Strategic decisions centre on acumen — not gender
Women in business seem to demand consideration of their ‘women-ness’ and their fitness to hold high office, but there’s an unhealthy tension between the two, writes Chantell Ilbury
I have a testy relationship with Women’s Month, and it seems the feeling is mutual. Despite being an experienced speaker with engagements around the world, I never seem to crack the nod to speak at Women’s Month events in SA. There’s possibly a reason for that. In a chapter, Backwards and in High Heels in my book, A Fox’s Tale, I wrote the following about the "empowerment" of women: "The term suggests a helping hand, as if women should be ‘allowed’ to do what they want to do, or that they be given an opportunity while others stand aside. That’s not an opportunity, that’s getting a hand up." I can imagine that didn’t go down well with women who feel they should fill more seats in South African boardrooms. They have a case. Over the past 17 years, I have guided the strategic conversations of executive teams of hundreds of companies around the world, across a diverse array of sectors. Many of those companies have been South African, and I can probably count on one hand those that had a...
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