The report of the Task Force on the Status of Women was presented to the Executive Faculty on November 12, 1997. The report contained statistics on the current representation of women on the faculty next year and included the results of the faculty survey on professional development issues that had been carried out in June/July 1997. The reported included eight recommendations of the Task Force aimed at increasing the number of women on the faculty at Washington University School of Medicine and promoting the professional development of all WUMS faculty. The report and its recommendations were unanimously adopted by the Executive Faculty with no discussion.

The Task Force on the Status of Women was established by Dean William A. Peck in February 1997 at the request of Sherida Tollefsen, then-President of AWN. Dr. Tollefsen had previously addressed the Executive Faculty and outlined the statistics on the representation of women on the faculty at Washington University School of Medicine: 25% of the faculty are women, equal to the national average. However, 41% of the women faculty hold the rank of instructor and 39% hold the rank of assistant professor. Only 20% hold the rank of associate or full professor, one-third fewer than the national average. In response to Dr. Tollefsen's offer of assistance in addressing the issues that have led to the under-representation of women at senior faculty ranks, Dean Peck established the Task Force on the Status of Women. Chaired by Ron Evens, the Task Force on the Status of Women also included Jeff Gordon, Linda Pike, Penny Shackelford, Marilyn Siegel, Phil Stahl and Sherida Tollefsen.

At their first meeting the Task Force agreed to carry out a survey of the WUMS faculty on issues relating to faculty recruitment and development at the medical center. Linda Pike served as the chair of the subcommittee that was authorized to develop and implement the survey recommended by the Task Force. Other members of the Survey Subcommittee were: Debra Haire-Joshu, Leslie Kahl, Nancy Parker Tice and Sherida Tollefsen.

The survey was carried out during June and July, 1997. Of 1257 faculty members, 782 returned their surveys for a response rate of 62%. Respondents reflected the demographics of the faculty in terms of gender, rank, track and department. Most respondents to the survey (80%) felt that WUMS provided a collegial environment in which to pursue an academic career. However, in other respects, the faculty were significantly less positive about the medical school.

Less than one-third of the faculty felt that their department had a defined process for recruiting new faculty members. Just over one-third felt that the current process was likely to identify candidates from diverse backgrounds. For both questions, women were considerably less positive than their male colleagues. On the question of identifying diverse candidates, 40% of the men but only 25% of the women indicated that current procedures were likely to identify candidates from diverse backgrounds. The results suggest that current recruitment practices rely heavily on "the grapevine" to identify potential faculty candidates. This often makes it more difficult to identify qualified women candidates as they are not part of "the old boys' network" and are therefore not recommended informally as often as their male counterparts.

On issues of faculty development, the survey indicated that the majority of faculty (~60%) were satisfied with the terms of their recruitment packages (e.g.. start up funds and protected time) but that few were provided with professional development assistance in terms of information regarding the criteria by which they would be judged or feedback on their performance via annual reviews with their supervisor. For example, only 30% of the respondents indicated that they had been advised prospectively regarding the criteria for promotion. A similar percent indicated that the criteria for promotion on their track were well-defined. Only 1 in 5 faculty members felt that criteria for promotion were consistently applied. The data suggest that faculty are provided with resources at the beginning of their career at WUMS but are often not given assistance in terms of information and advice that would aid them in enhancing their career development.

Perhaps the most striking findings related to the issue of mentoring. Faculty mentoring was assessed through a series of six questioned designed to determine the assistance that had been provided to WUMS faculty in terms of having someone who could provide advice regarding career goals, critique one's scientific, clinical or teaching work, recommend one's participation in invited meetings, on editorial boards and writing invited manuscripts and nominating one for membership in honorary societies. The total possible score for all six questions combined was 30. The average score for WUMS faculty was 18--a decidedly neutral response. There were significant differences in the level of mentoring based on gender, department and how a faculty member acquired their position at WUMS.

Faculty who trained at WUMS received significantly more mentoring (score = 19.4) than faculty who had been recruited from outside the institution (score = 17.0). Faculty who acquired their position as a result of a job offer made to their spouse received the least mentoring (score = 12.1). This latter group was comprised almost exclusively of women (21 of 22 individuals). In every group, female faculty received significantly less mentoring than their male colleagues. For faculty who had trained at WUMS the scores were 19.7 for males and 18.5 for females. For faculty recruited to WUMS, the scores were 17.8 for males and 14.1 for females. The scores reported by women faculty members recruited from outside the institution (independently or with their spouse) were the lowest of any groups studied and indicate that these individuals received essentially no mentoring. (If an individual responded disagree to each of the six mentoring questions, their scaled mentoring score would have been 12.)

Significant differences in the level of mentoring were also observed among departments with medical departments showing the highest (18.5) and preclinical departments showing the lowest levels of mentoring (14.8). Again, for every set of grouped department, women received significantly less mentoring than their male counterparts. Corporate studies have shown that to be successful, women need more mentoring than men. In one study of high ranking corporate executives, 38% of the men but 100% of the women reported having a mentor. Thus, mentoring is not optional for successful women. The apparent lack of mentoring of female faculty at WUMS is likely to be a major contributing factor to the dearth of women in senior faculty ranks.

The specific recommendations of the Task Force on the Status of Women were:

These recommendations were adopted by the Executive Faculty in November and reiterated by the Dean at an open forum sponsored by the Faculty Council on January 8. At the meeting, Linda Pike presented the results of the faculty survey. Dean Peck then presented the recommendations of the Task Force and indicated that he was in the process of drawing up a charter to establish an Office of Faculty Affairs at the medical school.

Subsequent to the release of the Report of the Task Force on the Status of Women, President Diane Merritt wrote a letter to Dean William A. Peck thanking him for establishing the Task Force and supporting their work on the survey. She also asked for a meeting to discuss the proposed Office of Faculty Affairs. The meeting took place on January 13 and was attended by Diane Merritt, Linda Pike, Karen O'Malley, Barbara Zehnbauer, Susie Mallory and Diana Gray.

At the meeting Dean Peck indicated his support for the recommendations of the Task Force and stated that the primary mission of the Office of Faculty Affairs would be the implementation of those recommendations. The position would be part time to allow the faculty member to actively pursue other aspects of their academic career at the medical school. He asked the Board to provide him with names of individuals who they felt would be effective as head of the Office of Faculty Affairs.

Dean Peck also noted that he had presented the Report of the Task Force on the Status of Women to the Educational Policy Board of the Washington University Board of Trustees. In his presentation, he cited the differences in mentoring of male and female faculty as a major contributing factor to the low representation of women in senior faculty positions at the medical school. The response of the Educational Policy Board was "ebullient", he reported.

After the meeting, President Diane Merritt solicited names from the Board members and the AWN membership at-large. She then provided the Dean with a list of six potential candidates to head the Office of Faculty Affairs.

The U.S. National Institutes of Health should require principal investigators to foster the development of female scientists as a condition of receiving funding, a conference on NIH research on women's health recommended last week. "Mentoring should be a mandatory component of every funded PI award for an R01 grant," the draft recommendations from the conference state. "NIH would provide a stipend for the mentoring."

The three-day conference in Bethesda, Maryland, was sponsored by the NIH Office of Research on Women's Health. The mentoring recommendation was compiled by a working group on career issues. At present, NIH does not require investigators on standard R01 grants to offer career support to female co-investigators.

Linda Cottler, Ph.D, Dept. of Psychiatry, was awarded the W. Scott Johnson Award by the Missouri Public Health Association. The was established as a memorial to W. Scott Johnson, an engineer who promoted sanitation standards and programs in Missouri. The award is presented each year to an individuals for outstanding contributions to public health in Missouri. Dr. Cottler received the award in recognition of her work in the field of substance abuse, high risk behaviors and the prevention of HIV infection.

Leslie Kahl, MD., Dept. of Medicine, received a Distinguished Service Teaching Award from the WUMS Class of 1999.

Jean Molleston, MD., Dept. of Pediatrics, was awarded the Stanley Lang Lecturer of the Year Award by the WUMS Class of 2000. She also received a Distinguished Service Teaching Award from the WUMS Class of 1999.

Jane Phillips-Conroy, Ph.D., Dept. of Anatomy and Neurobiology, received a Distinguished Service Teaching Award from the WUMS Class of 2000.

Linda Pike, Ph.D., Dept. of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics, received a Distinguished Service Teaching Award from the WUMS Class of 2000.

Allison Whelan, MD., Dept. of Pediatrics, was named Associate Dean for Undergraduate Medical Education.

"Gone are the days when biomedical products and procedures were tested only on men and then prescribed for men and women. Progress has been made," reports the Society for the Advancement of Women's Health Research in their winter newsletter. However, "recruiting women into clinical trials and then keeping those women in the trials continues to present challenges for the biomedical research community. Obstacles remain. One is that traditional recruiting techniques often do not work with women. Other barriers are the reluctance of some physicians to refer women to clinical trials and women's lack of information about trials. "Last Fall, the Society convened the first meeting of its Clinical Trials Advisory Panel. The panel is part of an ongoing Society effort to address the multi-faceted issues related to the recruitment and retention of women in clinical trials. The Society also plans to continue to work to ensure that women and gender analyses are automatically included in biomedical research.

The National Breast Cancer Coalition has instituted a Congressional Forum Series. The purpose is to provide information to Congressional staff on public policy issues so that the decision-makers can make informed decisions. The January Forum consisted of a panel of speakers who provided a basic overview of breast cancer science and policy issues.

In September, the Coalition will sponsor and environmental summit for scientists and physicians. It will be a fact-finding conference. Pat Etzell, Development Director of the Breast Cancer Coalition, explained that the conference will start with no assumptions. It will ask the scientists what information they would need in order to decide if there is an environmental link to breast cancer and before asking public policy experts to seek to enact legislation.

The Genetic Discrimination Bill has strong support in Congress and from President Clinton, so reports Women's Policy, Inc. The bill would prohibit health insurance from denying or restricting coverage because of a genetic predisposition. This would ensure that women who are tested for the BRCA1 or 2 gene could not be penalized by insurance companies. Louise Slaughter, D-NY, is the sponsor of HR306 in Congress and Olympia Snowe, R-ME, is the sponsor of S89 in the Senate.

Word comes that Dr. Wanda Jones, currently director of the Office of Women's Health for CDC in Atlanta will become the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Women's Health. Her appointment seems related to the President's choice for Surgeon General, currently the director of the CDC.

This year, we celebrated the news that two more women were appointed as deans of medical schools. Lest we celebrate too much, consider this: only eight out of 125 U.S. medical school deans are women. Indeed, women are not well represented in senior positions in academic medicine, period. According to AAMC's 1997 statistics on women in academic medicine, only 5% of clinical chairs and 10% of basic science chairs are women (0% at WUMS). Today, 26% of our faculty are women, but only 10% are full professors (6.7% at WUMS) compared to 31% of men: and the proportion of men and women at each rank has remained stable for over 15 years.

Why do we need more women leaders? We cannot afford not to. Just look at the statistics: In 1997, 42% of medical students and 34% of all residents are women. To insure that women and men progress in their careers, we need more leaders to be role models for these students and residents, as well as mentors for our junior and senior faculty. Individuals at the dean's level must identify how women can be mentored, guided and integrated into leadership positions. Why? Because the demands and pressures on academic medicine will require that we develop different and new models for leadership systems.

It is time that we look at leadership systems that are more inclusive, collaborative, and sane. We need to look beyond those boundaries that tend to confine us--gender, discipline, race, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, and all areas that limit rather than expand our influence. We know we have the talent by virtue of the qualities that attract individuals to academic medicine: unrelenting inquiry, teaching, excellence, service, uncompromising energy, and passion. We need to capitalize on the resources we have and include women at all levels of positional leadership.

A recent initiative supported by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation demonstrates that there is room for all personality types and styles of leadership. The foundation provided funding to seven academic medical centers to move health professions education (for medicine, nursing, and other professional groups) into community sites. In its evaluation of the effort, the foundation identified conditions that facilitated the project's outcomes and desired curriculum changes. These included: 1) an articulated and shared vision; 2) a leader that challenged traditional boundaries related to hierarchy, institutional histories and traditions, disciplines, social, cultural, turf, and gender barriers; 3) managed passion, in which leaders were able to take risks, be creative, and sensitive to the needs for celebration and renewal; and 4) a collaborative system, which included an honest and open redistribution of resources and power. Leaders of the partnerships were both men and women.

Leadership styles may differ among men and women. As Sally Helgesen wrote in her 1990 book, The Female Advantage: Women's Ways of Leadership, women leaders tend to build integrated organizations that focus on nurturing good relationships. Women, she wrote, are less concerned with hierarchy and tend to be more inclusive in their decision-making. Male leaders, on the other hand, often thrive in a hierarchy where command and control come from the top.

A participative leadership model has worked well at the East Caroline University School of Medicine. James A. Hallock, MD., the vice chancellor and dean, shares power and authority with our senior associate dean, Ann C. Jobe, MD.. Over the past two years, these two administrators have included department chairs, representative faculty, and others in a strategic planning process. Working together, the team has been able to reconfigure the curriculum committee process, reorganize our administrative structure, identify core goals, and enhance opportunities for faculty development. This effort required participative leadership and the investment of time by the faculty and administration.

Positive things are happening in other places, as well. In the past two years, two women have served as chairs of the AAMC Council of Academic Societies (CAS). This is remarkable, considering the continued sparse numbers of women who are members of CAS. A team of leaders on the CAS administrative board clearly listened to members of this organization and identified new directions for this leadership arm of the AAMC. The annual AAMC meeting continues to have excellent sessions specifically labeled for women in medicine. It is time, however, that the AAMC no longer fragment its membership into women in medicine. We should have plenary sessions that address both men and women in academic medicine with women from the ranks of AAMC leadership speaking.

A collaborative leadership system is a healthy system that helps everyone contribute to the good of the entire organization. Expanding the leadership system to include women is a major step in assuring that academic medicine is representative and healthy. There remains a paucity of opportunities for women in senior leadership positions in academic medicine. Now, it is time for academic medicine to walk the talk, to not only say the right things, but to do the right things. We have gained more gender equity in the total number of medical students and residents. It is time for more women in dean's positions, department chairs, and senior faculty so that we no longer need to ask, "Where are the women?"

(reprinted from Academic Physician and Scientist, Jan/Feb. 1998)

It's hard to overestimate the importance of professional meetings to any scientist's career. But it is particularly crucial for women to attend, organize, and present their work at conferences, according to successful female scientists.

"Women have lower visibility, less mentorship, and fewer female colleagues per department," observes cell biologist Mina Bissell, director of the Division of Life Sciences at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley. Moreover, she adds, they "have to fight the perception that they are not as competitive as men. Thus, it is more important for women to be exposed to other colleagues' work and ideas, be seen and heard, and network outside their institutions." In order to take full advantage of meetings, Bissell and others advise women to make themselves visible by asking questions at symposia, giving invited talks, and serving on organizing committees.

Women often account for nearly half the audience at biological meetings. Despite their increasing numbers at such professional gatherings, women rarely represent a similar fraction of invited speakers. "There's a real threshold all scientists have to overcome before they get on the meeting 'circuit,'" reports Helen Blau, chairwoman of the department of molecular pharmacology and director of gene therapy technology development at Stanford University School of Medicine. That hurdle is especially high for women, she notes, not because of conscious discrimination, but because mostly male organizing committees favor established speakers and members' friends. When the Association of Women in Science conducted a limited survey of scientific symposia attended by its members in 1993, the association found that fewer than 25% of speakers at most meetings were women. When organizing panels consisted solely of men, only 7% of speakers, on average, were women.

Many scientists agree with Blau that the primary reason for this discrepancy is the relative dearth of women on organizing committees. Several women interviewed for this article say they have seen plenty of anecdotal evidence to support the contention that all-male committees tend to invite a much smaller proportion of female speakers than do committees with female members.

Virginia Zakian, a professor of molecular biology at Princeton University, has collected several examples of meetings that illustrate this apparent bias. Among those she described in a talk at last December's Women in Cell Biology meeting: Nature's 15th International Conference on neuroscience in 1992, at which three of four sessions were chaired by men. In those sessions, all of the speakers were also men; in the single session chaired by a woman, however, three of five speakers were women.

Conference organizers and session chairpersons can do several things to encourage presentations by prominent female colleagues, according to Blau. For example, organizers should consider inviting female scientists who have outstanding publication records but who are not yet "on the circuit," she advises. In addition, Blau encourages women to offer to organize meeting, "and when they do, they should make a conscious effort to invite female speakers." She reports that a session she recently organized for an upcoming meeting of the Gene Therapy Society will consist entirely of women speakers.

Blau's conscious choice of female speakers illustrates her belief that all women are more likely to succeed in science if today's leaders make an effort to "bring other women along." Ultimately, she believes that when representative--rather than mere token--numbers of women speak at scientific meetings, "both men and women will be more comfortable."

Although giving invited talks is the most obvious way scientists gain recognition at conferences, it's not the only one. Even if they are not making a formal presentation, attendees should use meetings to expand their professional networks and discuss their work, advises Jaleh Daie, a professor of botany at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Unfortunately, women often do not take full advantage of networking opportunities at professional conferences, she notes.

"I have always encouraged women to attend scientific meetings, even if they have to spend their own money to do it," Daie says. "That's where you get the latest information--though not necessarily at formal presentations. You can learn a lot by hanging out, talking with people informally."

Making the most of such conversations is a skill--one that men generally acquire by emulating male mentors and joining an already thriving male network. But that's less often the case for female scientists, many of whom don't have good networking skills, according to Daie. That's true in part because most female scientists don't have ready access to informal networks in their places of employment, she continues; women tend to socialize less with their mostly male colleagues, who often get to know each other through stereotypically male activities such as sports.

So it's especially important for female scientists to make the most of networking opportunities at conferences, Daie says. To do so, women "need to go beyond just meeting new people" and instead to lay the groundwork for professional relationships. "The best way to get to know another person's expertise is to share your own," she advises. "At first, you look for a way to give something to the other person and try to get to know them on a substantial level. Later, you can identify ways to support each other."

To young scientists who are attending their first conferences, Daie offers the following advice: "Consider meetings to be working events. Don't just sit passively in sessions or wait to be approached; choose a few people about whose work you want to learn more, seek them out, introduce yourself, and ask them questions." According to Daie, the most productive time at meetings is spent in one-on-one conversation. Talks, she notes, "will be published sooner or later."

by Alison Mack

Excerpted from The Scientist, Nov. 24, 1997)

Power is a most misunderstood concept. It has a negative connotation, yet without it nothing gets done. The more you give away, the more comes back to you. And it doesn't usually show up on organizational charts.

In previous positions, Shirley Chater had plenty of power. She's been president of Texas Woman's University and from 1991 to 1995 headed the U.S. Social Security Administration. Now a Regents Professor at the University of California-San Francisco, she keynoted a November conference on women's leadership, sponsored by the American Association of Colleges and Universities in Washington DC.

Power has many facets. "Informal power is what makes life interesting," she said. Positional power is based on rank or title; it may be temporary, but it works well in crisis situations when someone must take control and give orders.

Chater prefers relational power, which she finds more effective and long-lasting. While women are less likely to have positional power on most campuses, they often have a great advantage in creating and using relational power.

"What you do as leaders will certainly depend on relationships you develop among colleagues, constituents, students and staff," she advised.

"Women very much undervalue their own strengths," Chater said, like using their power and organizational skills to get things done.
Citing Warren Bennis on leadership, she said managers are those who do things right, while leaders know the right thing to do. Now facing many serious challenges, higher education needs leaders who can do the right things at the right time. Women leaders excel at using various types of power.

The power of persistence. Chater spoke of a mother whose newborn was assigned a social security number with three sixes, which the Bible considers a sign of the devil. She pleaded with authorities at local, regional and national social security offices for a new number. No dice. The mother persisted and eventually got to Chater herself who found out the "we had enough computer capacity to give everyone six social security numbers, so we just skipped that one and gave her another." The mother's persistence brought her success, even in a bureaucracy of 65,000 employees.

The power of persuasion. Informal power often relies on persuasion, but so does positional power because there's always someone above you in the hierarchy. Chater had to persuade the White House to allow her to assemble her own team of people with diverse skills to help her lead the Social Security Administration. "I was one of few administrators whose team had the competence it needed," she said, because she was able to persuade and negotiate for people with the skills she needed. "Bringing in new people to change the culture is incredibly important," she said.

The power of communication. Good communication means you have to "Say what you do and repeat it over and over and over," she said. Chater's favorite way to communicate is through stories, because people remember them long after they've forgotten facts and numbers. "The power of a story to make clear a vision is phenomenal," she says.

The power of vision. At the social security agency, her vision was to create an environment where employees provide "extraordinary service in a world class fashion" and put the customer first.

Because the phones rang off the hook the first week after checks went out, they wanted to improve service to callers by spreading phone calls throughout the month. When they asked recipients how they'd feel about changing the process to send some out each Wednesday of the month, instead of just on the first, clients said, "Are you kidding? We've spent our whole lives trying to negotiate how to pay our bills based on the checks being sent out the first Wednesday, and now you want to change?"

Instead, they decided to improve response to phone calls by arranging that only new clients would be affected.

The power of redesigning processes. "Redesign means literally wiping the slate clean and starting over rather than trying to mend what is in place," Chater said. It's a great opportunity to think creatively outside the box and use current technology and information to improve processes.

At Texas Woman's University in 1986, students sweltered in 110 degree sun in serpentine lines to register for classes. Watching them from her presidential perch, she wanted to improve the process. First they tried band-aid approaches like bringing students ice-cold lemonade, sending out advisors to help them select classes and offering child care while they waited. Finally they decided to set up a new telephone registration system, open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. When students ignored the new system, they learned the preferred time to register was 3 a.m., so they changed the hours.

The power of change. "Re-engineering a whole culture like higher education takes an incremental approach," Chater advised, but there are ways to jump start the process.

So successful was their effort that in a private survey on who did the best job answering their 800 phone number, the Social Security folks came out on top, better even than L.L. Bean, AT&T and Nordstrom's.

(excerpted from Women in Higher Education, December 1997.)

AWNings wants to know.

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Promotion or Award____________________

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Send to:

Linda Pike

Box 8231 (or pike@biochem.wustl.edu)

Last modified: August 18, 2003