How to cash in the diversity dividend
As nominations for the 0 Women in Property program open this week, The GPT Group’s chief financial officer Anastasia Clarke reflects on the next steps for companies taking diversity seriously.
One of the few female CFOs in an ASX-100 company, Clarke is a role model to many women in the industry. She’s also a vocal advocate of 0 Women in Property, an initiative driven by the Property Council’s diversity committees and national sponsor The GPT Group.
“Women want equality in the workplace, and I don’t think it’s hard for business to understand that. And diversity is good for the business bottom line,” Clarke says.
“We know that diversity delivers better decision making. The issue of diversity is bigger than any one organisation. It demands a collective approach,” she adds.
The 100 Women in Property program was established in 2016. It has been rebranded 0 Women in Property in 2018, highlighting the program’s progression and ongoing aspiration.
The program asks established leaders to identify and sponsor emerging female talent in their organisations or business spheres. The idea is to harness people power to grow the industry’s talent pipeline.
Clarke, who joined The GPT Group in 2009, also chairs the Property Council’s capital markets division.
Clarke says initiatives like 40:40:20 – something driven by the Property Council over several years – is now well established in many organisations, including her own.
“When I started my role with GPT, we had a broad objective of per cent men and per cent women in senior roles. We introduced the 40:40:20 concept, and we changed our method of measurement to one that was based on remuneration, rather than job role.
“We also took action to meet our targets in candidate and interview sets. This has worked well, and we achieved 40:40:20 in 2017.”
Ensuring pay parity is another issue under the spotlight, and Clarke says the gender pay gap is “alive and well”.
The latest national gender pay gap data, released by the Workplace Gender Equality Agency in November, found the gap is narrowing, but men still take home $26,527 a year more than women on average, and the pay gap across the entire economy is even wider at $89,516 for top management.
According to WGEA, women were seven times as likely as men to leave the workplace during parental leave, which also exacerbated the pay gap.
Just last week, John Holland Group announced it was adjusting the salary of 15 per cent of its female employees who were found to be paid less than their male colleagues across the business.
Joe Barr, the company’s chief executive officer, said he was determined to “stamp out the gender pay gap where it exists. Fixing salaries immediately is the first step, and now the challenge is making sure pay gaps don’t creep back in”.
Clarke, who has previously sponsored two participants in the Women in Property program, is also an active member of The GPT Group’s inhouse mentoring program, Connect 4.
“Small things make a big difference to people’s career development,” she says, adding that many of the women she’s mentored cite work/life balance as their toughest challenge.
“The biggest social issue in my mind – and the one that will deliver a real shift in gender equality – is equal family caring.
“Encouraging women and men on the cusp of family formation to talk about their expectations of equal caring is important. But so is our whole society removing the stigma around men taking on the role of primary carer.”
Clarke urges young women to start talking about their career and caring expectations early. “If women are responsible for the entire burden of the household, performance will be compromised on one front – either family or career.”
Clarke says a “catalyst point” in her own career was accepting a promotion while she was pregnant.
“If you are going to come back to work, why not come back to a bigger job.”
Property Council’s 0 Women in Property program will open today at 8.30am AEST calling for nominations from both participants and sponsors. Nominations will close on Wednesday 21 February 2018 at 5pm AWST.