It’s hardly news to report there’s a significant lack of women IN the news, especially when it comes to expert sources quoted in the financial press.
Flick through the Australian Financial Review or the business pages of our major metropolitan papers, and it’s difficult to spot women featured as either op-ed contributors or sources in news and features stories.
It’s an issue ANZ is seeking to address through the launch of its Notable Women program, which will see female ANZ staff receive coaching and support in order to help them raise their media and networking profile and more effectively work with the media.
It’s a great initiative, seeing an employer take on some responsibility for ensuring the opinions and views of its female staff members are heard.
But it’s one that also raises the question — who’s actually responsible for the lack of female voices in the press? Is it women for not putting themselves forward, or editors for continually allowing male voices to dominate? Or is it employers for not better equipping their female staff with the skills for such opportunities?
It seems Sex Discrimination Commissioner Liz Broderick believes editors must bear some responsibility. Speaking at the launch of the ANZ program in Melbourne on Monday night, during a debate which asked if men or women are responsible for the lack of women quoted in the media, she suggested business sections of papers commit to a 30% target on including female sources by 2015.
That’s not an easy ask, especially at a time when journalists are tasked with more challenging deadlines — including having to report for multiple media platforms. A deadline’s not going to be stretched, or a story missed, in order to get a female source involved.
But it’s a target that could be possible with a little cooperation from all stakeholders involved on just who’s quoted in the media: that includes the journalists in thinking beyond their usual book of contacts, editors in asking for greater diversity, women in putting themselves forward, and employers in ensuring women have as much if not more of an opportunity to contribute to the media, as men.
The latter is particularly important and often overlooked in discussions on this issue. It’s not always that women don’t want to, are too busy, or don’t feel confident contributing to the media. It’s often that they worry about following company procedures and whether they can or should challenge internal approval processes on putting their name in the spotlight. Often they’re hamstrung by policies that specify only certain individuals can act as spokespeople on particular issues – usually those individuals who’ve been trained to push the company brand, rather than the best person to share their expertise on an issue.
I say this based in my own experience (and I’m referring to my time prior to editing this women’s publication) and continually coming up against comments such as, ‘Let me just get talking with you cleared by internal comms’ and, ‘Can I check what you plan to publish’, and ‘Can we set aside a time to talk next week’ for even the most straight-forward of stories. In the age of social media, where anyone and everyone is continually sharing their opinion online, often with their place of employment specified in their social media bios, it’s difficult to see why any senior manager should require clearance on sharing their expertise from an internal communications team — unless it’s regarding sensitive information about the company they work for. Making difficult requests on a journalist and impeding on their ability to reach a deadline and get their job done is a sure fire way to not being contacted again for a quote.
Too often employers, and internal policies or confusion regarding who should speak with the media, are the real hurdles in the way of women becoming expert sources in the media. Blame the bureaucracy not the women.