British business is losing millions of highly qualified female workers after they start a family, according to a new report in the Economic Journal - and the media industry is no exception. The Institute of Practioners in Advertising's latest census shows that 57% of under 25-year-olds working in media agencies are female, but this percentage plummets to 46% in the 31 to 40-year-old category. From then onwards, men rapidly dominate the workplace, accounting for 64% of over 50-year-olds, and 83% of chairman/managing director/chief executive positions. Women, in contrast, tend to dominate in secretarial and HR roles.
Furthermore, some believe the media industry still has a male-oriented culture of drinking, golf and long lunches, which deters many women. Abba Newbery, managing partner in charge of communications planning at Universal McCann, says Media 360 is a perfect example of sexism in action. "If you're a young woman reading the programme, and see that only two of the 26 speakers are female, what sort of impression does that give you? And the fact that the event is held at a golf venue makes it intrinsically sexist."
Mark Palmer, who used to work at OMD but is now an independent media consultant, agrees that the industry is sexist, and predicts that, because of holding companies' focus on profits, this is unlikely to change. In his opinion, the reason women are not getting to the top is primarily because their inherent skills are undervalued.
"The rules to get on in this industry relate to the more male buying skills and suit aggressive stereotypes," he says. "You basically get on by being pushy, not by skill, and there's a fair amount of machismo in the culture. Women who make it compromise in some way."
He adds: "The only senior role that females tend to occupy is head of planning. And why is that? Because it's evaluated on skill and ability and women are often very good lateral, open thinkers. But it's significant that very few of them end up running the company."
Retaining talent
Although Nick Lawson, group chief executive of MediaCom, has "tried to put systems in place to encourage women to come back to work after having a family", media owners are generally ahead of their agency counterparts in terms of retaining female talent.
Tim Brooks, managing director, Guardian News & Media, has witnessed the value of keeping top female talent first hand. His current boss is Guardian Media Group's chief executive Carolyn McCall, who has three children under the age of six, and his previous two bosses were chief executive of Trinity Mirror Sly Bailey and chief executive of IPC Media Sylvia Auton.
The Guardian has worked hard to accommodate working mothers' needs; the challenge now is to break down social barriers still further, so that men also feel comfortable discussing how to balance their lives. Brooks says: "One of my male board members has a young child and we have agreed a flexible work plan, so he can spend a day a week with his kid."
Family friendly policies are even more commonplace in magazine publishing. Caroline McDevitt, managing director, IPC Advertising, says: "I'm in the camp that says women have never had it so good, as I believe women are holding all the aces.
"My experience in my three years at IPC Media is that [sexism] is a non-issue. Let no one suggest women have to behave like men to succeed these days - they simply have to be confident professionals."
Sally Cartwright, director-at-large of Hello! magazine, agrees there is "virtually no sexism in operation", having never encountered it in her career. "My experience is quite the opposite," she says. "At the point I wanted to move into the publishing side of magazines, I was at IPC, which had just realised that it ought to promote more women into its mainstream publisher roles. I am sure I benefited from the timing."
But although the media industry is changing for the better, there is still work to be done.
"Opportunities for women are still not equal," says Suzanne Hodgins, Kinetic's planning director. "We have to be visibly better at our jobs and make sure that people know about it. Sadly, there is still a view that beyond group account director level or equivalent, women are a risk. Why promote a woman when she will probably leave to have a family?"
Hodgins adds: "I was once told that I couldn't have a career in media and have children - thus I effectively created my own glass ceiling. While I would concede that women can't have it all, the life choices and the compromises we make should be of our own volition."
20+ Emma Wilson
Partner with responsibility for media strategy
Harvest Digital
Emma Wilson, 29, founded digital media agency Harvest with two male partners six years ago. She was previously a marketing consultant with Hyperlink Marketing, where she developed the online marketing strategy for clients including Post Office Counters, Royal Bank of Scotland Commercial Services and Black & Decker.
Wilson believes that, while the traditional media sector has been male-oriented, the digital marketing generation is not hampered by the same gender bias. "Digital media feels like a nicer industry, and it is certainly not as aggressive or macho as TV or press buying," she says. "This is because digital is not about buying a commodity, it is about optimising a campaign continually, once it's gone live, which many women are very good at."
Nevertheless, she concedes there is still a laddish culture, which makes the industry difficult for parents with family commitments. She says: "The long hours and drinking culture is an issue. I took two clients to Rome last weekend, for example, and they wanted to drink until all hours. If you don't get involved, you won't get on. It's a lifestyle choice."
Wilson's choice is to dedicate herself to her career for around the next five years, before thinking about having a family. In her opinion, she could not do her job successfully if she had children to look after.
"If I had children, my work would definitely suffer because I couldn't put the hours in," she says. "At the moment, I do three events a week, and you couldn't do that with kids. I know some women do juggle, but I don't think that's for me, because you're not giving the best of yourself to either your career or your children."
30+ Abba Newbery
Managing partner in charge of communications planning
Universal McCann
"The world is sexist," says Newbery. "Women are universally paid less than men and encounter the famous glass ceiling. And the media industry is no different."
Newbery, 34, has scaled the media career ladder fast, her previous position being communications planning director at Carat.
However, she sees her career challenges as more straightforward than most women's, because she is gay and so doesn't have to deal with the children dilemma. "I'm not going to take the ‘normal' marriage and children route, so things are potentially easier for me, because I can operate like a guy without having to balance childcare," she says.
Nevertheless, Newbery sympathises with female colleagues who do face these challenges, believing it's "incredibly difficult to hold on to a job in an industry such as ours that starts early and ends late".
From what she can tell, many women juggling family and career end up feeling guilty, not only about not being good enough at their job, but also about failing as a mother. Newbery feels that women in media should be supported more, so that the industry can avoid a talent drain. "Culturally, I can't imagine a crèche on a media agency site, but we should be providing these," she says.
One problem, Newbery believes, is that media agencies are so intent in outbidding each other on cost that the staff end up having to bear the brunt, working longer hours to complete client work and pitches.
She emphasises that she's talking generally, rather than specifically about her employer, which has a good track record of promoting women to senior positions.
"We're expected to sign waivers in our industry saying we're not going to commit to EU guidelines on hours, and it's common practice to work at weekends or travel at the drop of a hat," she says. "And there's still a huge ‘let's go out and get drunk at the rugby or races' culture.
"The industry is a long way from where it needs to be. However, I can't think of any industry that has cracked it yet."
40+ Elizabeth Kershaw
Executive group publishing director
NatMags
Elizabeth Kershaw, executive group publishing director at NatMags, has worked in magazines throughout her career. Does she believe the magazine sector is sexist or a man's world? "Not at all," she says. "The magazine sector is probably the fairest equal opportunity employer for both males and females."
She argues that NatMags has led the way in giving females equal opportunities: the company was ahead of its time when it appointed Alice Head as its first managing director in 1924.
Females currently outnumber males on the NatMags board, and all publishing directors, bar one, are female. But the preponderance of women in senior positions is certainly not down to luck. "Over the decades, women in senior positions have worked really hard to make fundamental changes that then carry through into the way we work," Kershaw says.
Unlike many other sectors of media, employees feel comfortable asking if meetings can be slightly shifted, or if they can leave early because of a non-work commitment, typically family related. Kershaw believes that by empathising with her employees and trusting them, she ultimately gets more of out them.
This is certainly true in her case. "I'm a single parent with a six-year-old and it's vital for me to have that flexibility. It doesn't mean I abuse it, though. In fact, I put an extra 25% into my work because I have that trust," she says.
Kershaw adds that NatMags also realises the importance of supporting women on maternity leave and making their transition back into the workplace as smooth as possible. "The magazine industry is much more nurturing of its staff than other areas of media. We're not disposable about our talent," she says. "We know that good magazines come from having talented people."
50+ Stevie Spring
Chief executive
Future Publishing
Spring is undoubtedly one of the most successful women in media. Before taking the top role at Future, she was chief executive of Clear Channel, and before that, she was managing director of Young & Rubicam.
She recalls that when she took up her first managing director role, she had high hopes of introducing "enlightened maternity policies" and a family-friendly approach
to talent.
Although Spring is committed to this approach, she is realistic that implementing this vision in practical terms can be very hard in a media environment, particularly when you are providing a direct service to clients, and the business is increasingly global.
"The biggest issue for women is juggling a career and a family, and the issue becomes even more complicated by the fact that there is a very sharp, competitive pyramid hierarchy during the child-bearing years," she says. "Nevertheless, media companies have more female chief executives than other industries."
As a former agency boss, Spring sympathises with agency heads, as she feels it is undoubtedly harder to manage the situation at agencies than at media owners. "Agencies tend to be smaller businesses with fewer employees, and that makes it difficult to juggle," she says. "It's easier to fill the gaps created by maternity leave in a bigger company."
Spring does not have children herself, but has still encountered sexism during her career in the media industry and believes that the old boys' network is still in force.
"I went to a City dinner the other week," she says. "I walked in and instantly realised I was a decade younger than everybody else there and the only female, apart from a girl who worked in admin." However, Spring does believe the culture is getting less "laddish".
Furthermore, some believe the media industry still has a male-oriented culture of drinking, golf and long lunches, which deters many women. Abba Newbery, managing partner in charge of communications planning at Universal McCann, says Media 360 is a perfect example of sexism in action. "If you're a young woman reading the programme, and see that only two of the 26 speakers are female, what sort of impression does that give you? And the fact that the event is held at a golf venue makes it intrinsically sexist."
Mark Palmer, who used to work at OMD but is now an independent media consultant, agrees that the industry is sexist, and predicts that, because of holding companies' focus on profits, this is unlikely to change. In his opinion, the reason women are not getting to the top is primarily because their inherent skills are undervalued.
"The rules to get on in this industry relate to the more male buying skills and suit aggressive stereotypes," he says. "You basically get on by being pushy, not by skill, and there's a fair amount of machismo in the culture. Women who make it compromise in some way."
He adds: "The only senior role that females tend to occupy is head of planning. And why is that? Because it's evaluated on skill and ability and women are often very good lateral, open thinkers. But it's significant that very few of them end up running the company."
Retaining talent
Although Nick Lawson, group chief executive of MediaCom, has "tried to put systems in place to encourage women to come back to work after having a family", media owners are generally ahead of their agency counterparts in terms of retaining female talent.
Tim Brooks, managing director, Guardian News & Media, has witnessed the value of keeping top female talent first hand. His current boss is Guardian Media Group's chief executive Carolyn McCall, who has three children under the age of six, and his previous two bosses were chief executive of Trinity Mirror Sly Bailey and chief executive of IPC Media Sylvia Auton.
The Guardian has worked hard to accommodate working mothers' needs; the challenge now is to break down social barriers still further, so that men also feel comfortable discussing how to balance their lives. Brooks says: "One of my male board members has a young child and we have agreed a flexible work plan, so he can spend a day a week with his kid."
Family friendly policies are even more commonplace in magazine publishing. Caroline McDevitt, managing director, IPC Advertising, says: "I'm in the camp that says women have never had it so good, as I believe women are holding all the aces.
"My experience in my three years at IPC Media is that [sexism] is a non-issue. Let no one suggest women have to behave like men to succeed these days - they simply have to be confident professionals."
Sally Cartwright, director-at-large of Hello! magazine, agrees there is "virtually no sexism in operation", having never encountered it in her career. "My experience is quite the opposite," she says. "At the point I wanted to move into the publishing side of magazines, I was at IPC, which had just realised that it ought to promote more women into its mainstream publisher roles. I am sure I benefited from the timing."
But although the media industry is changing for the better, there is still work to be done.
"Opportunities for women are still not equal," says Suzanne Hodgins, Kinetic's planning director. "We have to be visibly better at our jobs and make sure that people know about it. Sadly, there is still a view that beyond group account director level or equivalent, women are a risk. Why promote a woman when she will probably leave to have a family?"
Hodgins adds: "I was once told that I couldn't have a career in media and have children - thus I effectively created my own glass ceiling. While I would concede that women can't have it all, the life choices and the compromises we make should be of our own volition."
20+ Emma WilsonPartner with responsibility for media strategy
Harvest Digital
Emma Wilson, 29, founded digital media agency Harvest with two male partners six years ago. She was previously a marketing consultant with Hyperlink Marketing, where she developed the online marketing strategy for clients including Post Office Counters, Royal Bank of Scotland Commercial Services and Black & Decker.
Wilson believes that, while the traditional media sector has been male-oriented, the digital marketing generation is not hampered by the same gender bias. "Digital media feels like a nicer industry, and it is certainly not as aggressive or macho as TV or press buying," she says. "This is because digital is not about buying a commodity, it is about optimising a campaign continually, once it's gone live, which many women are very good at."
Nevertheless, she concedes there is still a laddish culture, which makes the industry difficult for parents with family commitments. She says: "The long hours and drinking culture is an issue. I took two clients to Rome last weekend, for example, and they wanted to drink until all hours. If you don't get involved, you won't get on. It's a lifestyle choice."
Wilson's choice is to dedicate herself to her career for around the next five years, before thinking about having a family. In her opinion, she could not do her job successfully if she had children to look after.
"If I had children, my work would definitely suffer because I couldn't put the hours in," she says. "At the moment, I do three events a week, and you couldn't do that with kids. I know some women do juggle, but I don't think that's for me, because you're not giving the best of yourself to either your career or your children."
30+ Abba NewberyManaging partner in charge of communications planning
Universal McCann
"The world is sexist," says Newbery. "Women are universally paid less than men and encounter the famous glass ceiling. And the media industry is no different."
Newbery, 34, has scaled the media career ladder fast, her previous position being communications planning director at Carat.
However, she sees her career challenges as more straightforward than most women's, because she is gay and so doesn't have to deal with the children dilemma. "I'm not going to take the ‘normal' marriage and children route, so things are potentially easier for me, because I can operate like a guy without having to balance childcare," she says.
Nevertheless, Newbery sympathises with female colleagues who do face these challenges, believing it's "incredibly difficult to hold on to a job in an industry such as ours that starts early and ends late".
From what she can tell, many women juggling family and career end up feeling guilty, not only about not being good enough at their job, but also about failing as a mother. Newbery feels that women in media should be supported more, so that the industry can avoid a talent drain. "Culturally, I can't imagine a crèche on a media agency site, but we should be providing these," she says.
One problem, Newbery believes, is that media agencies are so intent in outbidding each other on cost that the staff end up having to bear the brunt, working longer hours to complete client work and pitches.
She emphasises that she's talking generally, rather than specifically about her employer, which has a good track record of promoting women to senior positions.
"We're expected to sign waivers in our industry saying we're not going to commit to EU guidelines on hours, and it's common practice to work at weekends or travel at the drop of a hat," she says. "And there's still a huge ‘let's go out and get drunk at the rugby or races' culture.
"The industry is a long way from where it needs to be. However, I can't think of any industry that has cracked it yet."
40+ Elizabeth KershawExecutive group publishing director
NatMags
Elizabeth Kershaw, executive group publishing director at NatMags, has worked in magazines throughout her career. Does she believe the magazine sector is sexist or a man's world? "Not at all," she says. "The magazine sector is probably the fairest equal opportunity employer for both males and females."
She argues that NatMags has led the way in giving females equal opportunities: the company was ahead of its time when it appointed Alice Head as its first managing director in 1924.
Females currently outnumber males on the NatMags board, and all publishing directors, bar one, are female. But the preponderance of women in senior positions is certainly not down to luck. "Over the decades, women in senior positions have worked really hard to make fundamental changes that then carry through into the way we work," Kershaw says.
Unlike many other sectors of media, employees feel comfortable asking if meetings can be slightly shifted, or if they can leave early because of a non-work commitment, typically family related. Kershaw believes that by empathising with her employees and trusting them, she ultimately gets more of out them.
This is certainly true in her case. "I'm a single parent with a six-year-old and it's vital for me to have that flexibility. It doesn't mean I abuse it, though. In fact, I put an extra 25% into my work because I have that trust," she says.
Kershaw adds that NatMags also realises the importance of supporting women on maternity leave and making their transition back into the workplace as smooth as possible. "The magazine industry is much more nurturing of its staff than other areas of media. We're not disposable about our talent," she says. "We know that good magazines come from having talented people."
50+ Stevie SpringChief executive
Future Publishing
Spring is undoubtedly one of the most successful women in media. Before taking the top role at Future, she was chief executive of Clear Channel, and before that, she was managing director of Young & Rubicam.
She recalls that when she took up her first managing director role, she had high hopes of introducing "enlightened maternity policies" and a family-friendly approach
to talent.
Although Spring is committed to this approach, she is realistic that implementing this vision in practical terms can be very hard in a media environment, particularly when you are providing a direct service to clients, and the business is increasingly global.
"The biggest issue for women is juggling a career and a family, and the issue becomes even more complicated by the fact that there is a very sharp, competitive pyramid hierarchy during the child-bearing years," she says. "Nevertheless, media companies have more female chief executives than other industries."
As a former agency boss, Spring sympathises with agency heads, as she feels it is undoubtedly harder to manage the situation at agencies than at media owners. "Agencies tend to be smaller businesses with fewer employees, and that makes it difficult to juggle," she says. "It's easier to fill the gaps created by maternity leave in a bigger company."
Spring does not have children herself, but has still encountered sexism during her career in the media industry and believes that the old boys' network is still in force.
"I went to a City dinner the other week," she says. "I walked in and instantly realised I was a decade younger than everybody else there and the only female, apart from a girl who worked in admin." However, Spring does believe the culture is getting less "laddish".