from the 2015-16 Times
Higher Education World University Rankings show that just 33 of the top 200
universities in the world (16.5 percent) are headed by women – including
Canada’s own McGill University, led by Suzanne Fortier. This is actually an
improvement from the 28 universities (14 percent) led by women in the 2014-15
top-200 ranking.
“[Pauline Jewett] was marginalized and seen as an outsider,
although by her extensive academic background she should not
have been seen that way.”

Lorna Marsden, past president of York University

and Wilfrid Laurier University.

In fairness, women’s contributions to university leadership are more significant

than the numbers would suggest. In Canada, women have held the presidency of
degree-granting institutions since the early 1900s, although at the time they
were relegated to the Catholic-run, women-only schools like Mount Saint Vincent
University in Halifax. In a 2004 speech to the Canadian High Commission in
London, Lorna Marsden, past president of York University and Wilfrid Laurier
University, remarked that the Sisters of Charity who founded and ran MSVU were
pioneers in academic administration and curriculum design but weren’t
acknowledged as such, overshadowed as they were by their male counterparts
and the higher-profile institutions they ran.

It took much longer for women to emerge as leaders outside of MSVU. The first
woman appointed president of a co-ed university was the formidable Pauline
Jewett, who assumed the helm of Simon Fraser University in 1974. In her
biography of the late Dr. Jewett, Pauline Jewett: A Passion for Canada, Judith
McKenzie, political science professor at the University of Guelph, paints a vivid
portrait of her presidency and ambitious agenda. Among Dr. Jewett’s priorities
were to hire Canadian academics at a time when they were often ignored in
favour of their U.S. and U.K. counterparts; to expand student access beyond the
traditional economic and social elites; and to bring pay levels of female
academics in line with those of their male colleagues. But she ran up against
fierce resistance and criticism.

Before making the move to SFU, Dr. Jewett had been one of the few women
members of Parliament “and was no stranger to patriarchal institutions,” writes
Dr. McKenzie. “Yet none of her experiences had prepared her for the intensity of
the old boys club mentality that pervaded Simon Fraser.” Frustrated, she cut
short her first term and returned to political life.

“She was marginalized and seen by many as an outsider, although by her

extensive academic background she should not have been seen that way,” Dr.
Marsden told the London audience in her 2004 speech.

More than a decade would pass before another woman would match Dr. Jewett’s
accomplishment and move into the corner office: Marsha Hanen at the University
of Winnipeg in 1989, followed in quick succession by Geraldine Kenney-Wallace
at McMaster University, Elizabeth Parr-Johnston at MSVU, Susan Mann at York
University and Dr. Marsden herself, in 1992, at Wilfrid Laurier.

Dr. Marsden credits Janet Wright, president and founder of Janet Wright &
Associates, an executive search firm, for these early successes by bringing
women candidates to the attention of search committees and governing boards,
and ensuring that they were included in presidential search pools. “When Janet
was trying to persuade me to let my name stand for president of Wilfrid Laurier
University, she had Marsha [Hanen] phone me,” recalls Dr. Marsden. “Janet
wasn’t just sourcing names for the search committees, she was mentoring people
who could become president. That was a huge breakthrough.”
“as we rise up the ranks there are fewer and fewer women”

Vianne Timmons, president of the University of Regina.

The proportion of women leaders continued to climb throughout the 1990s. But
then, as Dr. Turpin’s study notes, the numbers stagnated. To this day there are
many universities that have never had a woman president. “To me that is
shocking,” says Vianne Timmons, president of the University of Regina.

The difficulty with recruiting women to the presidency, in her view, starts
further down the pipeline, at the level of provost, vice-president and dean, from
which presidents are often chosen. “When I have a VP position open, I get
applications primarily from men,” notes Dr. Timmons. “It’s a real concern. Where
are the women?”

Academia is by no means an anomaly in this regard. Across sectors and

industries, “as we rise up the ranks there are fewer and fewer women,” says
Vandana Juneja, senior director of Catalyst Canada. “We see women facing
similar challenges and similar barriers” as they strive to move higher up the
ladder.

The reasons why are numerous and complex and have little to do with child-
rearing and family responsibilities, as is often assumed. Ms. Juneja notes that
even among women and men who have made similar life choices – such as to not
have children – and who aspire to senior leadership positions, women still lag
behind. “There are other factors at play,” she says. These include systemic
barriers such as a dearth of senior role models that can make it difficult for
women to envisage themselves in leadership roles; a lack of access to informal
networks and senior level mentors and sponsors; and deeply ingrained biases in
hiring and promotion practices.

Aggravating the situation, in Dr. Timmons’ view, is the high degree of public
scrutiny that women in these positions are now under. She says she’s astounded
by the number of negative comments made about her on social media that refer
specifically to her gender. “I don’t care so much when [the comments] are about
my clothes or my hair or my voice even. But when it’s about my parenting, or
being a mother, those I find a little more challenging,” she says. “Sometimes it
cuts to the quick.”

“They think they can bully you a little bit more, they can push you
around a bit”

Still, she reads the messages and shares them when making presentations to
senior administrators and at leadership forums she hosts for women in the
community. “Women leaders need to be prepared for what they can face,” she
says. “I don’t want to whitewash it.” On the other hand, she also emphasizes the
many positive aspects of her job. “There’s not a day I don’t feel that I’m making a
difference. That’s critical.”

Not only are women less likely to hold the top job at a university, but once having
attained it, they are also more likely to have a mandate cut short. According to
Julie Cafley, vice-president of the Ottawa-based Public Policy Forum, the last six
of eight presidents with unfinished mandates have been women. (Likewise, U of
A’s Dr. Turpin told the Globe and Mail that he and his research colleagues
recently updated their analysis of university presidents and also found that this
is happening with greater frequency to women than to men.) Several former
presidents that Dr. Cafley interviewed for her PhD research, both male and
female, spoke of “a dominant male culture” within Canadian universities,
especially at the board level and in senior leadership teams – not that different
from what Dr. Jewett encountered more than 40 years ago.

“It was a very, very male world,” said one former male president to Dr. Cafley. “It
was a very distasteful experience for me because it was my first real encounter
with [an] old boys club and all the negative connotations that that meant.”

Another participant in Dr. Cafley’s research, a woman, confided: “People don’t

take you seriously … They don’t think you know about numbers and money …
They think they can bully you a little bit more, they can push you around a bit.”
Most recently, one woman’s rise to university president ended before it even
began. Wendy Cukier, formerly vice-president, research and innovation, at
Ryerson University and founder of its Diversity Institute, was scheduled to take
over as Brock University’s first female president on Sept. 1. However, just days
before it was to take effect, the chair of Brock’s board of trustees, John Suk,
announced that the appointment was cancelled in a “mutual decision.” Few other
details were given. Linda Rose-Krasnor, a psychology professor and president of
the Brock University Faculty Association, said the news “left many of us in a state
of shock [and] confusion.”
“If we want to see women moving into these positions, we need to
socialize search firms and boards to look at different pathways in
for women.”

In an effort to overcome some of the barriers women face, Universities Canada

officially launched last year a network of women presidents. Among other things,
the initiative aims to develop a supportive network to mentor newly appointed
women presidents as well as those who aspire to the presidency; to seek out
speaking engagements and other opportunities to raise the profile of its
members; and to ensure that they are nominated for top honours such as the
Order of Canada and the Killam Prize.

“My hope for the network is that it will be an environment that can help to
promote the value of women in executive-head positions, that can provide
sponsorship opportunities for women … but also can do some advocacy in the
broader context,” says Sara Diamond, president of OCAD University.

Sara Diamond, president of OCAD University.

One issue the network hopes to tackle is finding ways to ensure equity and
diversity on university governing boards and to foster boards that will support
women presidents. “If we want to see women moving into these positions, we
really need to socialize search firms and boards to look at different pathways in
for women,” Dr. Diamond says, and to ensure that women make their way up the
appropriate ladders within academia so that they acquire the skills that are
attractive to search firms and boards. “The kind of skill set that is increasingly
required for these roles is pretty wide and there isn’t that much training within
that path up the ranks,” she says.

A panel of women presidents spoke about the importance of diversity at this

year’s annual conference of the Canadian University Boards Association held in
Halifax in April. The advancement of women’s leadership was also a major topic
of discussion at the Universities Canada membership meeting in Toronto that
same month. Bill Thomas, chief executive officer of KPMG Canada, addressed the
latter meeting and spoke about the strides his own organization has made in
appointing women to leadership positions.
An unconscious bias

Mr. Thomas said the biggest barrier to women’s advancement is unconscious

bias. He challenged all presidents to think about the leadership teams at their
own institutions and what changes could be made to ensure that women have an
opportunity to participate fully in its leadership. Universities Canada President
Paul Davidson says his organization is offering unconscious bias training for
university presidents similar to the training that KPMG used. “This is an urgent
challenge. It’s an ongoing challenge,” Mr. Davidson says.

In another effort to promote gender diversity, Universities Canada recently

changed its bylaws regarding regional representation on its executive board. The
goal is to have women eventually make up half of the board, says Mr. Davidson,
and have it reflect the true diversity of the country.

Canada’s French-speaking universities are taking part in a broader initiative.

The Agence universitaire de la Francophonie, a group that represents the world’s
francophone universities, launched a network of senior women administrators
two years ago. The network plans to run a mentorship program to encourage
women to seek out leadership positions, including those of dean, vice-president
and president. It soon hopes to launch a centralized agency that will track the
number of women in these roles at the more than 800 French-speaking
universities around the world and conduct research on what hurdles stand in the
way of their advancement.

The work will be especially significant for universities in regions such as

francophone Africa, where women academics lag far behind their male
counterparts, says Marie-Linda Lord, former vice-president of students and
international affairs at Université de Moncton. But its impact could extend well
beyond French-speaking countries since francophone universities are also found
in English-speaking regions, says Dr. Lord, who sits on the women’s network as
vice-chair of the Americas region. “Even in Canada, it’s a male world, with male
frameworks of thinking and male ways of doing things,” she says. The network
will be open to men as well as women, adds Dr. Lord. “We have to engage in a
dialogue. We have to avoid marginalizing ourselves.”

“There are some deeply embedded challenges that women in

academia face that have to be addressed”

Wendy Cukier, former vice-president, research

and innovation, Ryerson University.

Governments can also play a role by continuing to ask questions about why “the
vast majority” of government-sponsored research funds in the country goes to
male researchers, says Ryerson’s Dr. Cukier (she was interviewed prior to the
announcement that she was no longer moving to Brock). Dr. Cukier notes that
research conducted by Ryerson’s Diversity Institute shows that women account
for only 29 percent of Canada Research Chairs, 7.7 percent of Canada Excellence
Research Chairs (this has since dropped to 3.7 percent), and 14 percent of
Ontario Research Fund – Research Excellence recipients.

As well, institutions should strive to implement bias-free recruiting and

promotion processes, and to provide access to mentoring, coaching and
leadership-development opportunities that are now commonplace in the
corporate sector, says Dr. Cukier. “There are some deeply embedded challenges
that women in academia face that have to be addressed,” she says.

The benefits of achieving a diverse and inclusive workplace will ultimately be

reaped by institutions as well as the individuals involved, says Catalyst’s Ms.
 Juneja. These include improved financial performance, better decision-making,
greater creativity and innovation, and enhanced attraction and retention of
employees. “Universities, like other organizations, need to engage both men and
women in leadership positions in order to really leverage the full potential of
their talent,” she says. “This isn’t a gender issue. It’s a talent issue.”

https://www.universityaffairs.ca/features/feature-article/women-still-struggle-make-top-leadership-
posts-academe/

Female leaders are missing

in academia
June 18, 2014 6.39am AEST

Author

1. Tanya Fitzgerald
Head of School, Associate Dean (Research), La Trobe University

Disclosure statement

Tanya Fitzgerald does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would
benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Partners

Victoria State Government provides funding as a strategic partner of The Conversation AU.
La Trobe University provides funding as a member of The Conversation AU.

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Republish this article

Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under Creative Commons licence.
 An overwhelming majority of university leaders in Australia are male. Flickr/David Burke, CC BY-SA

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Women make up 64% of Pro Vice Chancellors, 65% of Deputy Vice Chancellors and
77% of Vice Chancellors in Australian universities.

Would such a headline cause a reader to re-scan the article to make sure it was
correct? Would there be an outcry about women in university leadership roles if this
headline were accurate? And why is there an apparent indifference given these are
the correct figures for male leaders in our universities?

The persistent numerical imbalance of women and men at senior levels in

universities does not appear to be cause for concentrated and wider concern. This
might be explained by underpinning assumptions that men “naturally” lead and that
management is a masculine domain.

Paradoxically, although many universities host research centres and acclaim the
intellectual contribution of academics engaged in research in the areas of gender,
work, and organisations, a blind eye appears to have been turned as to how gender
equity might be applied in the workplace.

There has been an unprecedented growth in the enrolment of women in higher

education over the past four decades. Since 1970 the number of female students has
grown twice as quickly as that of men. But the good news ends there.

This dramatic growth is not reflected in the workforce demographics. Studies by the
OECD and UNESCO in 2010 show that despite having the same or better
qualifications, women have not made significant progress in terms of salary,
promotion or a marked increase in representation at senior levels.

And those women in senior leadership roles are caught in an institutional spotlight
and accordingly judged as leaders and as women, rather than just as leaders, as their
male counterparts are.
Jane Den Hollander - one of only nine female vice-chancellors in Australia. Supplied by Deakin University

An even bleaker revelation reported recently in the Times Higher Education was that
of the 18,500 professors in the UK, only 85 are black and a mere 17 of these are black
women.

Nations such as Iceland, Norway, Finland, Sweden and Israel have higher numbers of
women in senior leadership roles. Positive initiatives such as gender mainstreaming,
affirmative action strategies, as well as quotas and targets have brought about a
number of changes that have created more socially inclusive and sustainable
workforces.

Yet despite affirmative action strategies in Australia, England, and New Zealand such
as flexible work and leave practices, gender balances on appointments and
promotions committees, and an increasing awareness of unconscious bias, there has
been a glacial shift forwards.

In many ways, an unintended consequence of legislative change such as the Equal

Employment Opportunity act and more transparent institutional reporting on staff
tenure, positions and salaries, has been that gender appears to be no longer on the
agenda.

What needs to be done?

In the first instance, there is a need to reinvigorate debates about leaders and
leadership in higher education. We ought to cast aside assumptions about what
makes a “good” leader as this invariably leads to an unconscious bias that when we
think “leader” we think “male”. This further suggests that women who venture into
senior management are transgressors; that they have strayed onto the playgrounds of
male power.

Second, we need to think beyond simply counting more women in by increasing their
numbers. While numbers are important to create a critical mass, it is a change in
attitude towards female leaders that is needed.

Third, women are frequently appointed for their relational, collaborative and
participatory skills; skills that are required in 21st century organisations and skills
that presumably their male colleagues do not “naturally” possess. We need to move
away from attributing leadership styles to both genders.
Women are travellers in a male world in which they are confronted with expectations
of being managerial (read masculine) enough to be acknowledged as managers, yet
feminine enough to be recognised as women. But to be accepted, they need to
conform to established stereotypes and stay out of powerful positions.

How can we rattle the managerial cage?

The first step is to dismantle narrow and gendered constructions of leaders and
leadership and to promote thinking about how workplaces and work practices can
become more democratic, inclusive and socially just. Thinking more broadly about
the characteristics required for 21st century leadership has the potential to liberate
both women and men from institutionalised ideas about leadership.

Second, serious questions need to be raised about universities. Worryingly, the

academy’s own claim to be the custodian and site of liberal ideas has failed in the
arena of gender relations. There are profound silences in regard to discourses of
human rights, democracy and social justice, questions about equity and diversity
within leadership and more collaborative and socially democratic ways of leading and
managing.

Equity and diversity is a leadership dilemma, and with a mandate to be the critic and
conscience of society, universities need to step up to their mission.

http://theconversation.com/female-leaders-are-missing-in-academia-27996
Leadership Roles
May 3, 2011 | :

by Marybeth Gasman

This past week, I had the pleasure of attending a session on empowering women for academic
leadership roles. The event was held at the University of Pennsylvania and featured female
academic leaders — our president, deans, center leaders and department chairs. Together, these
impressive women offered advice to all of the women in the audience. I firmly believe in passing on
valuable information to others so I am including what I learned below.
First, to be an academic leader you must be a superb scholar and thought leader. If you want to
advance and have the respect of your faculty colleagues, you need to earn that respect by
conducting rigorous research and by speaking out on important issues.
Second, rather than merely ticking accomplishments off their list, women need to take time to enjoy
their success. They need to enjoy it while it’s happening. Women also need to share these
accomplishments with younger women, detailing how they accomplished their goals.
Third, colleges and universities need to think deeply about the impediments that stand in the way of
women earning tenure, as earning tenure is the pathway to academic leadership. Current leadership
needs to examine these impediments and work to remove them. For example, what kind of family
leave policies are in place and are these policies embraced and actualized by current academic
leadership? When are meetings held? This is a simple question, but meetings that are held early in
the morning and in the evening disadvantage women who still bear the majority of child-rearing
responsibilities. Not being able to attend important meetings can disadvantage women.
Fourth, colleges and universities should establish leadership training programs that
disproportionately prepare women and people of color for leadership roles. These programs can
provide mentors and also demystify the pathway to academic leadership.
Fifth, presidents of institutions of higher education need to charge their deans with advancing more
women and minorities in leadership positions at the school and college level. This expectation
should be linked to performance appraisals for deans.
Lastly, male faculty members and administrators need to be made aware of the “facts” pertaining to
women within academe — both nationally and within their college or university. Often, men operate
with inaccurate information about the success of women and are unaware of the gender disparities
that continue to exist. Women benefit when men are informed and can offer their support to the
advancement of women.
A professor of higher education at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Gasman is the author of
“Envisioning Black Colleges: A History of the United Negro College Fund” (Johns Hopkins University
Press, 2007) and lead editor of “Understanding Minority Serving Institutions” (SUNY Press, 2008).
http://diverseeducation.com/article/31346/