IN THIS ISSUE:
- UNIONIZATION IN CANADA - DIFFERENCES BETWEEN WOMEN & MEN
- NOTICES
- TRADES & TECH BACK IN FULL SWING FOR 2013!
- PRESCRIPTION DRUG PROGRAM NEEDED IN N.B.
- EXAMINING THE GENDER-DIVERSITY PROGRAMS OF 235 COMPANIES - EUROPE
- WHAT DOES BIRTH CONTROL HAVE TO DO WITH REDUCING GLOBAL EMISSIONS?
- CHANGING COMPANIES' MINDS ABOUT WOMEN
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UNIONIZATION IN CANADA - DIFFERENCES BETWEEN WOMEN & MEN
For the seventh year in a row, the unionization rate for Canadian women was higher than men's in 2010 (31% versus 28%). Female union members earned on average $25.97, & male, $27.41. The number of unionized employees increased by 80,000 from 2009 to 2010, reaching 4.3 million Canadians, 30%.
In New Brunswick in 2011, 29% of workers were union members (30.8% if you count persons who are not union members but covered by collective agreements). That is an increase from 2010, when 27.8% were union members (29.2%, members & those covered by an agreement).
Full or Part-time – 33% of women & 30% of men working full time were unionized. 25% of women & 18% of men working part time were unionized.
Permanent or non-permanent positions – Among permanent workers, 31% of women are unionized, & 29% of men. In non-permanent jobs, 28% of women & 25% of men are unionized.
Public or private sector - In the public sector 73% of women & 69% of men were unionized, reflecting women's presence in public administration, & in teaching & health positions. In the private sector, only 13% of women were unionized, compared with 19% of men. The lower rate among women reflected their predominance in sales & several service occupations.
- Unionization 2011, StatCan, http:// bit.ly/13R8VIN
NOTICES
April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month - a month dedicated to raising awareness of sexual violence to all members of our communities, and to highlight the need for support and services to those affected by sexual assault. http:// bit.ly/10vVoAn
Engaging Youth – Let's Talk About It… Online! - For the month of April, we will be asking you and all our partners around the province to use the images to spread awareness of sexual assault in New Brunswick. Change your Facebook and Twitter profile pictures, add the graphic to your email signature, and help us spread the word! Contact Jenn Richard for more information ( [email protected] ). Find us on Facebook by searching for the “Sexual Assault Awareness Month 2013 - Mois de la sensibilisation aux agressions sexuelles 2013” event where you can download profile pictures and other campaign resources!
Taking Charge of Your Life by Managing Your Time and Your Priorities - Spring is on the threshold! And it's time to think about this season of your life in a very thoughtful and purposeful way! Check out the All-new Agenda for the Saturday, April 27 event. Registration must be completed in advance, and the last two events have sold out our 60 spaces. We encourage you to register early! Registration fee is $49 + HST. Check out the other informative and personally-challenging sessions here !
Same-sex Domestic Violence (National Victims of Crime Awareness Week) – Free training by Ms Jane Oxenbury on Fri April 26 2013 (9am-4pm) at the Multipurpose Centre in Shediac (58 Festival st., Shediac). Training offered in English with simultaneous translation. Limited seating. Register by April 5 th 2013 by calling or e-mailing the Beauséjour Family Crisis Resource Centre: 533-9100/ [email protected]
At the Fredericton Women's Show, shop til you drop or learn something new! Bring your sisters, daughters, mom, boyfriend etc. It's free! Find one of a kind crafts and fine art or learn from the professionals on mental, physical and spiritual health. There will be fashion shows, seminars, free goodie bags each day to the first 200 women! And much, much more! We will be collecting any donations for Women In Transition House at the doors. If you can, give generously! Sat., Apr. 13 - 10:00 a.m. to 6 p.m., Sun., Apr. 14 - 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m FREE ADMISSION!!!!
Are you handling your own Family Law matter? Do you need information about court forms and procedures? Consider registering for any of these workshops. The schedule is on our family law NB website and will be updated constantly - http:// bit.ly/PZTALN There is also an online registration form: on-line registration
The Social Aetiology of Mental Illness [SAMI] training program is pleased to present the following free webinars. Please join us!
http:// bit.ly/XpGq1W
Live broadcasts take place on TUESDAYS, from 11:30am-12:30pm EST (Toronto Time).
Computer Science at UNB offers a girls-only summer camp this year, Aug 19-23. In case you have a daughter in grade 6-8 or know someone who does, please consider this new summer program, CyberGirlz. A link with the information included below can be found at http://iscx.ca/summercamp2013 .
http:// bit.ly/1089EQU
A Benefit Brunch will be held in support of Family Enrichment by the Snooty Fox on Sunday, April 7th from 11 am to 2 pm. Live music by Somerville! The Snooty Fox prepares a special menu for the event. In the Special Menu each item is $10 and they donate $8 to Family Enrichment!!! You can also order from the regular menu. However, no donation is made to Family Enrichment from these purchases. The staff donate some of their time and some of their tips as well. We will also have a 50/50 draw. Come one, come all. Bring your family and invite your friends!!!
Lean In videoconference - dedicated to women on college campuses globally on April 11 at 4 p.m. PST . Sheryl will be speaking about her new book, Lean In: Women, Work & the Will to Lead , the growing Lean In community and then will be taking your questions from campuses globally. Join us: April 11 th , 4pm PST /7pm EST http://bit.ly/LIApril11Event
TRADES & TECH ARE BACK IN FULL SWING FOR 2013!
Trades & Tech Gala for Girls is a relaxed dinner that fosters a positive environment in which young women have the opportunity to hear speakers discuss the rewards and challenges of their chosen career path, and to connect with mentors from their community. Mentors provide students with advice, guidance and inspiration by sharing their experiences. Participants leave empowered and informed about exciting non-traditional careers.
The first Gala Dinner for the year 2013 will be held in Saint Stephen. The Gala dinner will be at the Saint Stephen High School on Thursday April 11, 2013 starting at 5:30.
In 2012 the Trades & Tech Gala for Girls team hosted their first Aboriginal dinner, the event was held in Fredericton. The Trades and Tech Gala team is currently preparing a second Aboriginal dinner to be hosted Miramichi during spring 2013.
Are you a young woman interested in exploring the variety of career options that are available to you? Would you like to meet women that are currently working in fields that are predominately dominated by men? Then join us for a Trades & Tech Gala for Girls dinner, you will have the opportunity to speak to mentors and to win great prices like an iPad!
Visit our website to see when the next Gala Dinner closest to you is, you can sign up online! http:// bit.ly/qPi3VN
Also visit our success stories page! This page highlights some of the success stories from New Brunswickers who've turned their passion into a career! Read about what they do in their jobs, what or who inspired them to pursue a career in their field, and their advice for students interested in working in their profession. http:// bit.ly/xOZdfP
PRESCRIPTION DRUG PROGRAM NEEDED IN N.B.
We can't get a prescription drug program fast enough for the 150,000 New Brunswickers who currently are not covered by any plan. I look forward to the time soon when they will benefit from the plan the provincial government has in the works. Those people will have to pay premiums & a deductible – it's insurance -, though some would qualify for a subsidy based on the family's ability to pay – it's also an anti-poverty measure -, but everyone in the province will benefit, not just those 150,000.
Kudos to the government for promising to deliver it soon, to the previous government for launching the process, & mostly to those who put us on a path to a good program, Dr. Dennis Furlong & the Advisory Committee on Health Benefits made up of citizens ...
As Dr. Dennis Furlong said, we transport people who have a heart attack by air to a first-class cardiac unit, perform expensive tests & surgery while in hospital for days & weeks & then discharge them with prescriptions they can't afford to fill. We'll do it all over again, as soon as the problem reoccurs. Think of other examples - asthma, diabetes, high blood pressure - & of the savings to the health care system if everyone were able to have the needed prescription.
The 20 per cent of New Brunswickers who don't have prescription drug insurance are either currently healthy enough to not need medication, struggling to pay for prescriptions or doing without or cutting back on their prescribed medicine because of the cost. Soon they will have to pay a premium which will give everyone protection, peace of mind, & medication when needed...
-Excerpt, column by Jody Dallaire, January 2013, http:// bit.ly/Z7TqKV
EXAMINING THE GENDER-DIVERSITY PROGRAMS OF 235 COMPANIES - EUROPE
Corporate transformations that address the underlying attitudes that prevent change are 4 times more likely to succeed than those that tackle only the symptoms of resistance. The particular mindsets that hamper gender diversity vary... Sometimes there is an unchallenged view that positions requiring long hours & lots of travel will not suit women... Some companies are reluctant to give women the tough feedback that everyone needs on their way to the top, & some men are reluctant to develop mentoring relationships with women for fear that the relationship might be deemed inappropriate…
One company went to great lengths to understand junior women's concerns about promotion, then worked to overcome them. Another strove to understand biases that might be at play in the promotion process & found, for instance, that women were often judged on their performance but men on their potential. It set up training courses for managers to shift perceptions. The same biases might be at play in recruitment. One company “organized an audit of our recruiting processes & found that recruiters tended to be more critical of female than male candidates. As a result, we organized training for the whole recruiting department.” …
The very best minds, men's & women's alike, are needed to address today's business challenges. McKinsey & Company's Women Matter research has been making the business case for increasing the number of women in senior management roles. It has shown a link between the specific behaviors that women tend to adopt more frequently than men, & corporations' organizational & financial performance.
- Excerpts, Women Matter 2012, McKinsey & Company. http://bit.ly/GN32hR
WHAT DOES BIRTH CONTROL HAVE TO DO WITH REDUCING GLOBAL EMISSIONS?
Everything, women around the world would say, because they know how closely linked reproductive health is to poverty, food security, climate change & beyond. This was the message that female leaders brought to the Rio+20 conference on sustainable development (June 2012), but not many were listening, least of all the Vatican.
“The only way to respond to increasing human numbers & dwindling resources is through the empowerment of women - giving women access to education, to paid income, & to reproductive health services, reproductive rights, access to family planning,” said Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland, former prime minister of Norway & former director-general of WHO, adding that no other way existed to change the current “pattern of human consumption”.
The Vatican led the opposition to remove references in the summit's outcome text that ensured women's reproductive rights. The final text has no such reference & commits to promotion rather than ensuring equal access of women to health care, education, basic services & economic opportunities. The Vatican equates reproductive rights & health with abortion – an inaccurate comparison, at best. Cate Owren, of Women's Environment & Development Organisation: “Political compromises for the sake of an agreement should not have cost us our rights – nor our planet.”
- Excerpts, Will the World Listen to Women?, Zofeen Ebrahim, IPS,
http:// bit.ly/MOybka ; Conference follow-up website: http:// bit.ly/P8T5Of
CHANGING COMPANIES' MINDS ABOUT WOMEN
The last generation of workplace innovations (policies to support women with young children, networks to help women navigate their careers, professional development) broke down structural barriers holding women back. The next frontier is toppling invisible barriers: mind-sets widely held by managers, men & women alike, that are rarely acknowledged …
Our ideas for breaking this cycle rest on our experience in the trenches with senior executives, on discussions with 30 diversity experts, & on the reflections of leaders at companies that have been on this journey for years - Pitney Bowes where 38% of vice presidents are women; & Time Warner, where more than 40% of senior executives in its operating divisions are women.
Look to the words that appeared most frequently as explanations for poor retention & promotion of women: “politics,” “management,” “the company,” “people,” & “the organization.” We've all heard endless variations on the mind-sets that set women up for failure: “She's too aggressive” (or “too passive”). “I don't want to tell Bob he didn't get the job.” “I don't know how to talk to or mentor her.” “A woman isn't right for that role.”
Real progress requires systemwide change driven by a hard-edged approach, including targets ensuring that women are at least considered for advancement, the rigorous application of data in performance dialogues to overcome problematic mind-sets, & genuine sponsorship.
At every step along the US corporate-talent pipeline, the odds of advancement for men are about twice those for women.
“When you look at corporate mind-sets, change starts at the top. I haven't seen change in diversity start from middle management.”
A starting point is making sure enough women are being considered for advancement. For a number of years, every list of candidates for promotion at Pitney Bowes had to include 35% women & 15% minorities, equal to their representation in the workforce at the time … because “white men had been disproportionately advantaged & had gotten complacent.”
PepsiCo tracks the progress of women at all levels - the full pipeline of female talent, not just the senior ranks, is highly visible. Pitney Bowes rates each division's diversity plan and, like Time Warner, includes in its bonus decisions an executive's success in promoting diversity.
Bottom-up survey data can help shake things up. Shell asks all employees to answer a survey with 61 questions - how they like working there, whether they feel able to speak up. The company uses the results to measure the inclusiveness of the work culture. Shell analyzes the responses of groups such as men & women, different nationalities & tenures. Over the years, it has seen the gap between men's & women's experiences shrink.
- Excerpts, Changing companies, Sept 2011, Joanna Barsh & Lareina Yee, McKinsey Quarterly, http:// bit.ly/oI83Q8
IN PARTING
Never, never, never let a man see you exert yourself physically, such as moving a heavy piece of furniture... You may work your head off all day, but when your husband comes home, stop… Don't impose on him. Just one little thing is sufficient to make him feel his manly superiority... The unmarried woman must use these same tactics in getting a man's interest... A man so appealed to will find his greatest urge to accomplish things. He will benefit more by a woman's dependence upon him than he will by her being shoulder to shoulder with him – unless she learns to call upon him in other ways. Manliness degenerates very quickly around women who provide no romantic flattery for masculine strength.
[email protected]
Toll free:
1-877-253-0266
Fax: (506) 453-7977
www.gnb.ca/women
Women Femmes NB
is sent out twice a month by the provincial government Women's Issues Branch. It provides news related to equality issues, including events, studies, initiatives and information from women's groups, governments, universities, etc.
**Text from non-governmental sources will be published in the language(s) in which it is provided.
