News Category: News
On International Women’s Day Vancouver Sun Op Ed Highlights Need for Women in Science 
Lack of women in science needs to be addressed
The Newspaper’s View – March 8, 2011, p. A12
Each year, International Women’s Day provides the world with an opportunity to review how women are doing on a variety of measures, and to assess where things have improved and where improvement is still sorely needed. So we typically hear about important topics such as women’s health, employment and education.
But while education is emphasized, the focus tends to be on the percentage of girls who attend and graduate from primary and secondary schools rather than on advanced education. This is understandable, since girls who don’t finish primary or high school have little chance of completing university.
Yet advanced education is also an important matter, since it is essential for ensuring a solid future in the knowledge economy, and since those possessed of it produce much of the knowledge that moves society forward. So for this reason, the United Nations chose “Equal access to education, training and science and technology: Pathway to decent work for women” as its theme for International Women’s Day 2011.
In recent years, the matter of women in science has received some attention given that women were -and are -under-represented in science faculties. While much of the attention has focused on the Western world, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s 2006 document, Women In Science, provides a worldwide snapshot of how women are doing in science and technology.
Although UNESCO did not have data from many countries, including Canada and the United States, its assessment of 89 countries with available data found that women constitute slightly more than one-quarter of all researchers. By 2006, only 18 per cent of countries had achieved gender parity in research, which is defined as having women make up between 45 and 55 per cent of all researchers.
Latin America did surprisingly well, as 46 per cent of its researchers are women, but in Asia, women constituted just 15 per cent. Perhaps surprisingly, only 32 per cent of European researchers are women, almost the same as in Africa, where women constitute 29 per cent of the research workforce.
There are likely multiple reasons for this under-representation of women, but one is certainly the fact that significantly fewer women than men complete doctoral degrees, especially in the sciences. This is particularly troubling given that more women attend universities and complete undergraduate degrees. Indeed, while 22 per cent of countries reported gender parity, more than half (54 per cent) reported that women represent more than 55 per cent of their undergrad degree recipients. Women are also (slightly) more likely to complete a second degree, yet in only 20 per cent of countries are women more likely than men to graduate from doctoral programs. For one reason or another, then, the gender gap intensifies at increasingly advanced levels of education.
The disparity between men and women is even more dramatic in the sciences, where just eight per cent of countries found women more likely to complete a doctorate. But then men tend to outnumber women in sciences even at the undergrad level.
If we look a little deeper, we find that women do dominate some scientific fields, such as medicine, but are grossly under-represented in other fields, such as engineering and computing.
The reasons for this are not entirely clear, though many have been suggested: In addition to outright discrimination, the under-representation of women has been attributed to an unwelcoming climate in some science faculties, the lack of an acceptable work/life balance in the sciences, the lack of female role models in the sciences, and the failure of science faculties and scientific enterprises to actively recruit women.
On International Women’s Day 2011, it’s worth discussing how we can dismantle those factors that exclude half the population from the future of Canada and the world.
Why more women aren’t becoming engineers
by Jennifer Myers
Globe and Mail – Tuesday, Nov. 09, 2010 5:29PM EST
Winnie Lai never really had any doubts about what she would study after high school. “I love to take things apart. I like science and math. I knew early on that I wanted to study engineering.”
A top physics student, Ms. Lai said that her high school physics teacher, who was also an engineer, nudged her dream along, providing support and encouragement. “I spent a lot of time talking with her and she prepared me, helped me understand what to expect at university.”
The two kept in touch while Ms. Lai pursued her undergraduate degree in engineering physics at the University of British Columbia. And when she graduated last spring, it was that same high school teacher who presented her with her iron ring. “It’s custom that the ring is presented by a fellow engineer, so that was quite special.”
Ms. Lai was fortunate to find a female mentor to guide her through her science and engineering studies. In what’s still largely a male-dominated field, such role models are hard to find.
In fact, the number of women getting into engineering in Canada has been on the decline, despite a decade of efforts to encourage more girls to think of technical careers. Even though women currently make up more than half of the undergraduate populations across Canada, the number of women enrolled in engineering programs dropped from a high of 21 per cent in 2001 to 17 per cent in 2009. The portion of licensed engineers in Canada who are women has grown from 7 per cent in 2000, but the figure still sits at only 10 per cent, according to Ottawa-based Engineers Canada.
Why don’t more young women take an interest in science and engineering? It’s certainly not for lack of efforts at motivation. In the past five years, industry and academics alike have introduced myriad initiatives designed to attract more women to the field.
Tyseer Aboulnasr, dean of the faculty of applied science and a professor of electrical engineering at the University of British Columbia, said the decline rests squarely on the shoulders of engineers themselves.
“Collectively, we have focused too much on the technology side, on building things,” Dr. Aboulnasr said. Women tend to want to help people and choose careers that allow them to make a meaningful contribution to society, and may not see how engineering can have such an impact, she said. “Somehow we lost the message that engineering can improve people’s lives.”
That is reflected by the fact that women are a significant presence in certain engineering disciplines (biosystems, environmental, chemical), in which they can clearly see how their work makes a difference.
Valerie Davidson, an engineering professor at the University of Guelph who is also the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council/RIM chair for women in science and engineering, said there is still an overall lack of awareness of what engineers do.
Ms. Lai agrees that misconceptions about engineering abound. When she first embarked on her engineering degree, she recalled, even her friends thought it was “dirty work, something that a tradesperson would do.”
A 2009 Engineers Canada survey of young women in high school found that many had negative perceptions of engineering and technology occupations. According to the report: “Most equate engineering and technology (but especially engineering) with construction work, outdoor work, working in a cubicle, and relating primarily to computers and machines, rather than people.”
The result is that women attribute lower status to engineering and technology occupations compared with, for example, health and social sciences.
That’s not surprising, Dr. Davidson said. “There’s high prestige for the medical profession. From a very early age it’s seen as important work and a privilege,” she noted, adding it’s the sort of message the engineering community has failed to leverage.
The study also pointed to another deterrent: discomfort with a male-dominated environment and the consequent need to adapt.
“It’s still a difficult place for women to be,” agrees Kerry Black, who is currently finishing her thesis for her master’s degree in civil engineering at UBC. Ms. Black, who completed her undergraduate degree at the University of Toronto in 2007, said she learned that lesson even before she began studying engineering.
While attending a Toronto-based university fair in 2002, she asked a Queen’s University representative about the admission requirements for the engineering program. “The gentleman looked at me and said, ‘You have to have good marks, perhaps you might want to consider other programs,’ ” she recalled. “I asked him four or five different times what marks I needed, and couldn’t get a straight answer.”
Incensed by his response, Ms. Black, a top high school student who excelled in sciences and math, enrolled at U of T. Once there, she said, she struggled, largely because she didn’t fit the image of a traditional engineer: “I like makeup, I like to dress up and wear high heels and that made me a target. There were comments made in the classroom and that did bother me.” It wasn’t until she was connected with a female engineering professor, who became her mentor, that she really felt on track. Without that support, Ms. Black said she likely would not have stayed in the field.
Some schools are increasing the number of female faculty to provide more role models that will in turn help attract more young women to the profession. Meanwhile, much of the emphasis of both universities and industry associations is getting out the message that engineering is a helping profession.
At UBC, Dr. Aboulnasr said the focus is on “bringing back the idea that through engineering you can make people’s lives better.” To highlight the connections between engineering, solutions and society, UBC has introduced community service learning into its curriculum. Last year, for example, fourth-year students worked with community partners to develop shoes for a woman who had difficulty walking, Dr. Aboulnasr said.
University of Toronto and Queen’s University each report modest increases in the number of female engineering students this year. And the number of women registered in Engineer in Training programs across Canada (a mandatory prelicensing phase), is now equal to the number of female engineering graduates, Guelph’s Dr. Davidson said.
Initiatives designed to reach high school girls are also showing promise. Go Eng Girl!, an annual event supported by Ontario’s 15 faculties of engineering and the Ontario Network of Women in Engineering, is aimed at promoting engineering to girls in grades seven to 10. It has grown steadily since it began in 2005. This year’s event attracted more than 1,000 girls, up from about 600 participants in 2009.
Although much still needs to be done to change the negative perceptions that discourage women from becoming engineers, Ms. Black is cautiously optimistic. “It’s a profession steeped in tradition. It is changing, but at a glacial pace.”
Government accused of manipulating science news
Wednesday, September 29, 2010 | 4:38 PM ET CBC News
The federal government engages in “unacceptable political interference”
in the communication of government science, says the head of a group
that represents both government press officers and science journalists.
“Openness is being held ransom to media messages that serve the
government’s political agenda,” wrote Kathryn O’Hara, president of the
Canadian Science Writers’ Association, in an opinion published online
Wednesday in the international scientific journal Nature.
The article comes during Right to Know Week in Canada, a celebration of
open information that “ironically … comes on the back of new evidence of
unacceptable political interference in the public statements of federal
government researchers,” said O’Hara, who is also the CTV chair in
science broadcast journalism at Carleton University.
“This message manipulation shows a disregard for both the values and
virtues of journalism and science,” she said.
O’Hara, whose group represents more than 450 media professionals,
communications officers, technical writers and educators, including
government press officers, referred to a case detailed recently by
PostmediaNews journalist Margaret Munro.
Documents obtained by Munro through access to information showed
several communications managers, policy advisers, political staff and
senior officials were involved drafting and vetting “media lines” for
Natural Resources Canada geoscientist Scott Dallimore.
Consequently, it took a week for him to get clearance to talk to the
media about his study on a flood in northern Canada 13,000 years ago,
which was published in Nature on April 1.
O’Hara wrote that when scientists are muzzled, it is hard to maintain
public trust in taxpayer-funded research. Journalists need to talk to
scientists to avoid misinterpreting research, she added.
Her article called for a return to a procedure “that has served us well
in the past.”
It used to be, O’Hara said in an interview, that journalists could
simply phone a federal scientist and talk to him or her.
And there was a period of time not long ago when departments such as
Health Canada were becoming more and more accessible, she said.
“After this government came in,” O’Hara said, “it was like the door
shut again.”
Problem not acknowledged
The science writers’ association began talks with at least one deputy
minister after its members, including both journalists and press
officers, voiced their frustrations at the group’s annual meeting June.
However, O’Hara said that so far the government hasn’t acknowledged
there is a problem, and that is a big challenge.
Natural Resources Canada spokeswoman Patti Robson told CBC News in an
email earlier in September that it “has adhered and continues to adhere
to the Communications Policy of the Government of Canada, which has been
in effect for years.”
The statement was in response to Munro’s piece, which showed new rules
went into force in March requiring Natural Resources Canada scientists
to get “pre-approval” from minister Christian Paradis’s office to speak
with journalists and to get ministerial approval for all their “media
lines.”
Robson said it is the “obligation” of the office of the natural
resources minister to “review the coming and going of all information
related to the department.”
Environment Canada was accused of being “in lockdown mode” on an
opinion piece in the Montreal Gazette Saturday by environmental
journalist Glen Blouin.
The department has publicly maintained that for the past two years it
has followed a media relations policy consistent with those used by many
private and public sector organizations and designed to ensure media
requests get quick, accurate, and consistent responses.
Press officers frustrated
Despite the official lines, during this year’s Canadian Science
Writers’ Association, it was government press officers who expressed the
most frustration about recent changes to rules for communicating with
the media, which extend well beyond interview requests.
Among them was Carolyn Brown, who left her job as the manager of
journals at the National Research Council Research Press in to pursue a
freelance career in June, around the time the federal publishing house
was privatized.
Many scientific journals routinely issue press releases about articles
that are of public interest. Brown did that to generate media interest
when articles in the NRC Research Press’s 15 journals were relevant to
Canadian communities or public policy issues – “because these are
academic journals not usually read by non-scientists,” she told CBC News
in a recent interview.
However, two years ago, new rules began requiring the press releases to
get approval from the Privy Council Office.
The first time Brown went through the new procedure, her press release
was not approved. She was told someone in Parks Canada objected to the
independent research about rivers in Banff National Park. The second
time, the press release was delayed until months after the article it
described was published.
“After a couple of these experiences, we decided it was not worth our
time and trouble to put out press releases anymore about articles
appearing in our journals,” she said.
Colleagues at other departments recounted similar experiences, she
said: “Delays to the point that the press release wasn’t relevant. Press
releases being completely stopped. And press releases being rewritten to
put the focus on the MP in the riding.”
The Canadian Science Writers’ Association put out a call to members in
August asking them to submit reports about such incidents from both
journalists’ and government press officers’ perspectives to present
during the group’s talks with government officials.
SCWIST member Dr. Judy Illes discusses popular Body Worlds exhibit
Body of evidence demonstrates human frailty
Immensely explicit, fantastically popular corpse exhibit returns to Science World
By Pamela Fayerman – Vancouver Sun – September 16, 2010, p. A1, A12
A pregnant women with a five-month-old fetus exposed through her opened uterus is among the preserved human bodies in an exhibition that opens today at Science World in Vancouver.
The display may be controversial, but that’s not the point of the Body Worlds exhibition, which set attendance records when it was last in Vancouver in 2006, says the show’s creative designer.
Dr. Angelina Whalley said cadavers like the pregnant specimen or those posed in intercourse positions—which aren’t included in the Vancouver show—are meant to be educational, not sensational, and to show “how life starts.”
Whalley is married to Dr. Gunther von Hagens, a German pathologist who invented the plastination technique in which human body fluids are replaced with a liquid plastic. A process then “cures” the corpses into human mannequins.
Dr. Judy Illes, a University of B.C. neurology professor who is also the Canada Research Chair in neuroethics, said although the exhibit is unquestionably explicit, “every art and science initiative has its strengths and its limitations.”
“The strengths of this exhibit are, unequivocally, in the educational potential,” said Illes, a member of a community advisory group set up by Science World a few months ago to get feedback on ways to present the material in a respectful manner.
Julie Robillard, a UBC post-doctoral fellow in neuroethics who helped Illes develop educational materials for Science World, said she thinks people will be compelled to “think about human fragility [and] contemplate death so that we can learn about our finite existence.”
“Contemplating life is a big goal of the exhibit. Learning about anatomy and comparing health and sickness is a worthy educational goal. There’s a lot of evidence to show that public understanding of science can significantly improve health outcomes. Comparing a healthy lung and sick lung is very educational.”
The only clues about the death of the pregnant woman who donated her body for exhibit purposes are her black lungs, which suggests she may have died from lung cancer.
An introductory video, along with other materials that viewers can see before entering the exhibit, will help prepare them for what they’ll see.
To help engage those who attend the exhibit, Science World is for the first time hosting an interactive online open forum involving Illes, Robillard and other experts in various medical fields.
The web link, accessed from the Science World website ( http://www.science-world.ca),will enable members of the public to ask questions of medical experts or make comments to stimulate discussion.
“They can pose questions and we will be available at the helm to answer, in a very dynamic, rapid way,” said Illes. “It’s not a live web chat, since it’s not in real time, but it will be monitored regularly.
“We think it’s a fantastic opportunity to further educate public and to give them a voice.”
She said she expects people will want to discuss their experience, but noted the exhibit “is not a source of medical information, nor are we. I don’t think this exhibition is geared to provide medical advice or counselling. It’s there to show what the body and brain looks like in health and disease.”
Whalley said 11,000 living humans, including nearly 100 Canadians, have indicated they would like to donate their bodies upon death to the Body Worlds enterprise, which now has exhibitions on tour in six cities around the world.
Although some Catholic leaders have criticized the display of fetuses and humans in athletic poses as offensive and even “ghoulish,” more than 30 million people have bought tickets to see the show since it first started touring in 1995. Critics have called the exhibit “pornography of the dead” or a kind of “human taxidermy.”
But Bryan Tisdall, president of Science World, said it would be next to impossible to imagine “a more fitting, engrossing topic” for a Science World exhibition.
“I can’t fathom another show ever bringing in more people. There is nothing with as much appeal as the body we all live in.”
The Science World exhibition, which runs to January 2011, features 200 plastinated specimens—including 25 human cadavers and several brains, including one affected by stroke and another by Alzheimer’s disease.
The previous Body Worlds exhibition at Science World drew nearly 350,000 people.
Science World (Telus World of Science) managers are hoping for the same attendance levels, but expect construction on the building’s exterior may deter some visitors. The interior exhibition space is largely unaffected, except for lots of noise.
Tisdall is particularly proud of the statistics from the 2006 show, when 74 per cent of those who attended were adults ( “very different from our usual demographic”) and 68 per cent of ticket buyers had never before been to Science World.
Ticket prices range from $8 to $25 and advance purchase—by phone (604-443-7530) or online—is recommended.
SCWIST Member Elizabeth Croft new chair for Women in Science and Technology
SCWIST member and University of British Columbia Mechanical Engineering professor Elizabeth Croft has been appointed the NSERC Chair for Women in Science and Engineering for the BC and Yukon region.
Male graduates had higher earnings than female graduates, at all levels of education
From the National Graduates Survey Class of 2005, published by StatsCan
The difference in annual earnings by level of education differed for males and females who were working full-time (Chart 2.6). For females, the median earnings increased by level of education. For males, the median earnings increased from the college to bachelor level and from the bachelor to master level but stayed the same between the master and doctorate levels.
Across all levels of education, males typically earned more than females (Chart 2.6). Furthermore, as the earnings level (percentile) increased, the gap between the genders increased as well – at least among college, bachelor and master graduates. At the doctorate level, the difference between male and female earnings still existed at the median and the 75th percentile, but was narrower than at other levels of education. At the 25th percentile, however, earnings of female doctorate graduates actually exceeded those of males by $2,400. The largest earnings gap between the genders was at the master level, at the 75th percentile, where gross earnings for males exceeded those of women by $13,000. This pattern did not change from five years before.
Earnings distribution of 2005 graduates working full-time in 2007, by gender and level of study
http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/81-595-m/2009074/activ-eng.htm
Male faculty out-earn females at universities
By Allison Cross – Vancouver Sun – August 11, 2010, p. B2
Male professors at Canadian universities on average earn higher salaries than their female colleagues—with the discrepancy reaching more than $20,000 at some institutions, according to Statistics Canada.
The average salary of a full-time, male teaching-staff member at the University of Toronto, excluding medical and dental faculty, is $20,362 higher than a full-time, female teaching-staff member, data from 2008 and 2009 show.
The University of Calgary has the second-largest gap, with male teaching staff earning $20,147 more than female professors.
Other schools reported similar discrepancies: Dalhousie University ($16,162) and McGill University ($15,082) are two examples.
University officials say these pay discrepancies aren’t a sign of modern bias but the result of former hiring practices that favoured men, the age and rank of professors and the distribution of men and women in different disciplines.
“When you actually factor in all those variables then, in fact, the gender differences in salary largely disappear,” said Edith Hillan, vice-provost, faculty and academic life, at the University of Toronto.
Fields such as business, computer science and engineering tend to pay more and are dominated by men, while female-dominated fields, such as social sciences and the humanities, pay less.
“In general, when you look at the data, unfortunately, I think it’s probably only about 18 to 20 per cent of all full professors [are] women across Canada,” Hillan said. “In a sense … a lot of it is the result of hiring practices in the past.
“At [the University of Toronto] we’re doing pretty well. Over the last few years, through a very proactive recruitment process, we’ve got up to the 50-per-cent mark in terms of woman hires. But most of them are going to be at junior ranks, because that’s the way the bulk of our professors come in.”
Pay gap
How the gender gap plays out in major B.C. universities.
University of B.C.: $16,559
Simon Fraser University: $13,095
University of Victoria: $11,526
University of Northern B.C.: $7,590
Gender bias in sciences
Women paid less, receive fewer awards, resources
By Margaret Munro, Vancouver Sun, June 24, 2010 – p. B6
Women scientists in every country, including Canada, tend to be paid a lot less than their male counterparts, according to an international survey.
Six to 10 years after completing their PhDs, men’s salaries start to increase relative to women’s, according to the survey of 10,500 scientists that found a pronounced gender pay gap. And the gap widens over time, it found, with men’s salaries 18 to 40 per cent higher than women’s in Australia, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, India, Japan, the United States and Canada. Male scientists in Canada averaged $80,000 US, compared to women whose pay is closer to $65,000.
The finding fits with a notable gender bias in Canadian science, where men win a lot more than big salaries. Last month, the Harper government awarded all 19 of its new $10-million research awards to men. Not only were no women selected for the prestigious prizes, called the Canada Excellence Research Chairs, but there was not a female name on the short list of 36 candidates considered.
The all-male prizes re-ignited a debate over whether gender equality will ever be a reality on Canadian campuses.
“That this sort of thing can still happen is an embarrassment for Canada and profoundly demoralizing for the women scientists in this country,” Lynne Quarmby, a professor in the molecular biology and biochemistry department at Simon Fraser University, said shortly after the all-male prizes were announced.
The results of a career survey in the journal Nature this week show the salary gender bias is an international phenomenon.
It is likely the result of “accumulating inequities in resources and respect,” says Kathleen Christensen, who specializes in workplace issues at the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, a non-profit research organization in New York.
Women scientists often start their careers with slightly lower salaries, in more poorly equipped labs, with fewer graduate students and appointments to less-prestigious committees, Christensen writes in a commentary.
Technical Interview Tips
by Sabina Nawaz
Three Ways To Find A Twinkle In Their Eye
3 keys to interviewing and hiring a candidate to die for, who you can live with- in the cubicle next to you
I have seen so many of them. They all are well dressed and pleasant. I like many but none has totally hit the mark. I really hope that he is The One.
I had flown back to the East Coast to conduct on campus college interviews sessions as a technical hiring manager on behalf of my company. By 11am I had already seen five candidates. After talking to each person, I’d recommend whether or not we fly them back for a day long interview at our headquarters. Whether on campus or in your office,
if you’ve interviewed candidates, I’m sure you’ve been where I was at this point. While it’s great to see a variety of candidates with many options from which to choose, you also really want the candidate in front of you to succeed. So you can have someone on board as soon as possible, so you can free up your calendar to do the rest of your job, and so you can delegate with confidence that it will be done well.
To help with this, wouldn’t it be great if you could measure the brilliance of the twinkle in their eyes and know your perfect candidate? Unfortunately we are not there. And so each of us develops some techniques, questions, approaches to interviewing. In addition to the specific technical questions you might pose, the points below cover three key areas to consider in helping you identify not just someone who looks good today but someone who will continue to be attractive after you have dealt with the issue threatening your next milestone. A full time hire lasts beyond your current project and might even outlast you.
It’s not just his skill but also his will
Your project was in crisis. His coding skills were superlative and he could definitely hit the ground running. You hired him. It’s been three months since he started. Number of lines of code written to date: zero. One of my hiring mistakes was someone like this. I was so bowled over by his technical prowess that I didn’t pay attention to an uneasy feeling in my gut. My gut was asking me to pay attention to the fact that he had his sunglasses on the whole time we talked. That he never described his specific contributions to a project when I probed behaviorally about his past projects. And that he obliquely blamed many different circumstances for lack of traction. Especially when you are in high need of certain skills and find yourself really excited about someone who is great in that arena, take the time to ask behavioral questions _ aimed at finding out if they’re just smart or if they also get things done. _Many people’s hiring mistakes are not because of a lack of the employee’s skill but a lack of will. We often have a barrage of skill based questions. How often do you ask will based questions?
Example questions:
•Describe your specific role and what you did on a project from start to finish.
•How did you handle unexpected situations?
•What would your manager/co-worker say was your most significant contribution to that project?
Look for:
•Specific contributions vs. generalized words like synergized, facilitated, and teamed up with.
Are others better because of her?
The twinkle in her eye might be bright because of their high IQ. But what about her EQ? Today’s business needs require more and more horizontal integration
and reliance on people across the globe. I currently coach a talented executive who is considering leaving his job because he is miserable every time he has to interact with a peer of his who I’ll call Joe. And the success of their business depends on their ability to work well together. He is not the only one. All of Joe’s peers find him challenging at best. They range from those who tolerate him and limit their interactions as much as possible to my client whose day job requires a heavy dose of Joe’s presence. The company might suffer both a business and talent casualty as a result of this non team player. Do you ask questions aimed at determining whether the candidate will be able to play well with others instead of someone who leaves a wake collateral damage?
Example questions:
•Describe a time when someone else wasn’t pulling their weight on a project that you were both on. What did you do?
•How did you handle a challenging situation with a co-worker?
•If you were to do this again, what would you do differently?
Look for:
•How accountable they are about their own actions and reactions vs. blaming others
•What they have learned through each experience
•How capable they are of challenging and changing their own assumptions and behaviors
Maybe is not an option
I loved the red in that dress. I adored the cute little piping in that jacket. And I absolutely had to have those shoes with the oversized buckles. I bought these three years ago. They still have their tags. Either because they didn’t fit just right or didn’t work with other things in my closet. When something has a spark of potential, I like to keep my options open. For as long as I can. Sometimes even longer than the expiration date for when I can return an unused and unsuitable purchase.
When interviewing candidates who are here to stay, I have to curb this desire. At the end of the interview process, if I don’t have a clear hire/no hire answer, if I’m still thinking of him as a ‘maybe’, then my answer converts to a ‘no hire’. Headcount is precious. And a bad hire will haunt you for several months if not years. If you find yourself hesitant, keep looking.
Sample questions (to ask yourself):
•What is it about this person that I concretely like?
•What is it about this person that I’m hesitant about?
•What did I not hear that I wished I’d heard during the interview?
Look for:
•Your gut reactions. What is it about the person that you may not yet have given voice to that’s making you uncertain?
•Others’ reactions – often they won’t have written it but talking to them could validate and clarify your own concerns
My day on the East Coast college campus ended at 5pm. I interviewed 14 candidates. It’s been five years since I left that company to start my own consulting practice. I’m happy to report that one of the people who I recommended as a ‘fly back’ that day still works there. She demonstrates will and not just skill, those around her love working with her, and she’s one of the first additions to new project teams.
………………………………………………………
Sabina Nawaz is an executive coach and leadership development consultant with a global business of clients in 22 different countries and companies worth more than $100 billion. She has deep, hands-on experience having started her career in software development. Sabina brings a C-suite view into a variety of organizations around the world. To learn more about her work, or ask further questions about this article, visit http://www.sabinanawaz.com
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Report: Pipeline’s Broken Promise
pipelines_broken_promise_final_021710.pdf
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Report: Why So Few? Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics
The AAUW (formerly known as the American Association of University Women) has released the following comprehensive report on the status of women in STEM. The report was funded in part by the National Science Foundation in the United States. Read a copy of the report here.
Wed Feb 01
