To complete the brief I have started to compile some further research together to help me with my message.
'Gender Inequality still an issue in the workplace'
‘There’s no question that the gender pay gap is alive and well, particularly in the top ASX companies,’ Federal Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick told ABC News Online. Only 13 of the 500 largest companies in the world have female CEOs.'
I picked out this key point because the statistic 'Only 13 of the 500 largest companies in the world have female CEOs' highlights the big gender gap is on a worldwide scale, and some of the companies could be one of the recipients of the mail shot to make them aware of the gender inequality in their workplace.
'Pay inequality is most blatant in the finance and insurance industry, according to research by the EOWWA (Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency) revealing that women in the industry are paid 40 per cent less than men. Only 17 per cent of Certified Financial Planners (CFPs) in Australia are female.'
As it says 'pay inequality is most blatant in the finance and insurance industry' these could be one of of companies I send a mail shot to, as then the women in the company can question the company, and the company can be made aware of the discrimination.
Because the research is by the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency I decided to research them further, and I found another article on 'Women falling from executive ranks'. I found some statements from it which could be helpful for my brief:
'The number of companies with no women executive managers has risen sharply to 45.5 percent, up from 39.5 percent in 2006'
'While 54.5 percent of Australian ASX 200 companies have at least one woman in an executive position, this compares poorly to the US where 85.2 percent of companies do. In Canada the figure is 65.6 percent, Britain 60 percent and South Africa 59.3 percent.'
'while more women than ever were participating in the workforce, they were overwhelmingly represented in the low-paid, low status roles.'
I think these statistics and statements are really useful to me because they highlight the fact there are definite inequalities, however, the EOWWA are an Australian government agency, so I highlighted the part where it says 'Britain 60 percent' because that is relevant to this country. Now I am going to research the same subject but look for examples in the UK.
I found an essay on 'Women and Gender Equity in Employment', which talks about the subject in depth in the UK, so relates to my message and recipients a lot more. Here is another study on the same topic.
I found a very recent set of statistics stating the exact amount women are paid less than men from the BBC website.
I then found a another article stating exactly how many women are FTSE 100 directors.
'The latest numbers from the Professional Boards Forum show that 17.3% of FTSE 100 directors are women, a rise from 12.5% when Lord Davies published his 2011 report setting a voluntary target of 25% of board seats being filled by female directors by 2015.'
I found some more statistics on the Guardian
I then started to look into my second idea of raising awareness for a women's charity, and went onto the Women's Aid website and looked at a campaign called EQUALS.
When I started reading it, it was about the belief that men and women should be equal, which fits into the previous research I was doing about gender inequality in the workplace. So I've decided to go with my first idea as the message still supports women and equality, like this charity does.
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