2015 (LDE)

Laying the foundation for diversity initiatives within the LDE collaboration

The goal of the LDE Diversity Symposium on the 14th of April, organised by the Leiden, Delft and Erasmus female academics networks, was to lay the foundation for diversity initiatives within the LDE collaboration. During the symposium, leaders from TUD, Leiden University and the Medical Delta shared their thoughts on the importance of promoting diversity, and an expert panel discussed strategies to effectively promote diversity within the LDE collaboration.

  

Programme

Prof. dr. Pols, rector magnificus of Erasmus University Rotterdam, opened the symposium by sharing his personal experience when he was a Department chair with talented young female doctors who all became a mother and all eventually left Erasmus MC. He was unaware of the fact that he was biased, because he expected talented people to knock on his door to ask or discuss a promotion. The men did but the women did not. Prof. dr. Pols explained that therefore this is a topic which concerns all of us.

Drs. Anka Mulder (Vice-President for Education & Operations Delft Technological University) stressed that we need to accelerate change when it comes to diversity, because it is important for innovation and a sustainable organization. She shared with the audience that in research diversity is also on the agenda. Horizon 2020 for example has now three goals: fostering gender balance in research teams, ensuring gender balance in decision making and integrating gender analysis in research and innovation. Drs. Mulder ends her speech with saying: Changing a university is like moving a graveyard – you don’t get much help from the people within. So, some external help from for example Horizon 2020 will be very handy.

The second speaker, Prof. dr. Simone Buitendijk (vice-rector magnificus Leiden University) started her speech with the statement that she herself is biased, and therefore undervalues some talent. She told us about the implicit bias everyone has. When men hire people, they mostly like to choose someone who looks like them. Women on the other hand choose more easily a men as a leader when they hire. So we all have an implicit bias, which is also found in the Jennifer and John study. This study shows that when people were asked to review these job applications, which were identical in every way except for names, both men and women preferred the male candidate. When asked how we can change implicit bias within our organizations, Simone Buitendijk stressed the importance of changing the organizational culture by raising awareness of gender bias, also focusing on men (“Men have gender too”), and implementing proven effective measures to do so, for example through diversity training for decision makers. She finished by stating: “We need hard targets instead of quota”.

The last guest speaker, Medical Delta Director Menno Kok, explained why diversity is important for Medical Delta, where technology meets medicine. He admits that this is a goal which is not easily reached. History also plays a role in this case, because the group of researchers in the field of medical technology traditionally consists of more men than women. The Medical Delta is actively pursuing gender diversity in its organization, as Menno Kok underlines: “Differences between Leiden, Delft and Erasmus are the catalyst of Medical Delta. We should ask ourselves how we can benefit from these differences”.

Panel discussion

The symposium ended with a panel discussion in which prof. Dianne Bevelander (Professor of Management Education with a focus on Women in Management) and Pauline van der Meer Mohr (President of the Executive Board of Erasmus University Rotterdam) also contributed. The panel admitted that changing to diversity takes a long time, and progress is slow. Therefor we should not leave it up to chance, try to change the attitude toward “The value of diversity instead of the problem of diversity” and move the dominant majority (male chairs of departments, research leaders) toward action through collective responsibility. Critical mass is needed and we need to change the way we value talent in research, education and valorization.

Most important, we should involve everyone in order to change to diversity. The audience consisted of lot of women, so an important question is: how can we actively involve the men?

Last remarks and quotes

Based on the different presentations and the panel discussion, some last remarks and quotes are written down here as food for thought:

  • Targets for attracting talented women: ‘‘More talented women will apply for a position knowing that certain targets for women will be used’’.
  • Education (cases, books and articles) is male-oriented, because it is written or developed by men. This gives a wrong signal to students.
  • Men should more often actively be involved in activities and events regarding diversity.
  • The attitude regarding diversity should change: it should be a common goal instead of seeing it as a problem.
  • Next to individual contributions from organisations, it is also a society issue in which the politicians can and should play an important role.
  • We should continue to emphasize that we all have an implicit bias. When we acknowledge and recognize this, we can take action. 
  • Try not to focus on special programs for women, but try to change existing processes in organisations. 

Deel deze pagina: