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#BTColumn – Saluting women on boards

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Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by this author are their own and do not represent the official position of the Barbados Today. 

by Donna Every

As we approach International Women’s Day on March 8, with the theme of Choose to Challenge, IWF will be celebrating those women who have chosen to challenge the status quo, whether in their careers or in other aspects of their lives.

One of the issues that the chapter has chosen to challenge for the month of March, and beyond, is that of Women on Boards, which is the subject of one of the IWF’s focus groups. That group was convened with the aim of understanding where Barbados stood on the Gender Diversity Index (GDI) and assist with building bridges for women toward senior executive positions, including directorships and chairmanships.

Bloomberg’s 2021 Gender Equality Index reported that women accounted for 29 per cent of boards of public companies across the globe.

The Morgan Stanley Capital International All Country World Index, one of the most recognized sources of Gender Diversity statistics, reported that less than 20 per cent of board seats in 2020 were held by women globally.

Deloitte’s report “Women in the boardroom – A global perspective (Sixth Edition)” showed that in 2018 only 16.9 per cent of women sat on boards globally and only 5 per cent were chaired by women.

Thankfully, we in Barbados seem to be trending in the right direction, based on the results of a recent survey done
by the Barbados chapter of the IWF.

However regardless of the index you choose, the dismal statistics make the work of the Women on Boards group of utmost importance.

Considering these global statistics, it is even more fitting to celebrate the achievement of one of our IWF Sisters, Roseanne Myers, who was recently appointed as Chairman of the Board of the Barbados Tourism and Marketing Inc. Congratulations to her on this achievement!

Roseanne Myers is no stranger to the Tourism sector. In 1986 she joined the start-up team of Atlantis Submarines as Marketing manager. She moved through the ranks to General Manager in 1994 and still holds that position today.

She has served as director on the boards of several major public and private sector tourism institutions, including the Barbados Hotel and Tourism Association (BHTA), Barbados Port Inc. (BPI), the Tourism Development Corporation (TDC), the Barbados Tourism Authority (BTA), and was the Chair of the BTA’s National Tourism Marketing Committee for several years.

In June 2016 she was elected as the Chairman of the BHTA and was the first direct tourism services member and therefore non-hotelier to head the organisation’s board. In that role she sat as their representative on the BTMI board.

Roseanne says that she has had positive experiences as a woman on a board. This is perhaps due to her style which, in her words is “direct”.

In addition, being heard and putting difficult positions forward and supporting them is a skill she has worked on over the years that has served her well.

Her Bio is very impressive and speaks of her great leadership skills. However, there are many women in Barbados (and across the globe) who have the ability to serve on boards and bring their knowledge and experience to impact the companies which they serve, yet the figures show that, as in STEM, women are very under-represented
on boards.

Roseanne regrets that although she has encouraged several women with appropriate skills to leadership positions, she has seen resistance from many of them.

She believes that circumstances and personal choices have steered away a few, who she believes have potential, for very senior positions.

This is particularly true in the case of women with young children, who have a strong potential for leadership but are hindered by family responsibilities.

Roseanne said: “My advice to younger professional women who are trying to advance their career and take care of their family, is to create support systems to ease the pressure and curb the need to ‘do it all’.

Putting aside funds for someone to assist with household chores like laundry and cooking, even if only once per week, is not a luxury but sometimes a necessity.

Recognise that your spouse has you to take on family duties so he can pursue career goals. Who do you as a wife and mother have? A paid resource may bring a return on investment in more than one way. Do not ask, ‘Can I afford to?’ but rather ‘Can I afford not to?’. It buys more family time as well as career time.”

These are some of the issues that the Women on Boards group will be discussing once the results of the “Evaluation of Board Diversity in Barbados” report, that the group commissioned, is publicized next month and we see how Barbados’ GDI stacks up against the global GDI and those of some of the more developed countries.

We hope that it will generate meaningful discussion and be the impetus for change in our country.

And finally, at this time where our tourism product is under severe pressure, I asked Roseanne for her thoughts
on the way forward for her company Atlantis Submarines.

She shared: “As a private sector tourism business, we need to keep reading the market to see how our audience may have changed, and to adapt to it.

We need to find financial lifelines until business returns and we have to balance the needs of the business and the needs of the employees. At senior management level we need to feed off each other and seek help in this recovery wherever we can find it.”

We are confident that with Roseanne, a strong woman, at the helm of our tourism marketing organisation, the Barbados tourism product will be able to adapt and innovative ideas will be created to restore our market share.

Donna Every is an author, trainer and international speaker. She is also a member of the board of the Barbados Chapter of the International Women’s Forum. Contact her at donna@donnaevery.com

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