Gender Gap
Ketra Armstrong, professor of Sport Management, is part of a first-of-its-kind Michigan Task Force on Women in Sports to help address the issues surrounding the opportunities and experiences for girls and women in sport throughout the state of Michigan. Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer commissioned the task force after recognizing there are women in high-ranking leadership positions within Michigan’s government but not in other areas of leadership, including sports.
Given Armstrong’s experience in sport leadership, she launched a research initiative on behalf of the task force to obtain some additional insight. Her research culminated in the report, “Women in Sport Leadership: Perils, Possibilities, and Pathways,” detailing the various factors and perspectives influencing women’s opportunities and experiences in sport leadership in Michigan.
“I wanted to understand the myriad of factors women face in their sport leadership aspirations, with a particular focus on the organizational culture. When you see trends and patterns of women’s historic and systemic under-representation, the filtering of women into certain positions, women’s exclusion from certain positions, that tells me that perhaps it’s not merely an individual thing, but one that is much broader and embedded in the system,” Armstrong said. “So, I wanted to frame this research in a way to address some of the micro-level individual factors and attributes that influence womens’ sport leadership opportunities, while also examining the macro-level organizational culture. Change has to take place at the organizational level. That is how we get real and sustainable change.”
Armstrong said that in addition to scouring secondary data and having conversations with various women who are employed in sport, she developed a survey that was sent to self-identified sport leaders throughout the state: coaches, athletic administrators, sports marketing and media professionals, officials, and individuals from various sectors of sport. Of the 566 sport leaders who participated in this research, 55% were women and 48% of them worked at the National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA) level (compared to 65% of the men in the study who were also employed at the NCAA level).
The items in Armstrong’s survey included demographic and background information (such as age, education, length of time in sports, the nature of their job responsibility, the setting in which they worked, etc.); well-being at work; overall career satisfaction; gender equity; organizational culture; a host of factors influencing their career advancement; and suggestions for improvement. One issue that permeated the results is the presence of gender bias (gendered stereotypes and gendered norms) and gender inequity.
“In various parts of the survey, the women’s responses conveyed how they are treated differently – in their pay, the opportunities they receive, their job expectations, how they are valued and evaluated as leaders, and their opportunities for advancement,” Armstrong said.
Her survey results showed that child care is also a big issue for women.
“Many women felt like they had to compromise being a mother or being a leader, being a wife or being a leader. Some of them chose to be all of that – to have children and a family, to be a spouse, to have a partner,” Armstrong said. “Other women didn’t make the same choice. They remained child-free or unmarried, feeling those were choices their career success required. These are unfair choices for someone to have to make… their personal life and livelihood or their professional career.” Twice as many of the women compared to the men were unmarried, and twice as many of the women compared to the men did not have children.
According to Armstrong, another poignant finding is that men and women perceive many of the barriers impeding women’s sport leadership differently. While the women affirmed the existence of an organizational culture that celebrates traits of masculinity, the men didn’t think it exists to the same extent. On the issue of gender inequality, more of the men perceive their workplaces as being equitable, while more of the women believe that gender discrimination exists, notably in the pay, job expectations, and treatment of women.
“Sometimes when you’re in a culture and it’s your ‘normal’ way of operating, there are things you’re often not mindful of. So we need to help men realize the subtle and profound ways in which organizational cultures are masculinized, how they perpetuate and celebrate masculinity, and how they marginalize any traits and attributes that don’t fit the traditional masculine ideology associated with sport leadership,” Armstrong said.
“It’s mostly men in the decision-making positions in sport, so they must understand how their practices and policies may sustain the inequalities that impact women. The first step in changing a situation is to acknowledge that it exists,” she said.
Armstrong said that another important aspect to understanding gender is that it’s experienced differently based on intersections with other personal characteristics or identities. Her research shows that women further experience discrepant treatment based on their age, sexual orientation, gender identity, race/ethnicity, and whether they have a disability. “Until we change the culture and recognize how pervasive gender ideology permeates sport environments, women won’t get the experiences that they so richly deserve,” she said.
She also indicated that this gendering of sport leadership isn’t just a state of Michigan issue; her research shows this is a nationwide concern.
Armstrong was encouraged by some of the comments from male responders that indicated they are mindful of the inequalities and are allies of women. Even with the challenges, many of the women completing the survey still enjoy their work in sport and feel like they are thriving.
Some of the recommendations offered by the leaders who participated in Armstrong’s study included: implementing a statewide marketing campaign that celebrates girls/women in sport throughout Michigan; creating, producing, and disseminating a Michigan “Best Practices for Gender Equity in Sports”; offering state-supported training, seminars, and speaker series on topics related to sport leadership that include gender equity, diversity and inclusion, and unconscious bias training; pay equity; better child care and paid leave policies; mentoring programs for girls and women interested in sport; and requiring organizations to provide a gender equity report every three years.
“The whole reason for this undertaking was to promote change, so our task force is hoping to be able to recommend to the governor some policies and practices that should be implemented that can make a difference in improving the opportunities and experience for women in sport leadership and for girls and women in every domain of sport,” Armstrong said.