Women are increasingly staking their place in the built environment with the federal government on Thursday announcing it would not award contracts to big businesses that don’t have gender equity targets, which will inevitably include construction contracts, along with a slew of organisations pitched at women in specialist sub groups. The biggest is construction.
In a recent quick look, we found these groups set to appear at the Sydney Build 2024 exhibition in May: Infrastructure NSW, Women in Construction, NAWIC (National Association of Women in Construction), Women in BIM (building information management), Awesome Women in Construction, Empowered Women in Trades, Trades Women Australia.
Now there’s a new group
Tomorrow’s Women in Construction hopes to educate and inspire girls to seek careers in construction through its new industry-driven platform.
The group’s website profiles more than 100 women who work across a range of roles in construction and present the information in different digital forms such as video content, graphics, and social media such as TikTok and Instagram.
A network of millennial women formed the organisation out of frustration around the lack of initiative across the construction industry in addressing the stalling number of women in construction, which sits at 12 per cent.
Co-founder (with Katharina Kister) and structural engineer Isabel Duffy said, “The construction industry has become an amazing place to work, but nobody’s talking about it. We built TWIC to show the next generation what their career options are and how fulfilling it can be.
“Each profile outlines further study undertaken by that woman, with links to relevant TAFE and University faculties, as well as information about site/office/remote working.”
Women architects’ prospects improving, but not in pay or power
At the other end of town women’s architecture group Parlour found in a survey released late last year that showed an increasing proportion of the rapidly growing architectural workforce. Other findings included:
- graduation rates have doubled since 2000, but less than half the graduates enter the Australian architectural workforce
- registration numbers for women have increased significantly
- the architectural workforce skews young, but the average age of women is increasing
- retention rates are equivalent for women and men over 40 years old
- increasing proportions of the workforce are employees
- women are a growing proportion of owners of architectural businesses
- women are significantly under-represented as owners of larger businesses
- gender pay gaps persist
- long hours persist, but have reduced over the last two decades
- patterns of part-time work are strongly gendered
- caring for dependent children has a significant and gendered impact
- the number of Indigenous practitioners has doubled, but overall numbers remain low
- the architectural workforce is culturally diverse
- cultural and gender pay gaps reveal significant inequity
In the broader workforce
The Workplace Gender Equality Agency recently released its first “employer gender pay gap” report since the federal government passed reforms that legally require private sector employers to publish their gender pay gap.
By law, almost 5000 Australian private sector employers were required to reveal their gendered pay at the end of February.
Minister for Women Katy Gallagher said, “The gender pay gap is a persistent and complex problem that costs the Australian economy $51.8 billion every year.”
On Thursday she revealed that the government would use its purchasing power to not award contracts to big businesses that do not have targets to address gender inequality, “which must include elements such as the number of women on companies’ boards, equal pay, flexible working arrangements and clear plans for how to prevent, rather than just respond to, sexual harassment.”
“Every year, the government spends $70b to procure goods and services and we think there’s more that can be done to make sure women are getting a fairer slice of that spending,” Gallagher said in her National Press Club address.
WGEA published its findings on base salary, total remuneration median and gender pay gaps for private sector employers with 100 or more employees.
Key statistics include:
- only 30 per cent of employers meet the target median gender pay gap between negative 5 per cent and positive 5 per cent
- 62 per cent of the median employer gender pay gap is over 5 per cent in favour of men
- The rest (8 per cent) are less than -5 per cent in favour of women
- across all employers, 50 per cent have a gender pay gap of over 9.1 per cent
- 26 per cent of boards do not have women members
And COVID helped
According to a new study by the International Workplace Group, women are increasingly moving to control working conditions.
IWG revealed that hybrid working practices introduced by COVID lockdowns have helped 89 per cent of female survey respondents facilitate a healthy work life balance.
Additionally, 38 per cent of women say they now have time to pursue a personal passion outside of work in the time saved from long commutes.
As a result, the study concludes that women are now making significant career decisions, such as changing jobs and switching to industries that can offer better work arrangements and work-life balance. In fact, 44 per cent were thinking about a career change inspired by the introduction of hybrid working.