Family Leave Policies

A new study by the Center for Women and Work at Rutgers University reports that working women who have paid family leave are much more likely to be working after the birth of a child and, most often, experience an increase in wage from pre- to post-birth.

The study analyzed information from the US Department of Labor between 1997 and 2009.  Among the findings, the study noted that since the mid-1980s, there has been a 13% increase (now nearly 73%) in the percentage of children with both parents (or the only parent) working outside the home.  And despite a tremendous amount of rhetoric about “family values,” “support for working families,” and “keeping our children secure,” the United States lags far behind other industrialized nations when it comes to policies that support workers needing time off for family time and needs.

Except for only a few states, practice in this country is limited to unpaid leave, despite 1993’s passage of the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), which requires that companies with a least 50 workers provide up to 12 weeks of leave (unpaid and not job-protected) annually “for their own health or the health of a family members.”  This leaves most employees to patch together sick time, vacation time, disability insurance, or unpaid time off to deal with personal or family health problems.  Most low-income workers have not vacation, sick leave, or PTO (Paid Time Off).

The United States in among the 3 countries (out of 178 – the others are Swaziland and Papua New Guinea) that do not mandate maternity paid leave.  And only 11% of private sector employees and 17% of public sector employees have access to paid leave through their employer. 

Specific key findings of the report include:

¬   Women who report taking paid leave are more likely to be working 9 to 12 months after a child’s birth than are those who report taking no leave at all (“non‐leave takers”).

¬   Paid family leave increases wages for women with children.  Women who report leaves of 30 or more days are 54% more likely to report wage increases in the year following the child’s birth than are women who take no leave at all.

¬   Women who return to work after a paid leave have a 39% lower likelihood of receiving public assistance and a 40% lower likelihood of food stamp receipt in the year following the child’s birth, when compared to those who return to work and take no leave at all.

¬   Men who return to work after a paid family leave have a significantly lower likelihood of receiving public assistance and food stamps in the year following the child’s birth when compared to those who return to work and take no family leave at all.

Linda Houser of the Center for Women and Work summarizes the positive economic benefit of paid leave policies:  "While we have known for a long time about the maternal and infant health benefits of leave policies, we can now link paid family leave to greater labor force attachment and increased wages for women, as well as to reduced spending by businesses in the form of employee replacement costs, and by governments in the form of public assistance."

Forbes magazine sums up the economic benefits of paid leave in this way:

1.     Paid family leave addresses a reality that directly impacts every business and should be planned for strategically, uniformly and deliberately,

2.     Paid family leave is NOT a tax, but income replacement insurance program funded by employees at minimal cost, and

3.     We are paying for a cost for caregiving already - indirectly and inefficiently, through employee turnover, retraining, and workplace productivity.

This is the type of information Chrysalis works to provide to policy makers through SOLUTIONS, our annual legislative breakfast.  Our work is to provide factual, objective information that should be taken into account when decisions – state, local, individual – are being made that affect girls, women, and working families.

Thank you for being a leader in this work.

If you’d like to read the full report:  http://www.nationalpartnership.org/site/DocServer/Pay_Matters_-_Positive_Economic_Impacts_of_Paid_Family_L.pdf?docID=9681

Children with High Needs

Recently, the Child and Family Policy Center issued a report documenting the challenges faced by many of Iowa’s children and their families.  The report, "A Baseline on Iowa's Young Children: Capturing the Demand for Early-Childhood Services" notes that Iowa has one of the nation’s highest rates of children with one or both parents working, and an increasing number of single parent families.  These are just 2 of the many factors that contribute to stress within the family and affecting young children.

Although a majority of Iowa children begin school in good health and with appropriate cognitive, language, and social/emotional development – termed “school readiness” – to be prepared to engage in learning.  There is, however, a significant share of Iowa children who are dramatically behind their peers and require special assistance to “catch up.”

Nationally, 56% of children begin school behind peers in at least one measure (cognitive, social/emotional, or physical), and 21% are behind in 2 or more areas – requiring significant school time and investment in remediation.  These facts led researchers to question whether it is possible to identify these children early and provide support and assistance that will reduce this trend.  A tremendous amount of data points to identifying and responding to high-need children through the family.

Here are what the report terms “Top-line Findings” in defining children with high needs:

•     There is no one measure that captures “need” among children; rather a cluster of characteristics that contribute to good or bad outcomes.  On average, the prevalence of poor early-childhood outcomes is highest among children of less-educated, unmarried or adolescent parents, parents who are depressed, parents with limited incomes who have difficulty meeting basic needs, and among children with special needs themselves.

•     A significant share of Iowa families face economic stress; many are headed by young and less-educated parents.  More than 40 percent of Iowa’s young children live in households below 200 percent of poverty, a realistic measure of what it takes to support a family.  Nearly one in five (19 percent of the total) live in households below 100 percent of poverty ($22,314 for a family of four in 2010).  In 2010, 17 percent of Iowa first-time births, and 8 percent of total births, were to adolescent mothers, almost all of whom were unmarried with less than a high school diploma.

•    Another significant share of Iowa children have special health needs.  In fact, 21 percent of Iowa children four months to five years of age are at moderate or high risk of developmental, behavioral or social delays. Based on national research, we know over 50 percent of young children begin kindergarten behind in at least one area of special need

and over 20 percent have multiple needs that require even greater levels of support.

As we know, the United Way of Central Iowa’s Women’s Leadership Connection has supported early childhood education as a key priority for the past 10 years, assisting with accreditation of early learning centers and preschools, facility improvements, book drives, teacher training, and volunteer readers.  Several Chrysalis Board members have participated in this tremendous project.

The work of Chrysalis takes place in prevention efforts through Chrysalis After-School, which we created and have funded since 1998.  Our goal is to assure that girls gain the knowledge and skills to become resilient and successful women – overcoming and/or avoiding these “top-line findings" that cause the next generation (their families) to face these tremendous challenges.  Since we began, nearly 6,000 adolescent girls have been part of this powerful program.  It’s the best investment in the future we can possibly make.

The Women and Men of Thanksgiving

Many of us know the most familiar story of the first Thanksgiving took place in Plymouth Colony, in present-day Massachusetts, in 1621.  But it took more than 200 years for President Abraham Lincoln to declare the final Thursday in November as a national day of thanksgiving in 1863, and only in 1941 did the U.S. Congress finally made Thanksgiving Day an official national holiday.

This may never have occurred were it not for a strong and confident woman: Sara Josepha Hale.

Sarah J. Hale, a poet and novelist, became editor of the Ladies' Magazine in 1828.  In 1837 the Ladies' Magazine became known as the Lady's Book, still led by Hale until 1877.  During her tenure as editor, Hale made the magazine the most recognized and influential periodical for women, and was involved in numerous philanthropic pursuits.  She used her position as editor to advocate the education of women. 

For 15 years, Hale waged a campaign to make Thanksgiving a national holiday.  But not until she enlisted the help of President Lincoln did her campaign succeed.

In 1939, toward the end of the Great Depression, the last Thursday of November was going to be November 30, and retailers complained to President Franklin D. Roosevelt that this only left 24 shopping days to Christmas.  Begging FDR to move Thanksgiving just one week earlier, it was hoped that Christmas shoppers would have the extra week to purchase more. 

When FDR issued his Thanksgiving Proclamation in 1939, he declared that Thanksgiving would be held the second-to-last Thursday of the month, causing a tremendous uproar – calendars were incorrect, school holidays had to be rescheduled, even football schedules had to be redone.  His political opponents questioned the right of a president to changing a holiday, even coining the holiday name as “Franksgiving.”

Twenty-three states followed the presidential order and changed the date for Thanksgiving, and 23 other states kept the traditional date.  Colorado and Texas decided to honor both dates as holidays.  In 1941, Roosevelt again announced Thanksgiving to be the second-to-last Thursday of the month, and 31 states honored the earlier date while 17 maintained the tradition by celebrating the last Thursday of November.

Lincoln had established Thanksgiving to bring our country together, but the confusion was tearing the country apart until Congress passed a law on December 26, 1941 that Thanksgiving would now occur annually on the 4^th Thursday in November.

(Another woman, artist Margaret Cusack, provided the design of a commemorative Thanksgiving stamp issued by the U.S. Postal Service in 2001.  It was a style resembling traditional folk-art needlework, depicting a cornucopia overflowing with fruits and vegetables under the phrase “We Give Thanks.”)

We are thankful for the passion and leadership each of you – women and men – give to the work of Chrysalis.  From each of us, our best wishes for a lovely and relaxing holiday.

Gen X Philanthropy

Many may think that the Generation-Xers are just beginning to understand philanthropy.  According to a recent article in US News, for many young professionals, giving to charity isn't just about writing checks.  Instead, the focus is on volunteering, socializing, and networking -- while also contributing to good causes.

"Many Generation X-ers are more interested in social advocacy and engagement philanthropy," says Dwight Burlingame, associate executive director at the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University. That means they are more likely to want to work directly with organizations instead of just donating money, he explains.

Interestingly, the Center notes that giving rates rise with education levels: 90% of persons with graduate degrees contribute to charity, while only 58% of persons with high school educations or less do.  And the average annual gift for a college graduate is $2,633, it reports.

But some young people want to do more - they want to get involved.  For example, Lindsay Hyde.  During her freshman year at Harvard, she wanted to become a mentor to younger girls in the area, but when she looked into potential opportunities, she couldn't find any groups willing to work with undergraduates.  So she organized her own team of volunteers and found two elementary schools interested in working with them.  When Hyde graduated from college in 2000, she officially launched a nonprofit which now works with over 400 girls a year in Boston, Pittsburgh, and Miami.

Strong Women, Strong Girls uses lessons learned from strong women throughout history to encourage girls and young women to become strong women themselves.  The curriculum focuses both on elementary age and college age young women, recognizing that both ages really need many of the same experiences and education.  Three basic tenets form the curriculum:

RELATIONSHIPS:  Research which shows that girls and young women need supportive relationships in order to thrive.  For elementary girls, the relationships form with college women, with peers, and with program leaders.  The young women in college form relationships with the younger girls and with peers, but also with participating college advisors and one adult mentor, who is paired with the college student each year.

SKILLS:  Younger girls need help developing social and emotional skills, while the young women develop leadership and professional skills including resume writing and interviewing.

ROLE MODELS:  A role model helps girls develop aspirations for the future - both through the experience with college students and through reading a weekly biography of a women in history.  College students learn from professional women and field experts, who can assist in their preparation for a career.

Strong Women, Strong Girls has developed a range of resources for individuals and organizations interested in working with girls and young women.  It also has tracked its success, based on participant surveys and academic achievement.

This program is similar to Chrysalis After-School programs because it intentionally brings in college age women who develop mentoring relationships with the girls.  This year, Chrysalis will begin a formal high school mentoring program, designed to teach the high school girls ("graduates" of Chrysalis After-School) how to develop relationships with younger girls, how to be a role model, and how to instruct about specific skills important to their healthy development.

We look forward to reporting on the success of this program at the end of the academic year.  And we're delighted to have your support and leadership in continuing the work of building future women leaders through Chrysalis After-School.  We’re in 30 schools this year, half elementary, half middle schools – in Des Moines, Indianola, Bondurant, Saydel, Southeast Polk, and Urbandale.  Between 500 and 600 girls and approximately 65 facilitators take part in weekly meetings, with specific curricula created by Chrysalis for the following:

GIRLSTRONG!                  Health and wellness

ON THE MONEY             Financial literacy

BRAINCAKE                      Science, technology, engineering, and math

DRAKE PHARMACY     Safe use of prescription and over-the-counter medicines

ProjectSTOP                     Violence prevention

Thank you for all you give to Chrysalis.

Gender Pay Disparity

Terry Hernandez, Executive Director of Chrysalis, just completed a television interview with WHO TV13 regarding the continued gender pay disparity.  When she asked the reporter what prompted interest in this issue, she noted the report in today's DES MOINES REGISTER listing salaries of state employees.

Once again, we need to count down to the 21st name on this list to find the first female: women's head basketball coach Lisa Bluder.  This is distressing enough, but our frustration should be compounded by the fact that her annual salary is less than half the salary of the lowest paid men's head basketball coach - and in this case, former men's basketball coach Todd Lickliter.

In the recently- released report SHE MATTERS, it was reported that in Iowa, women still make only 79% of what a man with equal education and experience is paid.  Calculating what this inequity means in today's dollars, if a woman (average salary $34,534) were to use the dollars represented by the gap (average salary for a man is $43,872), she could buy one of the following:

- 2,312 more gallons of gasoline

- 82 more weeks worth of groceries

- 14 more months of rent payments

- 8 more months of mortgage and utility payments

- 29 more months of family health insurance premiums

Today Chrysalis presented this information - in addition to the other disparities of note - to a group of women in higher education across the state, then at a workshop on teen pregnancy prevention.  We agree that, even though the Equal Pay Act was signed nearly 50 years ago, we are still far from being paid equally when our experience and education are the same.

Our work continues to be both to educate our community and stakeholders about issues like this, and to provide solutions to such problems.  Even more important, then, is our work teaching girls to advocate for themselves and be bold in asking for what they need, our work helping women become employed in "nontraditional" jobs that may pay higher wages, and our work in the corporate community to help leaders understand the reality and create workplaces that are more female- and family-friendly.

Simple things like flexible work schedules, onsite services such as ATMs or child care, and family medical leave will help keep women in the workplace as a skilled talent pool.  And these are the types of workplace benefits new young professionals should request as they seek careers.

Remarks from Terry Hernandez's Women of Influence Acceptance

According to Webster, INFLUENCE means power, persuasion, inspiration, affecting change.

I believe that this is the basis for all we are in this world. It's about relationships. And it's about sharing “me” and all the mysterious, odd, frustrating, delightful things that make me me.

I guess it took me 40 to 50 years to unlearn what I thought I knew about me –

·          as a girl growing up, I knew how to cover up pimples, how to avoid folding the clothes or cleaning my room, how to be “cool” –

·          as a woman, I knew how to shade my long nose with blush, hide cellulite, keep my mouth shut and know my place –

…how many women can you think of that, like me, knew they would never be president; knew they would never make as much money or have as much “clout” as a man; knew they would never be as thin, pretty, tall, or glamorous as they’d hope; knew how to feel guilty about choosing to raise a family instead of running a company…

I am so fortunate to do the work of Chrysalis, which is all about influence – it is about inspiring and encouraging – it’s about helping girls and women unlearn what they may know:

·          to teach girls to be themselves instead of worrying about what the media – or their peers – say they should be…

·          to teach young women to reject the notion that to be liked and accepted, they have to look and act like Britney Spears, Lady Gaga or (in my day) Madonna…

·          to help other women understand they are not objects and will not be treated as such…

·          to help girls and women celebrate their strengths rather than focusing on their weaknesses.

I’ve found in our work that the more limited the financial resources, the more abundant and creative the human resources are.

We say the work of Chrysalis is to “inspire to aspire” – it’s all about influence, and it’s been on our radar for decades. It continues to lead each of us to influence – to make change. And change is certainly not difficult if you are open to it.

So, here are my suggestions to you to continue to be a person of influence: treat people kindly, pay attention, respect others, offer assistance, ask for help, do good deeds, practice solid values, be a good friend, listen-listen-listen, volunteer in the community, and mentor the next generation.

Don’t just follow the rules.  Follow your heart.

I'm grateful to continue this important work and appreciate the passion we all share.

The Rest of the Story...

During her visit, Dr. Trent shared many stories about the extreme challenges she faced to achieve her goal of completing an education.  Since there was so much to be told, I want to share with you more of the remarkable story of her life, as blogged by NY Times Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Nicholas Kristof.  As they say, here is “the rest of the story:”

November 15, 2009

Op-Ed Columnist

Triumph of a Dreamer

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Any time anyone tells you that a dream is impossible, any time you’re discouraged by impossible challenges, just mutter this mantra: Tererai Trent.

Of all the people earning university degrees this year, perhaps the most remarkable story belongs to Tererai (pronounced TEH-reh-rye), a middle-aged woman who is one of my heroes. She is celebrating a personal triumph, but she’s also a monument to the aid organizations and individuals who helped her. When you hear that foreign-aid groups just squander money or build dependency, remember that by all odds Tererai should be an illiterate, battered cattle-herd in Zimbabwe and instead — ah, but I’m getting ahead of my story.

Tererai was born in a village in rural Zimbabwe, probably sometime in 1965, and attended elementary school for less than one year. Her father married her off when she was about 11 to a man who beat her regularly. She seemed destined to be one more squandered African asset.

A dozen years passed. Jo Luck, the head of an aid group called Heifer International, passed through the village and told the women there that they should stand up, nurture dreams, change their lives.

Inspired, Tererai scribbled down four absurd goals based on accomplishments she had vaguely heard of among famous Africans. She wrote that she wanted to study abroad, and to earn a B.A., a master’s and a doctorate.

Tererai began to work for Heifer and several Christian organizations as a community organizer. She used the income to take correspondence courses, while saving every penny she could.

In 1998 she was accepted to Oklahoma State University, but she insisted on taking all five of her children with her rather than leave them with her husband. “I couldn’t abandon my kids,” she recalled. “I knew that they might end up getting married off.”

Tererai’s husband eventually agreed that she could take the children to America — as long as he went too. Heifer helped with the plane tickets, Tererai’s mother sold a cow, and neighbors sold goats to help raise money. With $4,000 in cash wrapped in a stocking and tied around her waist, Tererai set off for Oklahoma.

An impossible dream had come true, but it soon looked like a nightmare. Tererai and her family had little money and lived in a ramshackle trailer, shivering and hungry. Her husband refused to do any housework — he was a man! — and coped by beating her.

“There was very little food,” she said. “The kids would come home from school, and they would be hungry.” Tererai found herself eating from trash cans, and she thought about quitting — but felt that doing so would let down other African women.

“I knew that I was getting an opportunity that other women were dying to get,” she recalled. So she struggled on, holding several jobs, taking every class she could, washing and scrubbing, enduring beatings, barely sleeping.

At one point the university tried to expel Tererai for falling behind on tuition payments. A university official, Ron Beer, intervened on her behalf and rallied the faculty and community behind her with donations and support.

“I saw that she had enormous talent,” Dr. Beer said. His church helped with food, Habitat for Humanity provided housing, and a friend at Wal-Mart carefully put expired fruits and vegetables in boxes beside the Dumpster and tipped her off.

Soon afterward, Tererai had her husband deported back to Zimbabwe for beating her, and she earned her B.A. — and started on her M.A. Then her husband returned, now frail and sick with a disease that turned out to be AIDS. Tererai tested negative for H.I.V., and then — feeling sorry for her husband — she took in her former tormentor and nursed him as he grew sicker and eventually died.

Through all this blur of pressures, Tererai excelled at school, pursuing a Ph.D. at Western Michigan University and writing a dissertation on AIDS prevention in Africa even as she began working for Heifer as a program evaluator. On top of all that, she was remarried, to Mark Trent, a plant pathologist she had met at Oklahoma State.

Tererai is a reminder of the adage that talent is universal, while opportunity is not. There are still 75 million children who are not attending primary school around the world. We could educate them all for far less than the cost of the proposed military “surge” in Afghanistan.

Each time Tererai accomplished one of those goals that she had written long ago, she checked it off on that old, worn paper. Last month, she ticked off the very last goal, after successfully defending her dissertation. She’ll receive her Ph.D. next month, and so a one-time impoverished cattle-herd from Zimbabwe with less than a year of elementary school education will don academic robes and become Dr. Tererai Trent.

I am so proud to work with Chrysalis, and with leaders like each of you, as you share Dr. Trent’s belief in the power of girls and women.  Thank you for all you do.

Women and Business in Iowa

According to our report SHE MATTERS: 2012 Status of women and Girls in Iowa, a 2012 report by American Express tracked the overall growth and growth by industry of women-owned businesses across the country.  In the report, Iowa was listed as last in the nation in revenue growth of women-owned businesses, and second to last in the nation for increase in the number of firms and overall employment by women-owned businesses.

But the national picture is much more reassuring.  This week, I received another article prepared by American Express OPEN, 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Women-Owned Businesses, that provides benchmarks from studies of women-owned businesses in an effort to encourage more women to put their business plans into action, and to provide a more accurate picture of the business environment.

Here are the “10 things:”

1.       In the past 15 years, the number of women-owned businesses grew by 54%; there are now 8.3 million women-owned businesses in the United States (more than the number of people in 50% of the world’s countries).

2.      Despite owning nearly 30% of U.S. businesses, women attract only 5% of the nation’s equity capital; in first-year funding, women receive 80% less capital than men.

3.       Women-owned businesses employ 7.7 million people - 40% more people than three largest employers — McDonald’s, IBM and Wal-Mart — combined (this is a 9% increase in employment over the past 15 years).

4.      Women-owned firms generate revenues of $1.3 trillion. Over the past 15 years, women-owned businesses saw 58% increase in revenue, from $546 billion to $1.3 trillion now - more than the combined market cap of Apple, Microsoft, GE, Google and Sony.  Revenue has grown more than twice the amount of U.S. population growth during the same period of time.

5.       The industries with the fastest growth and greatest share of women-owned firms are educational services, health care and social assistance, and entertainment and recreation.

6.      In seven out of 13 of the most populous industries, women-owned firms are exceeding overall growth.

7.       The top states for women-owned businesses are Arizona, Nevada, Wyoming and North Dakota; top cities are Sacramento, Riverside, San Antonio, Houston, Baltimore and Washington, D.C.

8.      2% of women-owned businesses bring in more than $1 million in annual revenue, versus 5% of all firms.

9.      As they reach 5-9 employees or earn $250,000, women-owned businesses experience faltering growth.

10.   Of women-owned businesses, 5.5% used a loan to get started, compared to 10.7% overall.

As a next step in our ongoing work to address the issues reported in SHE MATTERS, Chrysalis and the Iowa Women’s Leadership Project are creating a handbook of recommendations for elected officials, communities, and individuals to use in order to take action.  The handbook will be entitled If SHE MATTERS to You, Here’s What You Can Do, and it will be printed for our distribution this fall.

We Are Making Progress

We’ve long known that equal rights – women’s, civil, gay – are continuing struggles for what so many of us believe is “right.”  But a recent article in The New York Times frames equal rights as being strong for our economy.

Research presented by 4 U.S. economists makes the case that in the last 50 years, 20% of increased productivity in our country can be credited to women and blacks.  Changes that have affected both populations – and the equal talents they bring to the workplace – have tremendously increased the availability of highly skilled and enterprising professionals.  This is referred to by researchers as “improved allocation of talent.”

This swell in the “talent pool” and its effect on our economy is confirmed by a 2009 report, The Business of Empowering Women, based on a survey of 2,300 senior private sector executives conducted by McKinsey and Company.  The report asked corporate respondents, “Do you expect your company’s engagement with women to increase the company’s profits?”  

Attracting and retaining female employees is also an effective business strategy, according to McKinsey.  Their research  demonstrates that the presence of gender- and race-diverse leadership correlates with stronger financial and organizational performance.  Companies with greater leadership diversity have reported operating margins twice as high as those with little or no female leadership, and there is a strong correlation between the percentage of top managers who are female and a company’s return on assets and equity.

Although we certainly aren’t a gender- or race-neutral society yet, significant shifts have occurred over the last half-century, note the researchers.  The New York Times article notes:

In case you are behind in your viewing of “Mad Men,” the television drama set in 1960s New York, (the show) is a reminder of how truly supreme white men were in the United States half a century ago. In 1960, 96% of lawyers were white men, 94% of doctors were white men and 86% percent of managers were white men. The subsequent 50 years were a revolution.  By 2008, white men accounted for just 61% of lawyers, 63% of doctors and 57% of managers.

“We’ve come a long way, baby.”

Thank you for being part of this movement.

SHE MATTERS Op-Ed

We are receiving quite a bit of tremendous feedback on SHE MATTERS: 2012 Status of Women and Girls in Iowa, the report we released last week at the Iowa Women’s Leadership Conference.  As we continue to publicize the information, I will be submitting an op-ed piece to the Des Moines Register and the Business Record which will include some of the highlights.  Here is the copy for the op-ed:

OP-ED submission

SHE MATTERS: 2012 Status of Women and Girls in Iowa

May 2012

The World Bank calls investing in women “smart economics” because research shows economic growth for women has a critical multiplier effect.  Women are more likely to share their personal economic gains with their families and communities; in fact, women reinvest 90% of their income in food, healthcare, home improvement, and schooling for themselves and their children.  In short, “women’s progress” is “society progress.”

In Iowa, there are changes in the lives of girls and women that we see every day:

×          we’ve embraced more women in our military

×          more women are attending and graduating from college

×          more women are in our labor force

×          girls are reaching greater proficiency in academics, including science and mathematics

×          women’s life expectancy has increased

Although these are reasons to celebrate, research presented in a new report from the Iowa Women’s Leadership Project, SHE MATTERS: 2012 Status of Women and Girls in Iowa, tells us that for many Iowa females, the vision of self-sufficiency, independence, and opportunity isn’t within reach.

This report provides a measure of the demographics of our state, the health and well-being of our girls and women, the achievement and autonomy we’ve attained, and the employment and income levels we’ve reached.

According to the 2010 U.S. Census, women and girls comprise just over half (50.5%) of our state population.  Since the 1070, Iowa women’s participation in the workforce has more than doubled – today over 80% of Iowa women ages 16 to 64 are working.

With this enormous increase in the female workforce, Iowa women – like women throughout the country – still earn only 79% of what men earn when all other factors are equal.  This may seem insignificant, but consider that collectively, Iowa women are paid over $4.1 trillion less annually due to this wage gap.  Per woman, this could mean 82 weeks of groceries, 8 months of mortgage payments, 29 months of family health insurance, or over 2,000 gallons of gas.

And there are other glaring disparities:

×          21.3% of Iowa’s legislators are female

×          women hold only 11% of executive positions in Iowa’s insurance businesses

×          only 16% of corporate board positions are held by women

×          the number of women-owned businesses has dropped over the last decade

×          13% of Iowa women have no health insurance, 14% live in poverty, and over 80% of homeless families are females with children

×          Nearly ¾ Iowa’s nursing home population and 2/3 of home health care patients are female

When we see these indicators, we realize that not only have women not progressed – in many cases, we’ve lost ground.  The facts underscore the reality that the value of Iowa’s (and our country’s) women and girls must be demonstrated.  By adequate earnings.  By career and promotion opportunities.  By assuring safety.  And by having an equal voice for all decisions affecting Iowans.  When these are realities, women and girls can participate fully in the life of Iowa communities.

We can do better, and we will do better.  The Iowa Women’s Leadership Project has engaged women and organizations throughout the state to provide input and energy toward changing the trend lines.  Our intent is that our daughters, nieces, and granddaughters will have role models will have role models that reflect Iowa’s population – half of our leaders, at a minimum, will be women.

SHE MATTERS: 2012 Status of Women and Girls in Iowa has been created by a public/private partnership of Iowa organizations forming the Iowa Women’s Leadership Project.  The report was released at the 2012 Iowa Women’s Leadership Conference in April, and will serve as a guide for the partnership’s shared work to improve the quality of life for Iowa’s women and girls.

Chrysalis (as part of the Iowa Women's Leadership Project) presents Report

This week Chrysalis Executive Director Terry Hernandez presented statistics from our new report, SHE MATTERS: 2012 Status of Women and Girls in Iowa, to over 900 women attending the Iowa Women’s Leadership Conference in Coralville.  She also had an opportunity to participate as a guest on “Talk of Iowa” on the Iowa Public Radio station as we shared some of the significant findings of this report, and over the weekend will present the report findings at the Iowa Business and Professional Women’s annual conference here in Des Moines.

We have done this report in partnership with the Iowa Women’s Leadership Project, a network of organizations from around the state with a vested interest in the success of women; Terry Hernandez researched and wrote the report, and Mary Ann Lee, Chrysalis Research Associate, provide a significant amount of reference material you’ll find in the report.

The partnership met roughly one year ago, called together to find ways we can work together to improve conditions for females in our state.  We believe this report will provide a starting point for our shared work, and an opportunity to benchmark progress (or not) in important areas for women and girls’ success.  The report will be updated annually, and next fall, our website will include an interactive tool to research a range of data concerning women and girls – this will be available to all interested organizations, corporations, decision-makers, and community members.

If you’d like to hear the Iowa Public Radio interview:  http://iowapublicradio.org/news/news_story.php?story=3660

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GUEST OPINION: In complex times, persevere

From the Des Moines Business Record:

 

3/16/2012 7:00:00 AM
GUEST OPINION: In complex times, persevere

Jann Freed

By Jann Freed



“If a company is only as good as its people, companies today have much to worry about,” says Margaret “Meg” Wheatley, an internationally acclaimed writer, teacher and speaker.

As an author of several leadership books, Wheatley was one of the pioneers of “systems thinking,” viewing organizations as organic and living systems, as explained in her book “Leadership and the New Science.” In her work with organizations, communities and nations, she has encountered caring, intelligent and well-intentioned people who are finding it challenging to do what they know is best.

“We are being asked to work faster, more competitively, more selfishly, and to focus only on the short term,” Wheatley said. “These values cannot lead to anything healthy and sustainable, and they are alarmingly destructive. I believe we must learn quickly now how to work and live together in ways that bring us back to life.”

If what I have shared interests you, take advantage of the opportunity to attend Wheatley’s presentation at the State Historical Building on April 18, sponsored by the Chrysalis Foundation.

Wheatley’s conclusion that “companies have much to worry about” is based on her extensive work in large-systems change – helping organizations become more committed and productive, and with the full engagement of people at all levels.

She has witnessed how pressures on leaders have increased dramatically. Leaders no longer have time or flexibility. They feel caged and exhausted. The demand for quick results and pressure from boards of directors have left them no time for development or learning. Leaders have told her: “Forget about values, learning or participation. We just need to execute.”

Based on Wheatley’s consulting work, she concludes that leaders need to be fearless in order to tackle the complexities in today’s world. This emphasis on becoming fearless led her to write about the significance of perseverance for people at all levels so that we can each contribute to making things better for the people, places and issues about which we care the most.

Perseverance is the capacity to keep going long after the passion for our work has dissipated. It is a continuous choice not to give up, no matter how difficult the circumstances. It is a choice we make to be aware, to be awake, to take in all of the information needed to do our best work. Wheatley calls perseverance a “life-saving skill for this time.”

Drawing on wisdom, Wheatley will explain how to confront the dominant energies of our time – aggression, anxiety and fear – in a way that allows us to do good work, serve others and care for ourselves, even when exhausted and overwhelmed. Wheatley said she has repeatedly observed that in the midst of the greatest tragedies, when people are working together and feel their connectedness is when they discover true joy.

Her work complements the efforts being made in our community to practice civility at a time when so many issues are being polarized, often preventing people from working together effectively.

Jann Freed is a leadership development and change management consultant at The Genysys Group.



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