Woman in a Nontraditional Female Job - Essay Example

? Journalism, Mass media and Communication Summary and Analysis of an interview with a woman in a traditionally non-female job Introduction Women have always been sidelined in areas of work that involve a lot of machine usage or technical areas. In most industries, women can be seen to form a percentage that is less than ten percent when compared to the men’s population in the same setting. The interview conducted was mainly to find out the gender issues that most of these women go through during their work at such places and the reason why they think this is mainly a man dominated area as opposed to the female. Women have always gotten very minimal opportunities to be involved in working in heavy industrial areas as this position is seen to mainly suit the men. Apparently, there are also very few women expertise involved in the same sector due to the perception that this is a male dominated area. In most instances, women will only be given the minor positions in such industrial areas and even the pay is seen to be less. The perception being that, it is just a favor for such women to be in such areas of expertise otherwise they are very vulnerable. Currently, there is an expert woman in chemical engineering who filed a complaint over not being given an equal opportunity in an interview for a position. This is still an evidence of some job areas being considered womanly or manly and thus the reason to this interview is of high value in order to understand gender issues at work places. Description of the interview This interview was conducted on the twenty ninth of March, 2013. The interview was conducted at Shed Pharmaceuticals Company. It was only possible to carry out the interview after consulting with the senior human resource person in this company. I was given one of the offices that belong to the chief pharmacist as it offered more privacy and the interviewee also needed to be in a more comfortable situation without any distractions that would impede getting the correct information from the employee (Barret, 2006). The interviewee was a thirty eight year old at the highlight of her work career. Her name is Joan and she has two children one at age twelve, while the last born at age seven years. She lives as a single mother and thus she has to take care of her family needs which include providing education, food and shelter for the children. I particularly chose this interviewee because of the nature of position that she has in this company. She is one of the senior analysts of the pharmaceutical products that are produced in the company. She went through so much in order to get to this position; therefore, she can tell best what some of the challenges are as a woman she has gone through during the highlight of her career. She is also the only woman in a team of five senior analysts and thus, it is what comes from her experience from working in a team of men whereby she is the only woman. Joan is also one the most convenient individual to contact for the interview as she has been in such a position under gender disparity in work places. More so, her area of specialization has always been perceived to be a male dominated area. Therefore, she is the most ideal individual for this type of interview. Summary of responses to the questions The ten questions were divided into three basic areas. Therefore, the summary will give a summary of the ten questions into the questions with the same agenda being made into one. One compacted questions during the interview process was based on opportunities given to women to express themselves and get a position in an interview. The main ideas under these questions involve the concept that women should be given even an upper hand during interviews especially in a situation that there are less women vying for the same position. I linked this to the notion that, less women are found in such areas of expertise and thus they should stand even better positions for positions like what Joan possessed. Her response According to Joan, yes there should be more opportunities in favor of women who have been involved in such areas of expertise like the one she is currently in. She although disagrees that this has not been implemented at any level though currently. She says that for her to get to that position she had to be persistent. Even in the event she was more deserving for the position that she is currently holding, the boss who was interviewing her gave her quite a hard time. Amongst all her competitors, she is the only one who had to prove her by working over an extra time that the rest of the candidates were not given. This only means that women were not considered fit for this position and they were mesmerized at what she could do for the company’s pharmaceutical products. She had to be put under probation of one month for her to be fully employed while the rest of the men who managed to get the same position were given direct employment. The second question was to do with the kind of treatment that the female workers in sectors that are not considered to be male dominated areas go through. This is in relation to the fact that, most women undergo through difficult conditions especially ridicule or they risk being overworked in such instances. Her response Joan agreed that women like her could go through so much ridicule and even be given very little pay for the positions that they occupy. She relates this especially with the initial company that she worked for. According to her, women in some instances are forced to bribe their way out to the top positions and to get equally fair treatment as their male counterparts. Under the male dominated areas, she recalls that under some situation she was forced to act like a secretary in the office while she was a qualified pharmacist. She was given the position as a pharmacist while when working she could most of the time act as the secretary to the company with a lot of paper work to be done other than her main professional area. She gave a brief overview of the kind of team that she worked with and it was mainly men. The boss of the company was a man and under him he had employed more men than women even in the event that they had very many applications from women. The treatment given to her during her time of work was mainly based on gender discrimination. This can be related to the fact that, she could work for extra hours not from her own will but forced by the boss. She also explains that although her work deserved more than her pay, she could get less than even the men could not match her area of profession. This can be seen from the ridicules that she encountered during her work that she was working with a male dominated area instead of making her family grow in love. The workmates could ridicule the idea that she could not manage to keep her husband and yet she was dominating a male dominated profession instead of making her family grow. The last question was based on sexual favors that most men demanded when women came for quest of jobs. The main idea to be tackled in this area was based on the fact women could be asked to give sexual favors in order to get certain positions. Her response Joan agreed that it was very true that women in most instances were forced to give sexual favors in order to get to a particular position. Like for her, the first job application backfired on her due to the reason that she declined to give any sexual favors to the boss in charge then. This has not only happened to her once but in a couple of job events. The only difference that could have emerged is that some were very adamant while at least some could let go. In her own understanding, at least ten percent of the women in the top position could get it through giving sexual favors as seen from most of her friends who have the same experience. One of responses was based on the fact that, some positions were particularly meant for men due to the physical nature of work load that it may entail. Some especially in heavy industrial works areas like constructions; women were not the best fit as they are considered to be very vulnerable. They can easily become sick and some of the items need to be manufactured on daily basis as based on their expiry date. Analysis of the interview The concept on gender bias especially in work places is real. This has been evidenced through the interview I conducted based on some areas of specialty being only meant for men and not women. Joan as the woman who was the interviewee spoke very emotionally. Most of her feelings were brought out through narration of her stories; her stories shed more light into the idea of gender based discrimination of women in specific areas of specialty. One of the key areas that were very catchy under the issue of women who are in job positions that are considered to be male dominated areas was unfair treatment and wages, sexual favors and ridicule. Females in some special areas are usually given very little wage as opposed to their male counterparts. One of the ideas that are related to this reasoning is that, they have very few responsibilities to handle as compared to their male counterparts. Something that has not been understood is that the world had completely changed and women are equally part of taking care of their families as well. The very minimal positions that are offered to women in the male perceived areas are due to the fact that, women have always been considered to be very fragile and some duties can easily absconded when having women being in charge of these positions. Therefore, this has led to very few women being given vital positions in a company (Barret, 2006). The bosses are always scared that women will bring the productivity of their company to being less productive and lesser profits made. This has formed the ridicule basis for women who are in the mighty positions and thus making the same women to become demoralized. Joan has proven that what men can do, women can even do it better and thus, women should be given more opportunities especially in areas that are perceived to be heavy for them in terms of the workload. It is therefore, important that most of the employers are made aware that women can work even much better for particular positions that they are perceived not to do better as evidenced by Joan, the pharmacist. Reference Barrett, M. (2006). Gender and communication at work. Aldershot [u.a.: Ashgate. Read More