Tuesday, February 21, 2006

"Angels" at the top

The Observer has an interesting take on the idea of the "Angel in the House" - the stay at home "lady" of leisure whose reason for being is to look beautiful and serve her man. These women - The Guardian Angels have made it in the man's world of being leaders of large organisations.... of course the organisations are independent not-for-profit companies and forces for social change, the glass ceiling has risen up a notch......

The article is interesting for it's focus on their values and skills and simply for showing that it can be done - I see them as role models but I question the stereotype of feminity....
"women are more used to showing emotion and not seeing it as a weakness 'they don't find it difficult to combine passion and professionalism, and passion is absolutely essential in the voluntary sector'" says Jackie Ballard, director of the RSPCA.
Their pay is much higher than the average wage, but considering the large budgets and numbers of staff they are responsible for, unbelievably low compared to the men who manage organisations of equivalent size in the private sector, and compared to Chief Executive's of Local Authorities and the NHS. This interests me as those feminine traits are clearly less valued still - even if men hold the senior positions, voluntary organisations are unable to pay at similar levels to the public and private sector. I do not believe the huge salaries in some companies are justified either, but the inequalities speak volumes.


Maybe they are Angels in the Boardroom - but why Angels? I bet they are not perfect, heavenly beings.......

1 comment:

TP said...

Fascinating article thanks for the pointer. Interestingly the charity I work for, The Woodland Trust, appointed a female chief exec just over a year ago.

She's quite different to those mention in the article though, unmarried, no children and in her early 40s I think.

As a bottom rung of the charity ladder I find it very dawnting. Charities are so hierarchically flat, and to progress through an organisation is very difficult - I think that's why you have to move around a lot. Interestingly these women came from a vairty of different backgrounds, many not in the charity sector.