Letter from Dr Judy B. Rosener published in the Financial Times:
Sir, I found the article "A contested question of quotas" (October 18) very interesting since I have been studying women and men in the workplace for almost 20 years, and it seems to me that the answer to the problem of so few women in large companies is pretty simple . . . change the culture of organisations. None of the changes needed seemed to be mentioned in the article.
First, admit that men and women are different, and that difference does not mean deficiency. In fact, the way men and women think and act are different - MRIs and CAT scans and PET scans show those differences - so because there is more to biology than was previously thought, leaders need to look at female and other kinds of diversity as added value.
So change the way you recruit, change the way you give feedback, change the way you provide benefits and perks, change the way you assign tasks and change the way you evaluate so that women are not disadvantaged for not thinking and acting like men. As I once said at a meeting of men in the automobile industry: "If women designed cars, there would be a place for our purse."
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