Patronising quotas can't fuel women's progress

MANY stupid ideas sound good at first blush. They have a certain emotional appeal to listeners and, even better, make the presenter of the idea feel good about themselves. That's why they get a regular airing.

Just last week, Peter Hunt, a well-known Sydney investment banker and corporate director, said the Corporations Act should set a quota of at least 25 per cent female directors on corporate boards.

Speaking at the launch of a progress report about women commissioned by the Chief Executive Women group, Hunt surely received enthusiastic applause. Sorry to spoil the quota party, but it's worth looking back on a 30-year-old episode of Yes Minister. With impeccable wit, three scenes expose why quotas are a very silly idea.

Opening scene: the minister, Jim Hacker, is being interviewed by Cathy, a schoolgirl. "One last question," she says. "With all this power, what have you personally achieved?"

Hacker mumbles something about it being very hard to know where to start and brings the interview to an abrupt close. Alone with his wife, the minister sighs about not having achieved anything. His wife suggests he put more women into top civil service posts. The minister is excited: "After all, there's a principle at stake (and) principles are excellent vote winners."

Hacker, perhaps like Hunt, feels good about himself. Some ideas do that. In certain fashionable circles, successful businessmen, such as Mark Carnegie, who have made their money, - magnanimously advocate increased taxes on people trying to get as rich as them. Like slugging the rich (which hasn't worked so well in France), pushing for quotas has become a badge of so-called progressive honour. "So-called" because these ideas don't lead to progress. They may deliver a short-term fix. Too bad about the longer-term results.

Speaking of results, The Australian Financial Review reported last Thursday that Norway was the first country to introduce a quota for female directors. While the number of women on boards quickly met the legislated 40 per cent target, the number of women in executive jobs hardly moved beyond 10 per cent - about the proportion of female executives in ASX 200 companies. And Australia is, as yet, quota free.

In other words, the Norwegian quota idea provides a quick, easy non-solution. It is symbolic, not systemic, change.

Scene two: An excited Hacker tells Sir Humphrey about his plan for a quota for women in top civil service posts. "And I shall start by appointing Sarah Harrison as deputy secretary," he says, smiling at his own brilliance. At a meeting of permanent private secretaries, Humphrey floats his minister's quota idea. The head of the foreign service signals his complete support. And then says: "Of course, it wouldn't work in the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, for obvious reasons." The head of Home Office agrees absolutely. But adds: "Of course we will have to make an exception of the Home Office. Women are not the right people to run prisons or police." Indeed, everyone offers extravagant support for the principle. No one agrees it will work in their department.

Curiously, it seems to be a similar story at Hunt's investment bank. Rather than lead by example, the chairman of Greenhill & Co in Australia cannot point to a single woman among the five managing directors in his firm.

Perhaps Hunt wants to follow those progressives in Greenhill's New York head office? Alas, no. No woman sits on the six-member board there, or fills any of the 10 senior management jobs, or even any of the 28 managing director positions. There are no female managing directors in Greenhill's Chicago, Houston, San Francisco, London, Stockholm or Tokyo offices either. A search of its website shows there is one female managing director in Greenhill's Los Angeles office. Out of 68 managing directors across Greenhill's offices, 67 are men.

The AFR reported Hunt as saying it was difficult to find women with the 12 years of investment banking experience needed to become a managing director. Yes, Minister, as Sir Humphrey might say. Walking the walk on promoting women is another matter entirely.

Final scene: A defeated Hacker feels good that he can at least promote Sarah Harrison to a higher position within his own department. When Sarah declines, Hacker is dumbfounded. He fought a battle for her, he says. Says Sarah: "I didn't ask you to fight a battle for me. I'm not pleased at being part of a 25 per cent quota. Women are not inferior beings, and I don't enjoy being patronised. I'm afraid you're just as paternalist and chauvinist as the rest of them. I'm going somewhere where I shall be accepted on my own merits, as an equal, as a person."

Hacker 0; women 1. That ought to be the scorecard for every self-respecting woman who recognises quotas for what they are: - wrong both philosophically and at a practical level. For all the good intentions, using social engineering to even up the gender scales demeans women as second-rate workers who need a leg up to succeed. It suggests gender will matter more than merit in a certain percentage of appointments (perhaps 25, maybe 40, why not 50 per cent?), depending on the quota.

Social engineering rarely works because social engineers assume they know better what other people want. And they rarely do. How can they? When it comes to quotas, social engineers assume most women want the top jobs. Yet many women consciously choose to leave work for the exhausting, chaotic, frustrating, elating, magical job of rearing children. Indeed, research by prominent British sociologist Catherine Hakim reveals that for every woman who regards work as the centrepiece of their lives, there are three men.

Men and women are not competing in equal numbers. We will reach a more sensible starting point for an intelligent conversation about women in the workplace only when women's preferences are part of the discussion.

Ergo, when the latest report or comment from anti-discrimination tsars and the equality police laments the paucity of women in top jobs, there is a credibility problem if women's preferences are not mentioned. The same goes when a businessman says that women need quotas to reach the boardroom without mentioning women's preferences for jobs that don't always lead in that direction.

Hunt's proposal repeats the fundamental flaw inherent in many so-called progressive prescriptions: - feeling good is not the same as doing good.