I've had the great fortune of being led by exceptionally capable women - women who are a rare find in today's cut-throat business world - and I've also had the misfortune of working with female team leaders who, sadly, think their role is confined to advancing up the corporate ladder as quickly as possible.
We all know the clich'es: that women need to step on toes and heads so that they can get anywhere near the top, in the process being labelled with all sorts of vulgar nicknames by those they have cast aside in their race for victory.
This really doesn't have to be the case. Sadly, it seems this is a consequence of the lack of examples of solid female leadership in corporate SA. The dog-eat-dog world is dominated by strong men, and women feel a need to tackle the boardroom on these men's terms. That's nothing new. Goodness only knows people have banged on about this conundrum for years.
I would like to think, however, that this trend can and is changing. I'm certainly grateful to the strong women I see in everyday life who don't perceive the boardroom as some sort of battle-to-the death, in which the one who gets the most barbs in, wins.
Delicate balance
I see many women who use more gentle talents to nurture, guide and build their teams up around them, often with very little apparent reward. For these women, their team's success becomes a reward and, in turn, provides proof positive of their leadership capabilities.
This sort of skills development, I like to believe, is becoming increasingly evident in SA's ICT sector, although we don't, as yet, have high-profile names like Meg Whitman or Marissa Mayer that young female professionals can turn to for examples of how to do - or not do - business as a woman.
Future leaders are being built, and there are other women they can look up to; keep these strong examples coming.
Yet, the path to moving from being a bludgeoner in the boardroom to a nurturer who can build teams that take SA - its economy and people - forward will take time. There will be many lessons to be learnt, including, according to the Wall Street Journal, becoming overwhelmed with seemingly endless requests to mentor younger people.
And then there's the tricky task of balancing family with work commitments. Which is why we need more board members who understand that women cannot be asked to sacrifice one for the other; instead, we need work environments that understand this delicate balance and work with it, a balance that applies across genders.
There will be many more challenges along the way, before the ultimate breakthrough of the glass ceiling happens, but working together, we can build a new generation of more-than-capable women leaders. But it will take a concerted effort to do so. Consider this a call to action.
Let's create a networking platform that collates skills; let's use that to leverage off each other; let's each mentor at least one young woman; and let's develop a YouTube or TEDx platform of videos that teach and give tips.
First published in the August 2014 issue of ITWeb Brainstorm magazine.
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