Equal numbers of men and women graduate from medical school, but only a fraction of leaders in the field are female physicians. Women make up 80 percent of the healthcare workforce, but they are vastly underrepresented when it comes to leadership roles, according to an editorial in the Harvard Business Review.
Just 3 percent of healthcare CEOs are women; 6 percent are department chairs; 9 percent are division chiefs; and only 3 percent serve as chief medical officers.
“These numbers point to a clear need for better representation of female physicians in leadership,” wrote Lisa S. Rotenstein, MD, MBA, resident physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and clinical fellow at Harvard Medical School. “How exactly to achieve this given the many barriers they face is less clear.”
Rotenstein outlined four priority areas to systematically improve the promotion of women in healthcare: quantification, rethinking awards and promotions, engaging broadly and creating opportunities for development and sponsorship.
Taking stock
Before adding women to their leadership ranks, organizations need to understand just how women are represented in their leadership. Similarly, organizations need to understand the experience of female physicians in their workplace, compared to their male counterparts.
“Quantification is a key facilitator of change in addressing gender imbalance,” Rotenstein wrote.
In the U.K., healthcare organizations must meet minimum standards to be eligible for National Institute for Health Research funding.
Evaluating achievements
Awards and promotions are linked, and with more men receiving major awards or recognitions, they benefit from promotions at a higher rate. In medicine, preference has emerged to promote clinicians with a career path in biomedical research. As more career paths in medicine have broadened, these promotions have not.
Prioritizing clinician-researchers can disadvantage others in different career paths, Rotenstein wrote. Organizations should consider promotions based on accomplishments in less traditional career paths that may be laden with women, such as Duke’s promotion tracks for faculty with clinical service and educational focuses.
Broad engagement
Men and women should both work on improving diversity in leadership, including participating in implicit bias training that can improve held beliefs and attitudes about women in STEM fields (science, technology, engineering and mathematics). Engaging men alongside women can be beneficial.
Opportunity
Of course, improving the gender imbalance in healthcare leadership requires that women have the opportunity to advance—beyond networking and forums. Both male and female leaders need to take on sponsorship roles to promote women’s access to diverse opportunities.
Amy joined TriMed Media as a Senior Writer for HealthExec after covering home care for three years. When not writing about all things healthcare, she fulfills her lifelong dream of becoming a pirate by sailing in regattas and enjoying rum. Fun fact: she sailed 333 miles across Lake Michigan in the Chicago Yacht Club "Race to Mackinac."