The Australian Office was delighted to host one of Australia’s most accomplished corporate leaders and Chair of the 30% Club Australia, Ms Nicola Wakefield Evans AM, in Taiwan from 4-6 March 2024 as part of the Australian Office’s International Women’s Day (IWD) celebrations. While in Taiwan, Nicola, had an exclusive interview with the Global Views Monthly, sharing her observations on gender issues throughout her career.
Original text is in Mandarin, please find the English translation below.
‘I have always been passionate about gender diversity. When I commenced my legal career, law firms weren’t women-friendly and was mostly dominated by men.’ Nicola Wakefield Evans studied law at the University of NSW and worked at King & Wood Mallesons for nearly 30 years.
Looking back at her school years, she mentioned that women were advised not to be lawyers, doctors, or scientists. ‘I was told not to pursue a career in law when I talked to my supervisor.’
‘To make progress in women’s rights is like climbing over a huge mountain and this can be daunting,’ she described.
Wakefield Evans believes that COVID was surprisingly a positive turning point for global gender equity. ‘COVID forced people to work from home and this makes taking care of kids easier. I believe this flexibility suits everyone, not just women. Men have found that they are happier working from home, they want to spend more time with kids, and they want increased flexibility,’ she said.
Australia established a specialized agency (the Workplace Gender Equality Agency) to supervise the implementation of gender equity in business
Australia has made quite an achievement in recently years in gender equality.
PwC’s latest report showed that the pay gay had worsened in 2022, however, Australia had improved the most, rising from 17th place to tenth.
In addition, according to the latest gender pay gap report released by the Australian government, the pay gap in industries dominated by women, was relatively small. However, in male-dominated industries, the pay gap can still be quite wide. For instance, in education and retail industries, there is almost no wage gap between men and women, but for real estate, construction or transportation industries, the wage gap can be huge.
Using Qantas Airline as an example Wakefield Evans said that despite Qantas’ leadership team taking gender issues seriously, it still performed badly in the gender pay gap statistics because most of the high paid pilot roles are male and female are mostly front-line staff.
Qantas Airways CEO Vanessa Hudson has issued a statement on making the effort to recruit more female pilots.
Gender pay gap has long been a focal point in Australia. This was why the federal government established the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA). Australian companies with more than 100 employees must reveal annual to the WGEA on their wage data as an indicating that they are treating both male and female employees fairly. Companies fail to do so, WGEA will call them up publicly and which in turn will impact the company’s own reputation.
There needs to be at least 30% female in senior management levels
When asked whether she encountered additional challenges when seeking promoting or salary increase in workplace as a woman, Wakefield Evans brought up her times as a lawyer as an example. She explained that when she was a junior lawyer, male lawyers were promoted faster than females because the attitude was that if we put women in leadership positions, she wouldn’t be as efficient as her male colleague because she might have children. This attitude to women in leadership has changed but there still remains a structural issue that ‘childcare in Australia is largely unavailable and unaffordable.’
As the chair of 30% Club Australia, Wakefield Evans also shared the mission of this global initiative. ‘30% Club was founded by Dame Helena Morrissey who believed that female representation on corporate boards need to be set at 30%.’ She further explained that the reason why it was set at 30% was because it could make a difference in decision making with a more diverse board. Although it is a difficult task, but this is how we make a difference in our society.
Wakefield Evans said that although the organisation does not have any government funding it works closely with the government and that Australian government boards now have more than 40% female representation.
‘Australia has been more successful in increasing the number of women on boards compared to other countries. We are proud for what we’ve achieved but there are still more we can do to improve including having more women in executive roles.’
As for comparing Taiwan’s gender equality status to Australia, she believes that both countries are quite similar when it comes to the gender pay gap, but that there are areas where improvement is needed. Australia has more women at board levels, while in Taiwan, the percentage is close to what Australia had 10 years ago. However, she believed that Taiwan has a good chance to catch up as Taiwan is very similar to Australia in terms of size of population, business structures and both are strong democracies. ‘If Australia can do it, so can Taiwan.’
She also mentioned that Taiwan did better than Australia when it comes to women participation in politics and in the public sector, and that Taiwan has a female president.
Of course, women in both Australia and Taiwan still suffer from the lack of affordable childcare. Career women continue to find themselves facing dilemma at work once having children and the question of who should be taking care of the children lingered.
Wakefield Evans noted that global gender equality has made much progress compares to when she first started her career. More and more women are entering the workplace. She also called on the government to ensure women have good education which allows them to have suitable jobs in the future.
How does AI affect gender equality? Wakefield Evans: Government needs to tighten regulations
When talked about the impact of AI on workplace, she said that gender bias exists in AI and we have yet learn how to make AI to be fair and gender neutral. She is also worried that the process made in gender equality could be hindered by AI and there may be a regression.
When the example of Amazon using gender bias algorithms in resume screening was brought up in the interview, she stressed that the government should strengthen its effort in regulating AI and we must all be aware of its possible impacts.