Women in Leadership: what's all the fuss?

a blog by Dr Felicity Taylor and Dr Sveta Alladi

There was plenty of debate at the Women Medical Leaders session at the 2013 FMLM conference, not least whether we all should have been meeting at all. Reflecting back, defining a group based on a characteristic, particularly gender, will always be contentious; a group of doctors with blue eyes would not expect to share common aims and goals, so why should having two X chromosomes be any different?

The group of over 50 women shared their experiences of leadership, both positive and negative, and for those of us just starting out on our pathway to leadership the stories were alternately inspiring and depressing.  It was clear that for many the struggle for equality in leadership has been fraught, with attendees describing the 'scars' that they sustained along their journey.    There was a palpable tension in the room during a discussion about balancing family and work life.  There is no 'blueprint for success': how do we promote the right for women (and men) to make their own life choices without fear of discrimination, without alienating those for whom having a family is not a reality or an option?  Amongst other attendees there was a clear feeling that this perennial female guilt was history: success is what you make of it, and they weren't going to let a small matter of their gender stand for an excuse.

Feminism has recently become a dirty word: we grew up in the Thatcher-era when women were promised that they could do anything; what this evolved into was pressure for women to do everything.  The Oxford English Dictionary defines Feminism as 1. The qualities of females (of which there are many!) and, 2. Advocacy of the rights of women. No-one would argue against equal rights for members of Black and Minority Ethnic groups, and yet women are often embarrassed to speak up for equality and our rights.  Granted, the battle for female entry into the medical profession has been spectacularly won; has this made us complacent or are we just grateful for any victory and fear to rock the boat further?  History offers a perspective: it is less than 150 years since Elizabeth Garrett Anderson struggled for a decade in her attempt to qualify as a doctor; despite gaining higher marks than all of her male contemporaries, she was still denied her degree, eventually learning French to gain her degree from the Sorbonne. Her success prompted a rush from the BMA to prevent other women from following in her footsteps.  Sadly, such barriers aren't totally consigned to the ancient history books: one of us studied medicine at an institution that only agreed to admit women in 1983.

So why the fuss about women in medical leadership?  Well, unlike our hypothetical blue eyed group of doctors, we can't claim equal numbers in the boardroom and at the highest levels of management.  This isn't in any way an attack on our male colleagues - two very brave male colleagues who attended the session emphasised that the absence of women in the top echelons of leadership is a loss to everyone, especially our patients.  We have had the comment made to us a number of times that it "is purely a matter of time" before the increased numbers of women doctors qualifying through medical school filter through into leadership and management roles.  This is disingenuous.  Women leaders hold their own in all areas of the workforce up to middle management level, but in medical senior management (as in all other fields of senior management), women lag behind men.  There have been entire books written about why this might be the case (see "Lean In" by Sheryl Sandberg), but we feel that whilst interesting, the time for debate and introspection has passed.  As a group, we need to accept that we are at a disadvantage and band together to negate that disadvantage by sharing skills and experience, just like a senior registrar mentors and teaches the new Foundation Year 2 doctor.  As doctors, we are excellent at promoting experiential learning; we just now need to promote self-development and self-belief amongst colleagues and friends. 

So, what conclusions were drawn from the debate at the session?  All members agreed that continued dialogue and prominence on promoting women medical leadership is vital, and the LinkedIn group 'Inspiring Women Leaders' will be used to coordinate these efforts.  Doctors in training were particularly keen to learn from the experiences of our senior colleagues, and support for a mentorship programme was expressed.  May we offer then a challenge to all colleagues: we ask that senior leaders commit to mentoring ambitious women; push them to work outside of their comfort zone, nurture and encourage them to apply for posts they are reluctant to put themselves forward for.  In return, we pledge to embrace every opportunity to develop our leadership skills, and to repay the time spent with us by our mentors by 'leaning in' - grasping every opportunity with both hands, and supporting and promoting our colleagues to do the same.  If we rise to the challenge, maybe by FMLM Conference 2014 the leadership gender gap will be a little bit smaller.