Are women seeking power scrutinised more harshly?

HILLARY Clinton’s ‘collapse’ during the 9/11 memorial in New York last week had many people questioning her competency, as like many women before her, in her quest to shatter the glass ceiling, she has been scrutinised to a degree like no other. The immediate media backlash that followed Clinton’s brief malady also raised the point about whether women seeking power positions were judged more harshly than men. Indeed, several male presidents had got sick while in office without similar furore, while women worldwide have said they’ve had to work through pain and illness without complaining, as complaining would make them seem weak.

All Woman asked several local women in power their views on the issue, and whether they were scrutinised more than men when it came to getting in their positions.

Kelly Tomblin, president and CEO of Jamaica Public Service Co:

I think many of us have a problem with being vulnerable as female leaders. This is something we have been taught and it’s often embedded in the subconscious, so that we don’t even realise it. We’ve been told that to be sick is to be weak. We all know the song, ‘I am woman, hear me roar… I am strong, I am invincible’, and because of that we often feel like we don’t have permission to be human. If I was coaching Hillary, I would tell her to be open to being vulnerable, warts and all, and people will love you for it. I would tell her to be transparent, fearlessly so, and it will also help to give others around her freedom to be transparent. I do hope that she has a speedy and complete recovery.

Diahann Gordon-Harrison, Children’s Advocate & former Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions:

There are some instances I can think of very clearly where people were just harsher. There is almost an expectation in some quarters that you won’t do as well because you’re not as structured as, you’re not as disciplined as, or you’re not as good as a man. But there are also some instances where women use that almost as an excuse not to perform well and give in to what I call the gender card — to say men would do it perhaps a little better. With regards to my field, which is law, and being someone who practised criminal law for a number of years, you find sometimes that there is almost an expectation that men are better at criminal law because it’s a dirtier field, so to speak, or it is a rougher field. So you find that some women use that and play that as an excuse for not giving of their best, because all in all I feel that there are many instances that you can point to that women judge women more harshly. Also, women who are in leadership positions are held to a higher level of account, particularly by other women, in terms of when you compare it with our male counterparts.

Rosalee Gage-Grey, CEO, Child Development Agency:

The difference is that I’m in female-dominated industry — child protection. So the general feeling is that women would be part of the majority. The two CEOs before me were women so though we have males working in the industry, the general thing is that it is a woman-dominated field. I didn’t feel that I was scrutinised differently. I worked before in a male-dominated field and I got along well there. I didn’t get the impression they felt because I was a woman I would slack off because I was sick or otherwise. However, I can understand how women would feel in a situation like that because of the stereotypes that are there about women and seemingly being the weaker sex. But over time we’ve shown that we are strong, very resilient, and spend much more time taking care of our health than the traditional male, and we are quicker to get the attention and seek redress to the issues that affect us. But what we might not do so well is see the warning signs of burnout and stress because we want to achieve and hence go all out even when we’re not feeling well.

Rhona Morgan, Attorney-at-law and Senior Legal Officer, INDECOM:

In getting to a senior position within my organisation, there was no male counterpart with whom to compete; just two young women whose work and work ethic spoke for itself. However, as a new mom, I remember being unable to go to the court to personally see to the signing of an order as I was ill, and being cautioned by one counsel that pregnancy ought not to be an excuse. In fact, I felt compelled to go above and beyond, even at times to my detriment, just to ensure that my pregnancy was not seen as an impediment to my performance. What we have is a widespread and improperly held perception that women are weaker or less competent than their male counterparts. Though many have proven that this is not the case, some cannot seem to dispel the idea that women are not up to par. It is quite unfortunate and pathetic that the rhetoric surrounding Mrs Clinton’s diagnosis is one which questions her competence, and even more unfortunate that her being female is a part of the discourse.

Cecile Charlton, dancehall artiste:

Of course women are scrutinised more. I actually thought to myself, had that been a man, people would automatically say, ‘Oh, he’s exhausted, he’s working too hard or he just plain has pneumonia’. When it’s a woman, it suddenly becomes everything else than just what it is. No one mentions just how long this woman has been serving her country, day after day, year after year, and apparently she doesn’t get sick days.