Hello.
This is 6 Minute
English from BBC Learning
English.
I'm Neil.
And I'm Sam.
Sam, does this situation
sound familiar?
It's a
colleague's birthday next
week.
A male boss says to
a female employee - "You're
great at organising things -
would you buy a card and get
everyone in the office to
sign it?
Oh, and we'll need
to order a cake too -
thanks, you're amazing!"
Yes, I have seen that.
A male boss asks a woman
to do all the jobs that
keep the office running
but do nothing to
advance her career or
improve her chances of
promotion - that's when
someone moves up into
a higher, better paid
position in a company.
Sadly, this happens
a lot.
In many workplaces
around the world, it's
the men who are
considered 'born leaders'
and promoted up the
corporate career ladder,
while the women are
given less important
roles.
Even today, many
working women find
themselves at a point
in their career beyond
which they cannot progress,
an invisible barrier to
succeed referred to as
the glass ceiling.
But in this programme,
we'll be meeting the
members of The No Club,
a group of women saying
'No' to the glass ceiling
by publicly questioning
the kinds of jobs men
and women are asked to
do in the workplace.
And, of course, we'll
be learning some useful
new vocabulary as well.
But first, I have a
question for you, Sam.
Despite the glass ceiling,
women do make it to the
top jobs in many areas
of work and business,
even in the male-dominated
world of politics.
So,
who was the first woman
to become British Prime
Minister?
Was it
a) Theresa May,
b) Nicola Sturgeon or
c) Margaret Thatcher?
I know the answer to this
one, Neil.
It's
c) Margaret Thatcher.
OK.
Well, we'll find out
later if you're right.
Professor Lise Vesterlund
is one of the four
academics who co-wrote
The No Club, a book
discussing how females
disproportionately take
on the unimportant,
less visible
tasks at work.
Professor Vesterlund
calls these non-promotable
tasks, jobs like taking
notes, organising social
events or chairing meetings -
jobs that take time and
effort but do little to
increase company profits
or to boost your career.
Research shows that most
of these tasks are done
by women.
Here's
Lise Vesterlund explaining
more to BBC World Service
programme, Business Daily.
We've been noticing gender
differences in wages,
in advancement,
in negotiation.
Burn-out
for women is much greater
than it is for men.
Their
dissatisfaction with their
work is much greater.
And we've been trying to
sort of address all these
objectives with lots of
different methods and
techniques, and what is
interesting about the
non-promotable work is
that it, in a very
structural sense,
contributes to all of
those differences.
Professor Vesterlund lists
some workplace gender
imbalances, including job
dissatisfaction and
burn-out - that's tiredness
and exhaustion caused
by working too hard.
Many of these issues
are made worse by
non-promotable tasks.
Natalie Quail agrees.
Natalie started her
successful dental cosmetics
company, SmileTime, after
winning a business
competition on the
TV show, Dragon's Den.
Here she tells BBC World
Service's Business Daily
about her experience of
being asked to take on
non-promotable tasks
in her work as a
trainee solicitor.
As a trainee solicitor
pretty much every task
that you take on is
a non-promotable task.
Note-taking is one of
them, in meetings, when
you kind of are told
that you can't really
speak or say anything.
I was tasked with being
the team party organiser,
so that was my role.
It does definitely
occur that the women
in the team, the level
of multitasking they're
doing is just... far outstrips
the men in a lot of
cases, for example,
you know, a lot of
women in the team
would also be juggling
having kids at home,
being a working mum.
Natalie found herself
doing non-promotable
tasks.
She thinks many
women in the workplace
are expected to be
good at multitasking -
doing more than one
thing at the same time.
For working mums, who
are raising a family
as well as developing
careers at work, this
involves some juggling -
trying to manage your
life when you are
involved in many
different activities
which all demand
your time.
In the forty years since
the term 'glass ceiling'
was invented, it seems
not much has change
for working women.
But
there is some good news.
The number of female
managers and women
working in jobs
traditionally seen as
male has increased
dramatically, and those
companies where getting
promotion is based on
ability not gender, have
benefitted from talented,
hard-working female leaders.
And speaking of female leaders,
Neil, what was the answer
to your question?
You
asked me who was the
first female British Prime
Minister, and I said
Margaret Thatcher.
Was I right?
You were right!
Mrs Thatcher,
nicknamed The Iron Lady,
became Prime Minister in
May 1979, the first woman
to break the political
glass ceiling in the UK -
an invisible barrier to
advancing in your career.
OK, let's recap the other
vocabulary we’ve learnt,
starting with promotion -
moving up into a higher, more
important position
in your company.
The term non-promotable tasks
describes those unimportant
jobs which help your
organisation but do nothing
to advance your career.
They are often
given to women.
If you have burn-out, you're
exhausted from working
too hard.
'Multitasking' is the ability
to do several things
at the same time.
And finally, 'juggling' involves
managing many different
activities which all demand
your time.
We’ve managed
our time pretty well so far
but now our six minutes
are up!
Bye for now!
Bye!