International Women’s Day: Bosses debate the future for women in media

Kathryn Jacob OBE, CEO, Pearl & Dean

It’s become a bit of a media game to try and figure out what the latest campaigning colourway is going to be. We’ve had black, we’ve had white, we’ve had roses and lapel pins.

But reducing a global movement to a dress code misses the point. Without diminishing its message, the #MeToo campaign is an extreme symptom of a trend that has been fundamentally undermining the creative industries for more than a century.

Between seedy tales from the Hollywood casting couch and shocking wage discrepancies such as the Carrie Grace BBC pay gap scandal, it’s clear that the female contribution has been very much undervalued by industry leaders and bankrollers.

Industries where female voices are quashed can only create a limited, two-dimensional representation of the world. Recent research found that women made up only 14% of directors and 7% of cinematographers on UK films between 2003 and 2015.

One of this year’s Oscar nominees for best film, Lady Bird, was directed by Greta Gerwig – only the fifth woman to be nominated for Best Director in the history of the Academy.

There appears to still be very much the sense that women somehow do not merit equal pay. The disparity has been shocking and now that the industry’s dirty secret is out, it’s time action was taken.

The creative industries would do well to consider Stacey Smith’s ‘inclusion rider’ mentioned at the Oscars. Whether it’s gender, race, sexual orientation, intellectual or other, diversity pays.

Jodie Stranger, CEO UK group and president global clients EMEA, Starcom

International Women’s Day remains important because it is a time to stop and celebrate women and their unique contribution to society.

However, it also stands as a stark reminder as to how far we still have to go. Whilst I appreciate the stats are heading in the right direction, it’s far too slow.
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I look forward to the day when we no longer need days like these because that will mean we have achieved everything that Emmeline Pankhurst set out to achieve.

Whilst I have certainly experienced first-hand progress since I started out in my career, and I am indeed privileged to work for an agency where 60% of our global leadership team are women, there are too many industries where such change is yet to be evident.

One must admire female leaders such as Mary Barra, Global CEO of General Motors, where her commitment to the company and her dedication to working her way up the ranks has her leading one of the most male-dominated industries in the business world.

I also strongly believe International Women’s Day should provide a moment to celebrate those who enable successful women to succeed, those people who are supporting progress in the right direction.

In my case, I have to thank my husband who supports and enables me to be the successful leader I hope I can continue to be, making personal sacrifices to establish some sort of family balance for us all.

Joanna Lyall, managing director, Mindshare UK

I am feeling very optimistic about the opportunities and future for women in media. Companies with women on the board deliver better business results and attract more women in.

Now, is a great time to be women in any industry as the spotlight is shining brighter on how we make it more attractive to take on the big jobs. I am seeing women lead in very different ways to those that gone before them.

They have the confidence to lead in their own way and the humility and honesty to not pretend it is easy.

Companies are waking up and recognising that something big must change and it isn’t just about improving maternity policies it is much broader and more fundamental than that.

I see two big challenges in getting more women into senior positions; confidence and visible ambition and the maternity slow down.

Firstly, let’s take confidence and visible ambition; women are less likely to make choices that are about raising their personal profile. We see less of them on stages, in keynotes and panels and this lack of visibility has significant impact on both them as an individual and those that look to be inspired by them.

Women often hold back and wait to be asked vs male counterparts who actively put themselves forward. Companies need to adjust for this and develop programmes to prepare women more actively for this being a part of their role that they can learn to love.

At Mindshare for example, we have partnered with WomenPresent an organisation whose mission is to increase the ‘podium share’ of women at public and private industry events. The organisation hopes to increase diversity and support the achievement of women globally.

We are marking our pledge to ensure that more brilliant women across our organisation get the opportunity to take the stage at conferences and events.

Secondly, the maternity slow down; we all recognise that we lose a lot of great women after having children as for some they make personal choices that it is not compatible and for others they lose the passion and interest that they previously had.

Managing the transition between going on mat leave and returning is so critical and so often overlooked.

Companies with a strategy and programme on how to work with both men and women during this time will be more successful.

Maternity and paternity leave is just part of life and we must embrace it and recognise the value of somebody becoming a parent and the positive impact that this can have on them at work and never use it as a reason to miss a promotion opportunity or to hold them back on return.

The return to work is a time when women can fall into a holding pattern because they are adjusting to managing work and home life and companies must do more to acknowledge this and then help them accelerate.

Celine Saturnino, chief commercial officer, Total Media

‘Practice over policy’

Celebrating International Women’s Day seems an apt time to review what more we can be doing to make senior roles in advertising more accessible and attractive. Column inches and social media mentions have been filled with the great efforts of many businesses to readdress the gender balance of senior talent in media.

All this work should be well commended and will help to create more opportunities and readdress the balance in the long term but it’s time to move on from policy creation and hashtags to tangible specific actions that can be measured over time. If there were three things I would want every business to consider today, they would be:

– Investment in a culture of inclusion that goes beyond policy making to integration, coaching and training.

– Investment in technology that allows real flexible working delivering 100% connectivity to people and platforms regardless of place. Although flexible working is becoming a lot more common in businesses (although not always accepted), ensuring you have the right technology to enable successful flexible working is fundamental.

– Spend time identifying female talent and ensuring they have sponsors to drive visibility throughout the business which is continually proven to make a big difference to opportunities for women in senior roles

And finally to make real progress this issue can’t be confined to one gender – men need to play an enormous part in accepting and supporting changing roles both at work and in the home.

International Women’s Day is an important time for reflection for the media and marketing industry. We’ve certainly come a long way since I started out over 20 years ago, and now, as a board member and managing director of an advertising and strategic marketing agency, there are certainly a lot more opportunities for women… and still more that we as an industry can do.

If I could give three tips to women in the industry today on their journey to leadership – based on my experience – they would be:

– Read, listen to and seek out any advice you can. I still remember and recount the advice of many speakers’ from events I attended in my early 20s. Recently, I took on a Mentor to help with my transition to the roll of Managing Director. Remember not panic – you don’t need to know it all, but you do need to keep growing and learning every day.

– Don’t be afraid to be yourself and know your worth. We spend most of our time at work and life’s too short to pretend to be something or someone you simply are not. Find a company that shares your values and personality – this will ensure you are more likely to flourish. Stick up for yourself when necessary. If they don’t want you for doing so – it’s not the place for you.

– Be human. If you treat people as individuals and as you would want to be treated, you won’t go far wrong. This doesn’t always mean you need to be a friend, but learn as soon as you can what is important to your colleagues, whether they’re a client, your boss or one of your team. It takes time, but you will get the best out of them and reap the rewards the come from collaborative and enjoyable relationships.