Female Managers: Taking the First Steps on Your Management Journey
Explore the key early steps that empower women in management roles, based on Global Perspective’s comprehensive second Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) report.
As you read this, picture yourself as a newly appointed female leader on a journey through six crucial steps that help empower and pave the way to success for women in management.
This is not a solo voyage - companies, teams, experienced leaders, and employees are all part of this expedition. Together, we can support diversity in management from the first day and lay the foundations for successful, diverse leadership to thrive.
The First Step: Launching the Management Journey
Picture your first day as a manager. The office suddenly looks different, doesn’t it?
It can be intimidating, with an extra layer of challenges often reserved for women. Imagine overcoming initial hesitation, silencing that inner voice asking, "why me?" in your head.
Imagine supportive supervisors and team members as your travel guides, fostering a culture where it is safe to fail, grow, and learn from each management trial.
Creating a Nurturing Environment: Internal Company Support
Your new management journey forms part of a bigger journey for your organisation. Promoting and supporting female leaders involves active support of career progression through training and coaching, ensuring continuous improvement.
Companies also need to address challenges of balancing personal needs and professional ambitions.
Imagine the relief and joy you would feel as a newly appointed manager if your company clearly demonstrates that it understands and respects your situation and needs, such as giving you a platform to lead without sacrificing life or family quality due to unreasonable or inflexible work expectations.
Gaining Momentum: Inspiration and Role Models
Every explorer needs inspiration and role models that help chart the way forward.
For female leaders, these could be pioneers who have successfully traversed the leadership landscape.
Imagine drawing inspiration from internal as well as external sources. Picture yourself, standing on the shoulders of senior female managers, learning from their experiences, stories, and advice.
Navigating Leadership: Communication
Communication fills a great deal of the day for any manager. It is through communication that you direct your team and guide their efforts toward success. As a leader, you carry a treasury of life experiences that can shape your growth. Picture yourself articulating a shared goal that unites your team towards greater achievements.
Imagine that your company has a strong company culture promoting trust through transparency and consistency that includes how communication flows across all levels of the organisation.
Charting the Path: Learning How to Lead
Leadership is very much a learning-by-doing process. As a new manager, you are constantly learning and evolving. Especially in the early days in your management career, lessons from your superiors and their support and guidance are invaluable.
Imagine a work situation where you can lean on role models, superiors, and the full backing of your team in the process of shaping team culture.
Mastering the Ebb and Flow: Team Dynamics
By now, you are growing in confidence as a leader, and are becoming increasingly proficient at one of the core aspects of management: team dynamics. You are the one who empowers your team, setting clear expectations, and fostering trust.
Imagine how you are handling conflicts, keeping engagement high, embracing team diversity, listen with an open mind, and help create a platform for diverse expression and superior team performance.
From Imagination to Real
Throughout the six steps, we have asked you to imagine different scenarios. This is a first step in creating change. By conceiving the reality we wish to create, we can start to map out the paths that will lead us there. This overlaps with a core aspect of management: turning the imagined into reality.
By harnessing this power in a collaborative way on a company, leadership, management, and individual level, we can shape the future of our organizations and encourage diversity in leadership and management.
Learn more
This article builds on Global Perspective’s comprehensive second Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) report. The report reflects valuable input from a diverse pool of successful managers who have navigated their unique paths in leadership in Japan. Their experiences have been distilled into practical guidance to empower and inspire the next generation of leaders.
