The four barriers discouraging women from a career in energy
This blog post was written by our founder, Juliet Davenport
The energy sector is one still way behind other UK industries in terms of gender balance at a senior management and executive level. In my opinion there are four main barriers discouraging women from joining the energy sector.
1. The perception of the sector needs to change
Nearly 20 years ago, when I became a part of wider industry groups – one of the things that struck me was that senior managers across the sector seemed to have three things in common:
They all tended to be male; all tended to be engineers; and all tended to think about the supply of energy just in terms of the technology.
They thought about the meters, and not about the people behind the meters.
I have always taken a very different view. To me, what’s exciting is what people do with energy. Energy is the magic within our society. It’s the thing that allows us to do things we couldn’t do otherwise.
Engaging people with their energy is extremely powerful.
Faced with that perception, any woman encountering the energy industry may feel that they too would need to look and think like the existing senior managers in order to be successful. In fact, I remember having that very conversation with someone from one of the big utility providers, who assumed she would need to change the way she worked in order to get ahead.
2. The industry needs greater flexibility
We need to stop looking at jobs in terms of set boundaries, and instead look at the outcomes.
This means each member of staff making sure they deliver what they need to; whether it’s at home, at the office, on site; or out of hours when the children are in bed.
As long as people are managing to get enough face time with their colleagues and prioritising their ongoing training and development; it shouldn’t matter so much about working the traditional 9-5.
The industry needs more role models in senior positions who show that working flexibly can work. Until we’re able to do that it, is going to be difficult to change it.
POWERful women is an excellent organisation within the energy sector; maybe we can learn from other sectors which see men and women working more flexibly.
3. We must promote Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths to girls
I am a passionate scientist – I have loved science all my life. But what I find fascinating is the way we introduce science to girls in our society. Traditionally, it has been seen as a subject for boys, and arts and literature are promoted more to girls.
I think one way of tackling this is to consider the spokespeople we have. Not only do we need more female spokespeople on radio and TV; but we need to make sure that they are encouraging and inspiring women, not patronising them.
Another method is making science more interesting and more available to young girls – something which the award winning enterprise, STEMettes strives to do.
Most of our society is built around technology; which is changing all the time with electric cars, smart meters and smart home appliances all coming into play. Currently, only 15% of the scientists who developed the technologies are female, which has undoubtedly led to a bias. Encouraging more women into STEM careers will fundamentally change our capability as a country, bringing a different level of innovation and creativity to problems that we face as a society. Enthusiasm from an early age is crucial to making science something achievable for all.
Encouraging women into STEM careers will fundamentally change our capability as a country.
4. Companies must look at their gender diversity
There are key things that companies can do to address the gender diversity within their organisations.
Firstly, they need to measure it and ensure people see and think about it. Until people make the effort to take a look at the raw figures, they just won’t see the problems.
Secondly, organisations need to overhaul their headhunting practices to ensure they deliver diverse shortlists. That might mean advertising in different places, using more neutral language and specifically seeking out diverse candidates who may not have otherwise appled.
And thirdly, companies need to offer more flexibility across the board to encourage all genders to work, provide caregiving and have the time and resources to progress in their careers.
There is a lot of work to do before we can achieve a truly gender balanced energy industry.
But there are things that we can start to change today, which is really empowering.
It’s as much an attitude change as anything else, and the more we raise it up as a priority, the more that will be done to solve it.
