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Tuesday, 4 October 2011

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Women in management



Nishan Wimalachandra

Words such as “manpower management”, “history”, “mankind”, “hero”, “you are the man”, have been used everywhere around the globe and those who are against men do not seem to find any common ground to make things as equal as “womanpower management, “herstory, “shero”, “you are the woman”?.

As the common problem of liberation of women seems to dominate most of women’s magazines, various taboos in our society seem to be relaxed to a greater extent; but women in management have been looked as a disaster by many.

Most people identify women in management equivalent to the end of the earth. This is well proven by the fact that most women themselves prefer a male gynaecologist and obstetrician to deliver their baby as against a female performing the same task.

This dialogue is not some old fairy tale, but an issue which is popping up in various parts of the world.

Truly, are women in management that bad? To answer this question in a balanced perspective, a thorough understanding of women must be made. But first of all the root cause of the problem must be identified too. Woman was made after the man, woman was made for man, and man for God; are just examples of general perceptions on women triggered by many ancient writings.

A historical perspective will confirm that all communities and religious groups have suppressed women to a greater extent.

And after all, all the blame of equal opportunity syndrome could be tracked to most Scriptures where women are not allowed to take part in religious leadership positions.

Most women make decisions based on intuitional spurs, as against men. Men require complex data to arrive at a decision as to whether to do it or not, and when their answer is made, men can back - track how the answer was obtained from the data analyzed.

But a woman’s way of doing the same is quite different as women will give fabulous answers out of nowhere, no data to begin with, no histograms, and no regression models, while eating a bar of chocolate they will do the trick.

So if both answers are compared, mostly what women have come up with is quite the accurate as against men’s.

Now this may sound like some voodoo magic, but the fact is that women’s intuitional capacity is extremely high. And this is proof how women feel their husbands are cheating on them without any evidence and finally proven that they were right from the beginning.

If a question is asked to name great women in the world, men could only come up with a few names such as Mother Teresa, and Marie Curie, but the truth goes longer than that. All world leaders and successful men have always had women as their advisors on many endeavors and even have stood by men when things have gone wrong.

Condoleezza Rice, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Margaret Thatcher, Dilma Rousseff, Indra Nooyi, Sheryl Sandberg, Melinda Gates, Sonia Ghandi, Michelle Obama, Christine Lagarde, Oprah Winfrey, Cher Wang and the list goes on for the most powerful women in the world according to the Forbes list of most powerful women in the world 2011.

It may not be a coincidence why the Obama administration as well as the Bush administration had selected women as the secretaries of state, it’s no accident, what matters is the intuition of women over data and maps which are invented by men goes far beyond.

And if anyone thinks that Bill Gates achieved everything on his own without the help of Melinda Gates they got to be kidding. Today International Monetary Fund has appointed Christine Lagarde to head its direction.

When these facts are considered, it is evident that Sri Lankans are missing the point. If Sri Lankan legislature is comprised a balance in men and women, at least things could get better than this.

Truly women are a great companion in managing an organization and could be well placed for a higher position too regardless of whatever is expected from them.

They are as competitive as men are, regardless of their soft skin and kind words, their spirit can never be broken. Truly a woman is an amazing creature who could see a different perspective as against a man; and women driving an organization may well do it as a maternal figure that helps, instructs and develops more people than men actually do.

The reason why a man would develop something or someone is for the pure reason to use it later, while women do it to admire a creation of her own, even though whoever she creates leaves the organization, she will still have ownership to the development or the achievement of that person, while men would always say that, the person in connection merely was a person who worked for them.

There are contrasting differences on women in management as we can see now. Their ability in attracting right people for any organization must be commendable, but unfortunately women always don’t attract the right people for their lives, probably not in their first attempt, but in organizations recruitment of people is a gift women have than men.

Women are only ineffective when they are clouded by emotions, but apart from them they are a great partner in success for many corporations.

Most career women have weak personalities as their husbands, while most ordinary men who are in leadership are constantly guided, directed by housewives who are as powerful as those who are career women, after all most men know that, how well mothers handle domestic affairs than their fathers.

The best reward for a woman is a kind word or a complement such as “you are truly amazing”, or “such a wonderful boss”, as against boozing with the male counterparts to win their favour. It’s easy to win the loyalty of women, and the things you must do to win them are simple.

Women in management favour highly organized people whose desks are clean, whose filing are updated and who are sympathetic. while men favour others mainly on whether the job is done or not.

For women in management it really matters how the job was done as well as whether the job was done or not, while men in management care only on the latter. The syndrome which women have in correcting, nurturing and improving is a gift and this must be well used as well as their directional ability to steer any organization in the world.

Unfortunately women don’t get well paid as men in the same position as well as equal opportunity may never be achieved regardless of the organizations who are striving to establish such dreams.

If women want to establish themselves as required by such organizations, they must be willing to be included in the lists such as the number of casualities in the war or be enlisted in the forefront of battles, unfortunately more men usually die during a war either in the name of the Queen or the nation, whatever the label we use, women must be absorbed into direct battles too as they consider themselves equal with men.

Can women excel in management, the answer is absolutely yes, but women in management and the attitude towards liberation must be clearly understood.

The general idea of men suppressing women is laughable as there are no organizations who sympathize with men in their perils.

Men don’t suppress women, it is the way world is made, and as long as organized religions are not willing to lift the taboos placed on women, the battle for liberation will be a continued process rather than an achievable dream.

Finally, women are great in management or in any profession they choose and they deserve equal opportunities and equal pay on par with men in management as long as they are willing to take all vocations men take on.

Is this an achievable vision? Not as long as Religion continues to suppress them because they are smarter than men in so many various ways.

After all most religions are headed by men and this is the root cause to be changed to steer into a better future, and therefore any quick fixes in accepting women into management by all individuals for that matter seems an elusive dream which must be only limited to dialogues.

(The author could be reached via [email protected])

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