Women reach top in PS but lack clout male counterparts had, study shows

Interesting study contrasting the number and impact (disclosure I was interviewed for the study):

It’s one of the many paradoxes uncovered by Carleton University researchers Marika Morris and Pauline Rankin in an interim report on a study of female leadership in the public service where women now dominate, holding more than 55 per cent of all jobs and 45 per cent of the executive positions below deputy ministers.

The study is part of the Women in the Public Service Project, run by the Washington-based Wilson Centre, aimed at getting women into 50 per cent of the world’s public service jobs by 2050.

Canada stands out with a public service that already exceeds the 50 per cent female target. The study is examining the impact women are having on shaping the public service and finding ways to measure it. The report is a springboard for such a debate at Carleton on Tuesday.

“With women accounting for 45 per cent of the executive rank, we no longer ask how to get more women in the public service but what difference it makes having them there,” said Morris.

…But that’s also when public servants started losing their monopoly grip on policy and as the sole, trusted advisers to ministers.

“So just as women are entering senior levels, it is harder now than ever to have an impact,” said Morris.

Women who took executive jobs over the past decade arrived just as developing big policy ideas took a back seat to economic restraint. Accountability, spending and job cuts, and avoiding risks were the order of the day.

It’s also a time when the trust between politicians and bureaucrats is low.

“I heard a lot about changes in the past 10 years, less trust and diminished policy-making role, so now that more women … have made their entry into management, they have less responsibility to actually create policy and programs than public servants had in the past,” said Morris.

She said women also moved into the senior jobs with a management style at odds with the hierarchy and traditional lines of accountability. Morris said many executives — both men and women — interviewed felt they “made a difference” and that often the biggest impact they had came from being “collaborative” leaders.

Women reach top in PS but lack clout male counterparts had, study shows | Ottawa Citizen.