Women and careers in the media:

Tackling the gender gap through the next generation

An interactive session that will invite attendees to discuss recent findings from research on the gender gap in the creative media industry and the implications for their students.

Tamsyn Dent (Bournemouth University)

and

Dr Kim Allen (London Metropolitan University)

The context

- Importance of CMIs to economic and cultural life - Government agenda to encourage young people to seek creative careers; key role of education, educators and IAG - But barriers to entry and precarious working conditions = lack of workforce diversity (class, race, gender) - Gender issues: despite making up the majority of the student population on courses aligned with the sector at FE and HE level, women represent just two thirds of the CMI workforce; marked gender segregation across occupational groups; earn less; less likely to be in top positions.

What is the role of media educators and education in addressing the gender gap?

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

• From your experience, how do young women perceive the CMI as viable and desirable careers?

• What do you advise to your students who express an interest in building a career in the CMIs. Would you encourage them to go to university? What subjects would you advise them to take? What organisations would you advise them to look up for further information on careers in the CMI?

• Would you give different advice to male / female students based on perceived employment opportunities in the CMIs?

• Do you think the current education system (both HE and FE) sufficiently equips young people with the skills and knowledge necessary to build a successful career in the CMI? How could it be improved?

• What should the industry do / how does it need to change to make CMI careers more accessible for young women?

Widening Gender Gap in the CMI

Gender gap wider in comparison to rest of UK

Gender Impact on average earnings

Gender impact on number of dependent children

Occupational gender gap within the industry

PhD: Gender Gap in the UK CMI

• Test the hypothesis that “women have been leaving the industry because of difficulty reconciling managing a career in the creative industries with raising a family.” (Skillset, 2010) • Further investigation of the Skillset data – UK mapping profile of women working in the CMI • Place data in international context • Investigate the working culture of the industry. Whether specific conditions exclude certain individuals.

• Impact of findings for your students?

Stories behind the figures

“I mean there’s no way you can manage the ferocity and intensity of TV Directing job with a child. They are like the same thing. Making a film is exactly like having a child. You need everything that you’ve got and more. It’s not just 24/7 it’s more. You know there isn’t a moment when you’re not thinking about the programme there isn’t a second when you’re not trying to do something for it you know you put all your everything all your being all your energy everything into it and then the same with a child and you can’t do that for 2 things”

Lack of realistic support

“No-one explains to you what you are going in as and what you should ask for that would be really helpful because I didn’t start asking for things with a contract for I don’t know maybe like three years, three and a half years after starting working there”

“Motherhood is the antithesis of creativity

in the media environment.”

“I really think there should be something for younger girls where you know … the thing is if somebody tried to tell me I’d have just said well I don’t care because I’m not going to have a kids … but even if it was just in my mind somewhere that there were other people who had been through it that you could talk to. I mean it’s so ridiculous when I was pregnant there were three women on that production who were pregnant and every single one of us hid it. Three pregnant women and we couldn’t even talk to each other about it because we were that terrified of not being respected because we were pregnant.”

How do we define ‘creativity’?

VIDEO – What attributes are associated with creativity? What does this mean for our understanding of the ‘creative person’?

The ‘leaky pipeline’: Young women’s formative experiences of the creative media sector

• • • • Research conducted in 09-10 for the Equality Challenge Unit on equality issues in higher education work placements in the creative sector (with Jocey Quinn, Sumi Hollingworth and Anthea Rose) In-depth interviews with students in Higher Education who had undertaken work placements in the sector Focus on experiences of female students (19-25 years) as female ‘creative workers in the making’ and their encounters with gender barriers and exclusions in the CMIs TV, Film, Advertising, Design and Photography– mainly in ‘creative’, technical, manual roles • Work placements are not just about employability skills. They shape young people’s career aspirations, understandings of what it means to be a CMI professional, and perceptions of belonging

‘

Like a fish out of water’

Gender imbalances and the ‘creative’ person

Bel (Film – set design): Most women are in the make-up or costume. Producer and director – the really important roles - they are all male. You see it. And I have heard from successful women who have made it, that when they walk on set – they’re a producer and an art director – the men will point them to the make-up room! Alena (Photography – art team): It was very male dominated. Well, in the creative team, his active team… all men. In a creative part meaning, working with the camera in broadcast and photographics, anywhere, it’s male dominated... The PR team, which means women who communicate, who probably organise him: all female Polly (TV – Camera operator): There were women in the make-up department, wardrobe, but the technical crew - camera, lighting, sound all middle-aged men. Then there was little 19-year old me. I was a fish out of water. The equipment is big and heavy and I felt they were looking at me , thinking how can she handle it?

Taking Pity? Taking Over?

Bel: There is the attitude of ‘we know better, we are men, she doesn’t know’, of ‘ah, let’s just sort it out for her, she needs four of them, put them in the box, she doesn't know she needs them yet but we know she does’. So there was that element of construction people taking pity on you and they know best. They just do it.

Alena: Men dominate and it’s more difficult for women because once something is male dominated, you have to work really hard … but the infiltration is seen as something that’s not that friendly [sic] looked upon…. One woman told me that she went through six month of hell before she was accepted in the team. They just didn’t want her, didn’t want a girl there…. I think that there is a little bit of you know, that inner ‘ah you’re trying to play on a boy’s playground, then you’re going to play hard’ and that’s you know. I suppose that’s a male nature [laughs].

Survival Strategies: Playing Hard?

Sophia (Film assistant): What do you need to make it as a woman in this industry? Balls.... You have to go with all guns blazing, otherwise men think they know better. Amy (Advertising – creative team): It’s a bloodthirsty, competitive business, you have to be assertive but that’s easier for men. Women who are angry get seen as hysterical because it isn’t ladylike, whereas for men it’s seen as attractive, so it was hard to get my voice heard Mel (Design –creative team): I do think the women have to act harder. The other woman who worked there, I found her crying once but when I saw her in the office she’d be really intense, cold, robotic….this uber-confident, sleek businesswoman and underneath I saw little bits of doubt, but you have to hide them….But I just couldn’t hack it. I guess I just didn’t have tough enough skin.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

• From your experience, how do young women perceive the CMI as viable and desirable careers?

• What do you advise to your students who express an interest in building a career in the CMIs. Would you encourage them to go to university? What subjects would you advise them to take? What organisations would you advise them to look up for further information on careers in the CMI?

• Would you give different advice to male / female students based on perceived employment opportunities in the CMIs?

• Do you think the current education system (both HE and FE) sufficiently equips young people with the skills and knowledge necessary to build a successful career in the CMI? How could it be improved?

• What should the industry do / how does it need to change to make CMI careers more accessible for young women?