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WOMEN IN THE APS

The representation of women in the APS has increased steadily over the past decade. At 30 June 2004, women represented 53.1% of all ongoing employees in the APS, a slight increase on the previous year.

Women represented 57.7% of engagements in 2003—04, compared to 52.9% of separations, suggesting the trend to increasing representation of women in the APS workforce is likely to continue a little further.

The proportional representation of men and women varies from agency to agency. Of agencies with more than 1000 ongoing employees, the Protective Service had the highest proportion of men (86.2%), followed by BOM (81.5%), while Health had the highest proportion of women (72.7%) followed by FaCS (70.7%) (see Figure 8.1).

Figure 8.1: Representation of women and men in agencies with more than 1000 ongoing employees, 2004

Source: APSED

As Table 8.3 makes clear, women continue to be under-represented at more senior classification levels, although there have been significant gains over time.

Table 8.3: Ongoing staff: Proportion of women across classification levels

Source: APSED

Women represented 39.3% of ELs at June 2004 (up from 37.9% in 2003). As Figure 8.2 shows, while women made up only 42.0% of engagements to EL classifications, they represented 48.4% of promotions. In addition, women made up only 34.7% of separations, so further increases in this group can be expected.

Figure 8.2: Ongoing staff: Engagement and promotion rates for women, 2003—04

Source: APSED

At June 2004, women represented 31.6% of the SES (up from 30.1% in 2003). Given that 31.9% of engagements and 41.9% of promotions to, and within, the SES were women, compared to 24.8% of separations, this increase in representation can be expected to continue. SES representation rates for women compare well with those in Tasmanian (25%) and Queensland (20%) State governments, but are still somewhat lower than the Victorian and New Zealand governments (35% and 36% respectively).

Table 8.4: Representation of women in selected classifications by age group, June 2004

Source: APSED

Table 8.4 shows that women’s representation at both EL and SES classification groups is higher for younger age groups, adding further to the evidence that the representation of women at these levels will continue to increase over time. Almost half of ELs aged under 40 (49.7%) and 41.6% of those aged 40—44 are women, compared with 28.8% of those aged 50 and over. For the SES, the picture is slightly different with women accounting for 36.7% of those aged under 40 and 40.7% of those aged 40—44, suggesting that women are less likely to be entering the SES under 40 than men, however, both figures are considerably higher than the 24.2% of the SES aged 50 and over who are women, and the current overall representation rate of 31.6%.

Large agencies with the highest representation of women at SES levels are DEST (55.4%) and Health (52.5%). The large agencies with the lowest representation of women at SES levels are BOM (13.3%) and Defence (20.9%).

In all, the positive trend towards increased representation of women at higher levels of the APS is continuing steadily, with no sign of stalling. There is still considerable room for improvement in the representation of women amongst agency heads (16.3% at 30 June 2004, prior to the appointment of four new women to departmental

Secretary positions on 22 October 2004). The variation across agencies suggests quite a few agencies could be more pro-active in encouraging women to apply for more senior positions.

AGENCY SUPPORT FOR THE EMPLOYMENT OF WOMEN

The employee survey asked respondents for their level of agreement with the following statement: ‘my agency actively supports the employment, development and promotion of women’. The majority of employees, 81%, agreed with this statement, and only five per cent disagreed. One large agency had a particularly low level of agreement of 56%. The level of agreement for all other large agencies varied from 73% to 87%.

Employees were asked about their agreement with similar statements for each of the other EEO groups. Employees were most likely to have agreed that their agency supported the employment, development and promotion of women and people from all cultural backgrounds.

This State of the Service employee survey figure is consistent with positive results in the Victorian public sector from the Victorian Government's People Matter Survey 2003 in relation to employees' perception of gender issues. While not directly comparable, the Victorian Government found a high rate of agreement (85%) that ‘gender is not a barrier to success in my workgroup’ among responding employees.³

The majority of women responding to the State of the Service employee survey (76%) agreed that their agency actively supports the employment, development and promotion of women. However, women were less likely to have agreed than men (76% compared to 86%) and more likely to have disagreed (7% compared to 2% for men). The highest level of disparity between men and women in large agencies was 29 percentage points. Some employees made comments about their agency’s support for women. For example:

[My] agency has a significant number of women in senior positions, so clearly there is a culture of support for promotion of women. For example in my Division, Division Head and 3 of the 6 Branches are women. Two of last three DHs have been women.

While my agency actively supports the employment etc of all sorts of people, the nature of the work may make it difficult for some people to be promoted to their full potential. For example, long hours may mean that women with young children or people from cultures that place a higher value on spending time with families may not be promoted as quickly or readily as their peers.

I believe the agency is somewhat backward in its approach to EEO regarding women …. This may be in part because it is a male-dominated workplace and merit decisions may be unintentionally biased even though EEO groups are regularly represented on selection panels.

The department has a good and well-promoted workplace diversity policy. However, the decisions about individual employment, promotion and development opportunities are made at individual not departmental level, and hence there is always the risk of the ‘cloning' effect. The profile of the department indicates that white Anglo men are getting more of the promotion opportunities than women or NESB people. Work-life balance issues wipe many women out of seeking or succeeding in promotions.

JOB SATISFACTION–WOMEN

The employee survey asked respondents to choose the five workplace factors (out of a list of 16) that impacted most on how satisfied they were with their job. Respondents were then asked to indicate their level of satisfaction with their top five factors using a five point scale (from ‘very satisfied’ to ‘very dissatisfied’).

A summary index was created from the results of the job satisfaction question in the employee survey. The index ranges from zero (respondent was very dissatisfied with all of the factors nominated) to 10 (respondent was very satisfied with all factors). An index of five translates to a respondent being, on average, neither satisfied nor dissatisfied with his/her nominated factors.

The APS-wide results on job satisfaction are discussed in Chapter 5. Results on job satisfaction in this chapter are limited to discussion of results in relation to EEO and age groups.⁴

Women reported slightly higher levels of overall job satisfaction than men; 75% were, on average, satisfied with the factors they nominated as important, compared to 72% of men. Table 8.5 shows the most important job satisfaction factors for women and men. Whereas in 2003 these factors were similar for men and women, with four out of five common to both, this year there are only two factors in common: ‘good working relationships’ and ‘flexible working arrangements’. This can be explained in part by the inclusion of ‘good manager’ as an additional workplace job satisfaction factor this year, which was chosen among the most important factors for women, but not for men.

The two factors that are common to women and men are also the job satisfaction factors most likely to be common to all EEO and other groups examined in this chapter. ‘Good working relationships’ was among the most important factors for every group, and ‘flexible working arrangements’ was common to all groups except people with a disability and people under 25 years.

Women were also more likely to place more importance than men on ‘regular feedback/recognition for effort’ and ‘opportunities to develop my skills’. By contrast, men were more likely to have chosen ‘salary’ and ‘opportunities to utilise my skills’ among the factors most important to them.

Table 8.5: Most important job satisfaction factors, by sex

Source: Employee survey

Note: The results in this table relate to factors chosen and rated by respondents. Data for factors chosen by respondents who did not go on to rate their satisfaction with those factors is not included.

Table 8.5 also shows the proportion of each group satisfied with the factors they had identified as important. The majority of women were satisfied with each job satisfaction factor they identified as most important, and the majority of men were satisfied with four of their most important job satisfaction factors.

In response to another question on people management, women were as likely as men to think their supervisor was highly effective at managing people (both 53%). This reflects an overall improvement in 2004 in employee perceptions of their immediate supervisor’s effectiveness at managing people, and closes the gap between the perceptions of women and men that was suggested by last year’s employee survey results (49% compared to 44%).

3 See <www.ope.vic.gov.au>. Caution should be exercised in comparing the results because of the differences in wording of the questions, and differences in methodologies between the two surveys.

4 It is important to note that discussion on job satisfaction in this chapter is based on analysis of results for, at times, small populations and is indicative only. The five most important factors chosen and rated by respondents have been highlighted as a useful point of comparison, including across the four EEO groups (i.e. women, Indigenous Australians, people with a disability and people from NESB), but the relative rankings of the factors has not been reported.