UCI’s Feminine Touch
VIEWPOINT by Judy B. Rosener
What do the country of New Zealand and the Graduate School of Management at UC Irvine have in common? Both are being led by a number of very competent women!
The two leading political party candidates for prime minister in New Zealand’s last election were women, so it was a forgone conclusion the country would have a female prime minister. In addition, the minister of justice (similar to the U.S. Attorney General) and a number of top other ministers are women.
However, I suspect very few students, faculty, staff or members of the business community expected a woman would be chosen to lead the Graduate School of Management at UCI as the acting dean, and that the two vice deans would also be female. This is not only a first for UCI, I suspect it is a first for any major business school in the country.
Professor Jone Pearce, who will become acting dean on July 1, is a respected organizational behavior scholar, an outstanding teacher and a longtime GSM faculty member. She is also the current president of the National Academy of Management, the professional organization of business school academics from across the country. Serving with Professor Pearce will be Mary Gilly, a marketing professor, and Joanna Ho, an accounting professor, both of whom, like Pearce, have had prior administrative responsibilities. Their visibility as scholar/academic administrators will be welcomed not only by women academics at UCI and across the country, but also by professional women everywhere.
David Blake, dean of GSM for the last five years, has supported and appointed women to key positions, and the GSM tenure-track faculty has a larger percentage of women than almost all most major business schools. However, at UCI, like most academic institutions across the country, women in almost all disciplines tend to be underrepresented in the full professorship ranks, tend to report unfair treatment when it comes to the evaluation of their work, tend to be paid less than their male peers, and tend to feel marginalized.
It is believed that when women are in visible positions of responsibility, students, faculty and staff of both sexes become more accepting of, and value the differences that, women bring to positions of power by virtue of their experiences as women. This is what makes this appointment so noteworthy.
With the addition of Professor Pearce as the acting dean of GSM, UCI will have five female deans and a possibility of a sixth. This means that currently 50% of UCI deans are women. The UCI chancellor and executive vice chancellor should be commended for bringing about this change since until recently, there were none!
Professor Pearce’s appointment is particularly welcome at this time since UCI is the recipient of a five-year, $3.45 million National Science Foundation grant aimed at enhancing gender equity on college and university campuses. The grant will result in the development and implementation of practices, programs and specific actions that will ensure that the climate for women academics is improved. It is assumed that as perceived and real inequities in the recruitment, retention and advancement of women academics are addressed, so too will the academic climate for men and people of color be improved. UCI and the University of Michigan are the only two public universities to receive this grant.
How the monies are used, and the ultimate outcomes associated with the grant, are being closely monitored by both those who know this type of effort is needed to address documented gender inequities as well as by those who oppose special programs for women. This means that UCI and its Graduate School of Management have the opportunity to lead the way in ensuring that business schools and institutions of higher learning improve the recruitment, retention and advancement of women. This is something that the business community also recognizes is a “bottom line” human capital issue!
Rosener is a professor in the Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Irvine and author of “America’s Competitive Secret: Women Managers.” She can be reached at
JBRosene@uci.edu.
