Illustration of Charlotte Moore, by Daniel Hertzberg

This Computer Was an Astronomy Star: Charlotte Moore Sitterly

Jason Cheng

Computer used to be a job title, referring to a person who performed calculations on behalf of higher-ups who didn’t want to churn through data for hours or weeks at a time. In the early 20th century, most computers were women. (In the 1940s, one wag suggested we use the term kilogirl as a measure of digital computing power, where one kilogirl equals 1,000 hours of labor.) In 1920, a 22-year-old named Charlotte Moore, after dazzling the mathematics department at Swarthmore College, joined Princeton’s Department of Astronomy as a computer. She rose to astronomy’s highest ranks, a solar specialist who published five monographs and more than 85 papers.

Vector Drawing of a Library

‘An Educated Lady’ Gets the Job: Anne Shaw

Jason Cheng

Anne Shaw spent only four years at the College of New Jersey, but her short employment signified an important shift in the makeup of Princeton’s staff.

Hired in 1877 as the assistant to the librarian, Frederic Vinton, Shaw is believed to be the first female employee to fill a non-service role on campus. That also made her one of about only 15 percent of American women who worked for pay in the 1870s.

The Average Age of Motherhood and Fatherhood are 26 years and 31 years respectively

Read this before you have a baby (especially if you’re a woman)

Jason Cheng

It seems so obvious: having kids affects men and women differently. Sure, emotionally and financially but most clearly in the simple way mothers and fathers spend their time. And when you actually look at how 10,900 Americans carve up 24 hours, the conclusion is pretty stark: if you’re a woman who enjoys paid work or relaxing activities, having kids will cramp your style. Being married with kids also isn’t looking like a great idea according to the numbers.

The Gender-Balanced Zone Graph, Showing the Positive Effects

Gender-balance Teams Linked to Better Business Performance: A Sodexo Study

Jason Cheng

Women remain underrepresented in leadership roles, in spite of research indicating that gender- balanced leadership has a positive impact on the bottom line.
However, gender balance impacts performance only when the optimal balance is reached.
The results of the Sodexo study confirm that this balance corresponds to a male-female ratio between 40% and 60%, reinforcing that diversity is key to enhanced performance.
Entities with gender-balanced management performed better on all of the performance indicators measured, including employee engagement, brand awareness, client retention and three indicators of financial performance.
Teams at Sodexo within the optimum gender- balanced zone have experienced on average an increase of four points in the global engagement rate versus only one point for other teams between 2010 and 2012.

Graph of Pay Imbalance

Women at Work: Women’s Access to Power and the Gender Earnings Gap

Jason Cheng

Using a unique sample of 5,022 workers in 94 large German workplaces, the authors explore whether and how women’s access to higher level positions, firms’ human resources practices, and workers’ qualification levels are associated with gender differences in earnings. First, they find that having more women in management reduces the gender earnings gap for jobs with low qualifications, but not those with high qualifications. Second, they find that while men’s compensation is positively affected by having a male supervisor, women with a female supervisor do not receive such an advantage. Finally, they find that human resources practices and job-level qualifications moderate the association between gendered power and gender earnings inequalities. Integrating women into managerial and supervisory roles does not automatically reduce gender inequalities; its impacts are contingent on organizational context.

Image Stating Equality = Innovation, by Accenture

Accenture: Equality Equals Innovation Research Report (2019)

Jason Cheng

Accenture has found that a culture of equality—the same kind of workplace environment that helps everyone advance to higher positions—is a powerful multiplier of innovation and growth. Global gross domestic product would increase by up to US$8 trillion by 2028 if innovation mindset in all countries were raised by 10 percent. Diversity positively influences an innovation mindset, and equality is the multiplier. A culture of equality is anchored by three pillars: an Empowering Environment (one that trusts employees, respects individuals and offers freedom to be creative and to train and work flexibly), Bold Leadership (a diverse leadership team that sets, shares and measures equality targets openly), and Comprehensive Action (policies and practices that are family-friendly, support all genders and are bias- free in attracting and retaining people).

Valuing the Risk of Workplace Sexual Harassment Cover

2018 Hersch – Valuing the Risk of Workplace Sexual Harassment

Jason Cheng

Valuing the risk of workplace sexual harassment

Using data on sexual harassment charges filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Hersch calculates the risk of sexual harassment by gender, industry, and age and establish that white females, but not nonwhite females, receive a compensating wage differential for exposure to a higher risk of sexual harassment.

Three Japanese business people meeting in an office

Lessons from the rise of women’s labor force participation in Japan

kendra

Brookings November 1, 2017 By Jay Shambaugh, Ryan Nunn, and Becca Portman After decades of steady gains, U.S. women’s labor force participation peaked in 2000. In retrospect, this was an important turning point: rising women’s participation had fueled household income and economic growth, and helped offset declining prime-age male labor force participation. Declining prime-age women’s participation since then has weakened growth, exacerbating …

People Around a Table, Playing a Game

How you can fight gender bias at work

kendra

We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again: Equality can’t wait. According to the World Economic Forum, at the current pace of change, it’s going to take 208 years to achieve gender equality in the United States. But it doesn’t have to be this way. If we all commit to taking action, change is possible. We asked LeanIn.Org—an organization that …