Despite a disproportionate number of women in the field, our sustainability industry severely lacks female leaders. Amanda Steele writes about addressing the gender imbalance

1. Built Environment
Gender Balance and Sustainability
Despite a disproportionate number of women in the field, our sustainability industry severely lacks female leaders.
Addressing the gender imbalance…
When asked to present recently at a
conference on sustainability and gender my
interest was piqued. After 14 years of working
in sustainability I relish the opportunity NOT
to talk about human induced climate change
(yes it is real, no I don’t care if you think it’s
a beat up, no we are not doing enough),
energy efficiency (yes it will save you money,
the returns are better than expected, no
we are not doing enough) or community
development (yes it is our responsibility too,
yes of course the government should lead
it, no we’re not doing enough). But gender
diversity and sustainable business value is a
little out of kilter with our standard focus in
sustainability circles. And yet, is it?
The issue of gender balance is certainly
familiar to me. After all, you don’t work in
the Australian corporate sector as a woman
without quickly seeing the imbalance of
gender. I’ve worked in utilities, banking,
finance and property—apparently the only
sector more “blokey” would be motor-racing
and I may give that a crack next!
of people who worked in sustainability in
2009 were women. I suspect that figure is
now higher. Of course there are also many
men. However, it’s interesting to note a recent
statement in the Guardian by Elle Carbury,
MD of the China Greentech Initiative: “From
all my 20 years in business, I have met more
women in this area than in others.”
So is sustainability “women’s business”? Ugh,
what an abhorrent term, implying as it does a
Victorian era image of women cross-stitching
together. Hardly, it is globally important work
that challenges pre-existing structures and
takes on persistent problems and operating
systems for the greater benefit. It is “essential
business”—business that looks at doing
more with less. But it does seem that women
are pre-disposed to this type of work. So is it
psychology? Is it female leadership styles that
lend themselves to sustainability?
As well, with sustainability’s role in nonfinancial reporting you quickly reflect on
the data that demonstrates the current
imbalance in corporate Australia. Not the
data around “women in management roles”
as most support staff have “manager” in
their title now. It means nothing and it is
not addressing sexual discrimination. When
you consider only 11.8 per cent of CEOs
in Australia are women and the level of
representation on boards is a humiliating
16 per cent we’ve got a long way to go. The
fact remains that “women do two thirds of
the work, receive 10 per cent of the world’s
income and own 1 per cent of the means of
production”, according to the United Nations
Development Programme. All round, they’re
depressing statistics.
What interests me, particularly with gender
balance and sustainability, is how this
industry is actually made up of a lot of
women. In fact, it’s mainly women. I could
base this on my experience, but if you look
at research from the Australian Centre for
Corporate Social Responsibility 60 per cent
4
Understanding that women have different
leadership styles is, in my opinion, key to
why we see more women in positions of
sustainability. I could blithely suggest that
women are better multi-taskers and so
can cope with the multi-faceted work of
sustainability. And in part that’s true. Women
do multi-task better than men according
to some academics. It may also be, as some
commentators contend, that sustainability
is about caring and nurturing, and this is
why women enjoy this work. But, after 14
years, I’ve never felt that my caring and
nurturing side was much use in corporate
sustainability. I’ve never found approval for
projects or strategies based on the “good”
it would do for the world. Rather I have
always argued the benefits for the business
first, and the community and environment
second. As I’m usually arguing to male
executives or boards, this has definitely held
me in good stead.
In my opinion women are essential for the
successful incorporation of sustainability into
business strategy and planning because of
their ability to deal with complex problems
in a calm and logical way and to approach
problems with a long term view for resolution.
I’m not basing that on research or science,
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purely on my experience of women in
sustainability leadership. Women are expert
in dealing with multiple stakeholder needs,
and this also is essential in sustainability.
In saying all of that, men can (and do) of
course have these traits in leadership and
make excellent sustainability leaders. I recall
many men I have had the pleasure of working
with in sustainability who are consummate
professionals in the field. What bothers me
is that, with the disproportionate number of
women in the field, we still see sustainability
conferences with only male keynote speakers
(I don’t attend them). Almost all business
books and business commentators on
sustainability are men and more worryingly
still, we are seeing more senior roles for
sustainability (Executive or equivalent) being
offered up to men instead of women. I wonder
if we analysed the most senior sustainability
roles in Australian corporations would we
would find that the higher up you go in
sustainability the more men are in these
positions. I hope not.
Sustainability allows analyses of systems
that don’t work and then provides solutions
to amend them. That may include climate
change adaptation, local employment
strategies, indoor air quality, wellness and
others. What I hope is that sustainability
practitioners also focus on the inadequacies
of a corporate system that excludes 50
per cent of our population from making
business decisions at senior levels and provide
solutions to fix that.
For more information contact:
Amanda Steele, Head of Sustainability,
Pacific, CBRE
Phone: +61 2 9333 9053
Mobile: +61 0434 734507
Email: amanda.steele@cbre.com.au
Website: www.cbre.com.au