Why Judy Dlamini is fighting for boardroom equality

Here’s some free advice for any woman hoping to make it big in the corporate world: change your name to David. At the 500 largest companies in the US, says a report in The New York Times, only 4.2% of CEOs are women — but 4.5% are men called Dave or David. It’s a little better in the UK, where women and Davids rank equal — at around 6% — at FTSE 100 companies.

Ridiculous? Of course. But these numbers sum up perfectly the disparity in corporate leadership opportunities for men and women.

It’s no better in SA. The names may be different, but women, who outnumber men in the overall population, make up only 3.3% of CEOs of listed companies on the JSE, says business consultancy PwC.

Men also account for 87.2% of CFOs and 91% of executive directors.

In its 2018 "Gender Pay Gap Report" the World Economic Forum laments that, globally, it may take another two centuries before the world’s female population achieves equal access to economic participation and opportunity.

As things stand, SA ranks 91st of 149 countries in this regard. When it comes to equal pay for the same job, SA is 117th.

These figures reflect the full economic spectrum, from low earners to the boardroom. As the CEO comparison shows, it’s no better at the top.

Women account for nearly 40% of MBA students in SA and routinely graduate top of their class. That should be reflected in a rapidly growing number of female executives. So where are they? The numbers are growing, certainly, but painfully slowly.

Schools say many of their women graduates set up businesses of their own.

"Many women have a natural flair for entrepreneurship," says the University of Stellenbosch Business School MBA head Martin Butler.

Judy Dlamini, one of SA’s most successful entrepreneurs and an outspoken proponent of gender equality, has a different take: "Why wouldn’t they go off on their own if they believe their talent will go unrecognised in the corporate world?"

M-Net CEO Yolani Phahle says: "Working for a corporate, you are restricted in ways that don’t apply when you run your own business. Some women don’t want to live according to others’ rules."

Dlamini, who has an MBA from Wits Business School (WBS), says the pace of boardroom "feminisation" won’t increase as long as SA is blighted by gender bias — shown in its basest form by the national scandal of femicide and rape.

South Africans need to "unlearn" their inbuilt bias to allow women an equal shot at corporate success, says Dlamini, founder of the Mbekani Group and chancellor of Wits University.

"In our society, if you are a woman, you have to work twice as hard as a man to be recognised. If you are a black woman, you have to work three times as hard. The environment is hostile.

"When SA had apartheid, the divide was racial. When freedom came, black men worked with white men, against women. They were in cahoots. As a society, we don’t respect women in SA. We have to unlearn the idea that women are less," she says.

"Power is a funny thing. When one group has it, it finds it hard to let go."

The corporate invisibility of so many MBA women graduates raises the question: are business schools failing in their duty to produce a new generation of leaders — or, at least, the female half?

Gordon Institute of Business Science (Gibs) dean Nicola Kleyn points out that schools are only one link in the education chain. Women outnumber men — and outperform them — at undergraduate level, and excel in MBA programmes. But then this progression loses headway.

"There’s a leakage somewhere in the system and we have to fix it," she says.

Schools say they must treat all MBA students equally.

"The classroom is not the place to socially engineer," says Milpark Business School dean Cobus Oosthuizen. MBA programme head Jane Usher adds: "We are here to create equal opportunity, not favour one gender over the other."

According to Butler: "We don’t push women overtly. Everyone at the table should have an equal voice."

Regenesys CEO Leoni Grobler says men and women are on the same footing. "You can’t single out women for special attention."

Actually, you can, though perhaps not in the MBA classroom.

Several schools offer leadership programmes to prepare women for what Rhodes University registrar Adele Moodly calls the "patriarchal" business world.

Tsitsi Hatendi-Matika, head of marketing & investment communication at Absa Investment Management, took part in such a leadership programme at the University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business (GSB) and regrets that more women do not do so. "I found it very helpful, both in preparing me for what lay ahead but also for networking," she says. "It allowed me to access other women who previously had seemed out of reach. I have to thank a number of women for what I have achieved in my career."

M-Net’s Phahle says: "The reason I’m where I am today is 60%-70% because of other women and a company that gave me the opportunity."

Networking is not a natural skill for all women, says Charisse Drobis, head of career management at WBS. The traditional old boys’ club still flourishes. "Club" activities may include crack-of-dawn meetings, after-hours drinks, golf and other social activities — each one a challenge for women with family and personal responsibilities.

And therein lies the rub. For most women in business, even those at the top, work does not exclusively rule their lives. Home and family may be just as important. As a result, women are often unjustly perceived to have split loyalties, to be less committed to their careers.

Maybe they need a "club" of their own. Moodly says women need formal support structures, mentors and role models to guide and nurture them towards and within positions of leadership.

"Literature reflects that men have such structures both formally and informally, given the patriarchal institutional cultures," she says. "Such support has to be facilitated for women within both formal organisational settings as well as informally. The family structure and need to balance family and work life still plays a significant role in women’s decisions to pursue leadership roles."

Maybe, too, they need to be more bloody-minded and assertive. Drobis quotes research showing that a woman pursuing a promotion may rule herself out if she fails to meet just one of 10 criteria. A man may meet none but will continue the chase.

She continues: "As a woman, you need to be able to work within corporate politics, to articulate your influence and understand which people can help your career. That’s often a difficult space for women."

It would help, says Kleyn, if companies had the courage to appoint more women on merit and not just as a form of tokenism.

"It’s about critical mass," she says.

"It’s very hard to make a difference when you are the only woman on the board."

It’s in everyone’s interests that change happens. A study in the Harvard Business Review says having more women on a company’s board results in better corporate acquisition and investment decisions and less aggressive risk-taking. It states: "Having female board members helps temper the overconfidence of male CEOs, improving overall decision-making for the company."

It says female directors tend to be less conformist and more likely to express independent views than male directors because they do not belong to old-boy networks. "A board with female directors might be more likely to challenge the CEO and push him to consider a wider range of options when making strategic decisions."

But what about women as CEOs themselves, not just as moderators of men? Changing leadership dynamics means they have never been more ready to take charge. There are still dinosaurs out there but the days of bully-boy leadership are mostly over. It is the era of what educationists call "soft skills". Moodly calls it "servant leadership".

The modern leader needs empathy, humanity, a willingness to listen and the ability to encourage, not force, employees to follow. GSB MBA head Segran Nair says: "Things like vulnerability are no longer seen as weaknesses but as strengths."

These are all qualities women have in bucketloads (actually, so do many men, but not all can display them), so they are perfectly designed for 21st-century leadership.

Soft skills don’t mean being soft. Margaret Hirsch, co-founder of the Hirsch’s household goods group, says outstanding women leaders in the business world got where they did through hard work and perseverance.

She welcomes the fact that women are becoming more assertive in the corporate environment.

But Hirsch, who is studying for an MBA at Regent Business School, has no time for those who automatically blame gender bias if they fail to progress. Sometimes it’s genuinely because they are not up to the job. "It makes me angry when people use the gender card," she says. "It diminishes what others have achieved."

Henley Africa dean Jon Foster-Pedley says: "It’s not enough just to put women in leadership positions. We have to make sure they succeed, not just for their own sake but also for those who will follow."

But does everyone agree on modern leadership requirements, or do some of those who make senior appointments still believe in the "old ways"?

Randall Jonas, chair of the SA Business Schools Association, says: "Sometimes you wonder how skilled these selection panels are. There should be many more women on shortlists for senior jobs."

Failure to promote women to the C-suite and appoint them to boards is bad for society and for business

—  What it means

Phahle, a Gibs MBA graduate, says: "In some companies, you still have to break down perceptions of what leadership is. The reality is that women are just as capable of leadership as men."

Once they reach the top, they should respect the qualities that got them there and not try to emulate male leadership characteristics. "They must be true to themselves," says Phahle. Drobis adds: "Women reach the top because of who they are, not to turn into someone else."

Zaheer Hamid, academic director of the Management College of Southern Africa, says: "Business should not be about making money regardless of the consequences, but also about impact on society. There is still an expectation in some circles that a leader should be driven and pushy and all about results. Business schools can empower women … as leaders."

The classroom can be a great leveller. In theory, male managers and executives who study on equal terms with women should be open to treating them as equals back in the workplace. Regent director Ahmed Shaikh says: "The classroom experience recalibrates male thinking and tears down preconceived bias. That’s a good first phase."

Rhodes Business School director Owen Skae says: "Without the contribution of women in the classroom, some male students would not succeed in their MBA. Perhaps we could also do more within MBA programmes to address women-specific challenges but we must recognise there is only so much we can do on our own. Society at large has to tackle these issues."

Why higher education leadership is not sexy anymore

Higher education leadership is no longer the “glamorous” job it once was, says Fulu Netswera, director of North-West University’s School of Business & Governance.

Most SA university business schools are looking for new deans and directors, to fill either existing gaps or ones that will appear soon.

Netswera says that as SA faces increasingly serious political and economic challenges, many potential school leaders are looking outside the sector or even overseas.

“This might sound alarmist, but latest anecdotal evidence suggests that a high-level skills flight is becoming a reality once more,” he says.

“The problem is compounded by the continuous thinning of higher education autonomy. Being a higher education leader is not as glamorous as it was a few years back, before the #RhodesMustFall and #FeesMustFall movements.

“As staff unionism and student movements continue to gain more power, prospective university leaders ask themselves if it is worth their time managing in these uncertain and unstable times. There may be too much unnecessary stress in management.”

Netswera says there are no visible programmes by universities to establish a future cohort of leaders not only for universities themselves but also for the public sector.