Positioning Diversity

The increasing numbers of women and minorities now entering careers in management suffer from a major disadvantage - by and large they are not exposed to the same range of experiences and career opportunities as men. Although formal barriers have been reduced through legislation, women and minority groups continue to be hindered in their careers by invisible obstacles such as prejudice and distrust. As the demand for high-quality white-collar management increases, the need for organisations to question why there are so few women and minorities in management will become acute.

When these managers are accepted in the formal structure of the organisation, in the informal social structure they can still be looked on with suspicion. For example, the masculine culture of a company may mean that women are not fully integrated; in a sense they are still regarded as outsiders or interlopers.

Low expectations or stereotyped images can often mean that women and minority managers are delegated undemanding jobs, making them less visible than white male managers. Women may be expected to perform tasks that are seen as suitably ‘feminine' in nature, such as personnel, rather than the more ‘masculine' managerial jobs, such as financial analysis. As a result, women managers frequently lack opportunities to develop a wide range of managerial skills.

In the UK some years ago I carried out a survey of businesswomen, using questionnaires sent to 100 who had reached executive level inside a company and to 100 women entrepreneurs. The response rate was a remarkable 49 per cent. Among the key conclusions were:

• Successful women managers are more likely than women entrepreneurs to have had a mentor (56 per cent compared with 43 per cent). One reason - possibly the most important - is that the entrepreneuses quit to set up on their own precisely because their progress was blunted in large corporations, through lack of a champion at higher levels.

• Forty-nine per cent of the women had had a single mentor; 22 per cent had had two; 21 per cent had had three; and 8 per cent had had four or five - or more - at different periods in their careers.

• Ninety-four per cent of the women who had mentors said their relationships were beneficial to their career.

• More than half of the entrepreneuses' mentors had encouraged them to start their own businesses; 5 per cent even helped them financially.

• The vast majority of mentoring relationships (63 per cent) started accidentally; only 8 per cent of the women had actually approached their mentor.

• The main benefits reported by the women were:

  • improved self-confidence and self-image

  • increased visibility to senior management (especially important to women managers)

  • focusing career aspirations

  • acting as a role model

  • help with work problems

  • improved communications and skills.

• Most mentors (79 per cent) were male.

• More than two-fifths experienced no problems with the relationship; 37 per cent had experienced problems of resentment from peers; 5 per cent said their careers had been damaged when their mentor lost credibility in the company.

• Two-thirds had experienced some form of sexual innuendo or gossip; 19 per cent reported that their mentor's wife felt threatened by the relationship; 11 per cent said their own husbands resented it; 4 per cent said their mentor became too emotionally involved with them.

• Sixty per cent of the women were acting as mentors themselves.

Dr Judi Marshall of Bath University found that mentoring improved the promotion prospects of women managers. Interviewing 30 women managers from middle management to director level, Marshall found that 70 per cent either were currently or had been in a mentoring relationship. All of these women placed great value on the relationship and said it had been a very important factor in their career development. The majority of the women saw visibility as a crucial factor for success. The mentors sponsored the women and often nominated them for promotion committees when they would not have normally been considered for posts. If a mentor vouches for a woman manager, companies are more willing to promote her because they view the mentor as a ‘safety net', Marshall concludes.

Jenny Blake, an independent consultant, comments:

I think the mentoring relationship is very beneficial to both the mentee and the mentor. In my capacity as a consultant I now try to fill the mentor role. I mentor personnel trainers and help them with their own development. At the moment I am mentoring a senior manager in the probationary service. I feel an older woman can play a very positive role as a mentor. I do not appear threatening to men, so I receive open feedback. I have found that an increasing number of women in their late thirties and forties are now willing to be mentors. They want to act as a role model to younger women to demonstrate that women can succeed in business. It seems clear to me that mentoring can and will play a very positive role in the future.

Potential problems with male/female mentoring

Between the mentee and the mentor

A female mentee often experiences disappointment with the relationship because her male mentor is unable to meet all her developmental needs. She cannot emulate him fully, and in certain areas may need to find her own methods of achieving goals and resolving problems. Women put more emphasis than men on delegating or on group discussion. If the male mentor does not understand this, he may interpret it as lack of assertiveness and push the female mentee into signing up for an assertiveness course.

Sexual tensions between the two can inhibit the relationship and make it less rewarding than mentoring between two of the same sex.

Pressure to adopt established sexual roles sometimes causes tension and conflict in the relationship. A male mentor may feel overly protective towards a female mentor and encourage her to be dependent. She may find it particularly difficult to terminate the relationship at the end of the mentoring programme. The same may also be true in the case of a female mentor and male mentee, especially where the age differences are similar to those in a mother/son relationship.

Says Dr Marilyn Puder-York, a clinical psychologist in New York:

There are many very productive male-female mentoring relationships, but there must be a high sense of shared values and ethical behaviour on both sides. And you often have to counter society's perception of the relationship by having lunch instead of dinner and by including spouses in socialising. Otherwise both can pay a heavy price. In general, if a woman has a male mentor, she should seek out a woman mentor as well. Beyond the social considerations, there are politics for women that a man may not be aware of.

Between the spouses and the mentoring pair

A mentoring relationship can seem threatening to the mentor's and mentee's partners, especially if business trips together are involved. The spouse often feels excluded by the closeness of the relationship.

Mentees have found various solutions, mostly based on total openness. Social gatherings to which spouses are invited make a useful opportunity to demonstrate the businesslike nature of the relationship.

Between the company and the mentoring pair

Sexual gossip and innuendo can kill a mentoring relationship before it gets going. Many potential male/female mentoring relationships never happen because of the fear of office gossip. In a mentoring programme it is often necessary for the two to work beyond work hours or even travel together. The two must act ‘professionally', which can simply mean that behaviour has to be much more circumscribed than in a mentor relationship between two of the same sex. One mentor solved the problem of gossip:

If you mentor one woman you are branded as a womaniser. If you mentor several, you are praised for your commitment to seeing more women in management.

The extra visibility of the relationship in the company may discourage even the highest risk-taker from being a mentor: ‘A young man can have the luxury of failing quietly, but a woman's mistakes are often broadcast, ' explains one mentor.