National WEXDEV Conference 2-3 September 1999

80 women attended the conference. The evaluations were positive with most attendees praising the opportunities for networking and the possibilities of developing collaborative projects. Indeed such was the attention given to these two aspects that there were suggestions that in future conferences substantive papers could be cut back and additional time given to discussion and structured opportunities to work in small groups. The Conference papers can be ordered from the National Office for $15.00.

In follow-up sessions on the e-mail discussion list and in report-back sessions at universities, the issues that commanded most attention were:

The importance of focusing on the relative lack of senior academic women at the conference. Some suggested that academic women may resist 'the generic focus on being a manager/leader'. Clearly WEXDEV must focus attention on ways of resolving this.
The importance of 'succession planning', on looking at women who are to be the next generation of leaders and training and assisting them in key competencies. It was suggested that WEXDEV could focus on women beginning their employment in member universities, seeing them as the senior women of the future. Activities that were suggested for these groups included workshops and seminars.
People were encouraged to explore mechanisms for increasing collaboration across the ATN including PEP activities based in other ATN universities; incentives for visits of mutual benefit whenever WEXDEV people are in ATN cities; and staff exchanges

Specific outcomes from the conference have included:

Drafting of a WEXDEV reconciliation statement by members of the Women's Indigenous Network (WIN) and WEXDEV.
Increased cooperation on the development beyond WEXDEV of an ATN Women's Program.
Proposals for a register of people working on overseas projects to be started through WEXDEV.
Development of a collaborative research proposal on organisational cultures.
Initiation of an ATN collaborative group on leadership development.
Commitment by the ATN Librarians to work on information exchange across WEXDEV.

The first session considered the questions: How will collaboration and networking across a consortium such as ATN assist in meeting new challenges in higher education? and What could be the role of a women's program such as WEXDEV

Professor David Beanland, Chair, ATN and Vice-Chancellor of RMIT University, who spoke on the Vision of the ATN, opened the conference, saying :

Why do we need the ATN?
What will the ATN look like?
Is the vision being achieved?
How has WEXDEV worked within the context of ATN?

He argued:

"WEXDEV, since its inception in 1996, has been seen as a highly effective example of the ATN collaboration. WEXDEV has had the capacity to focus on collaboration, networking and spreading information throughout the five universities. This is valued by the ATN Vice-Chancellors, who have provided the funding for the National Office on a part-time basis since the cessation of the DETYA funding.

"The interest indicated by the media and by other universities, both within Australia and overseas, indicates the high quality of the model developed by WEXDEV, the excellence of the publications it has released and the leadership role that WEXDEV has taken in the field of executive development for senior women in higher education."

Professor Denise Bradley, Vice-Chancellor of the University of South Australia, spoke on major challenges facing higher education and the role of ATN WEXDEV. She posed the question:

Professor Denise Bradley, Vice-Chancellor, UNISA

"What have we learnt from the WEXDEV experience?

It's taught us that collaboration is not easy and natural
Getting broad agreement at the top, between VCs, has its challenges, but is possible
Gaining the funding to support the program is achievable if the program delivers results
Getting it to work effectively at the next level down is harder in:
- individual institutions
- similar ways across five institutions

WEXDEV successes:

It has succeeded this far because of hard work by Executive and Directors
It has achieved influence
Women in ATN 'know' more ATN colleagues that most ATN men
Email network provides the platform for depth of relationships."

Professor Eleanor Ramsay, Pro-Vice-Chancellor, Equity and Development of the University of South Australia, spoke on internationalisation and the rise of the global university. In a wide-ranging discussion on the impact on senior women managers, she pointed out:

"Academic men compared to academic women have had access to broad international networks which have advantaged them, particularly in terms of their publication rate. As a result of these networks they are more likely to be quoted, to be invited to international conferences, and hence to build their international reputations faster and sooner.

"In additional to the forming of international networks, the second area in which men were initially moving faster internationally is that of the academic entrepreneur, moving off shore with programs, with consultancies, with research and development and with major projects not normally associated with university work.

"The strengths that I see women bring to understanding and responding to international issues are in many ways the strengths that we both develop and use in a network such as WEXDEV. Firstly, women have been in my experience always very interested in the nature of work beyond boundaries, beyond the boundary of our specific work unit, beyond the boundary of our institution, beyond the boundary of our state. We are curious, we want to understand the whole context, we are seekers of connections. Secondly, women are prodigious networkers, and this is an enormously important habit for international work. Thirdly, women are also good at strategic collaboration. We are great sharers of knowledge and information, we tell each other what we are doing and in doing so we seek and identify opportunities to collaborate and work together."

Professor Lesley Johnson, Pro-Vice-Chancellor Research, University of Technology, Sydney, spoke on academic work, a crisis of identity, saying in part:

Professor Lesley Johnson, Pro-Vice-Chancellor Research, UTS

"Academic work has stretched rather than adapted to meet the challenges caused by the transformation of the higher education sector. We need to reconceptualise what it means to be an effective and productive academic rather than to continue down the track of simply adding on to the accumulating task of the academic. The PhD is one of the things we need to fundamentally rethink in terms of problems it causes in the role of the academic. We are being trapped by a narrow sense of what the problem is. We believe it is only the cutbacks in higher education funding that have affected us, whereas we actually need to shift away from thinking about the cutbacks to thinking about our practices in academic work and the role of the academic. I want to suggest that the PhD incapacitates us as academics in a range of ways, just as it also produces various capacities in us. As I have indicated, it produces people who are used to working in their own world. It seems to me that women are not necessarily so deeply invested in the academic identity that I have suggested results from the PhD."

Professor Shirley Alexander, Director of the Institute of Interaction Multi-Media at the University of Technology, Sydney, spoke on the convergence of information and communications technologies.

"While the rhetoric surrounding the convergence of communication and information technologies and their likely impact on higher education often exceeds the reality, the technology does provide significant opportunities for the sector to address some of the challenges.

"The scale of what is yet to be learned is such that it is unlikely that any one institution can do it along and leads to my recommendation that the ATN is ideally situated to undertake a collaborative approach to the development of a framework for the range of policies and procedures required to make a success of online teaching and learning. Policies for teaching and learning, human resource management, staff development, information technology planning and capital management planning are all likely to be significantly enhanced if all institutions in the network are willing to share their own learning."

Dr Ruth Dunkin, Deputy Vice-Chancellor, RMIT University, spoke on strategic partnerships and alliances.

Dr Ruth Dunkin, Deputy Vice-Chancellor, RMIT University

"Strategic partnering" is one of the new buzz phrases of recent times. In this session I look at what strategic partnering is - and what it is not, what are its uses and benefits and what it takes to establish successful partnering relationships. I suggest that it is a concept that is easily confused and distorted and is often superimposed on old ways of organisational functioning. Successfully pursued, however, strategic partnering epitomises new ways of relating inside and outside organisations in an era in which organisations are pressured to become more flexible, leaner and focused on delivering value for their clients and stakeholders."

Professor Joyce Kirk, Professor of Information Studies in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Technology, Sydney, led a session on knowledge management:

Professor Joyce Kirk, Professor of Information Studies, UTS

"Knowledge management is one of the 'buzzwords' in contemporary management theory. As used it has many meanings, often in association with phrases such as 'the intelligent organisation', 'knowledge work and workers', 'relationship building' etc. It is obviously important for universities to enhance their knowledge and information management eg by effectively creating capturing, sharing and using organisation-wide knowledge, as this is a powerful means of effecting change. Successful knowledge management should contribute to enhanced team performance, customer service, corporate culture, management roles and information dispersal."

On the second day Professor Gail Hart, Director of Teaching and Learning Support Services Department at Queensland University of Technology spoke on the ATN Teaching and Learning Committee projects.

Professor Gail Hart, Director of Teaching and Learning, QUT

"One project is designed to support a systematic and explicit strategy to cultivate and evaluate the development of relevant graduate's capabilities over a course of study. Thirteen case studies across the five institutions have been used to exemplify effective approaches to the identification, development and assessment of graduate capabilities in a range of discipline contexts. A staff development package, building on the experience embedded in the case studies, will be available to trial across the ATN later this year."

Professor Sandra Harding, Dean of the Faculty of Business at Queensland University of Technology, spoke about the collaboration between ATN Faculties of Business.

"On the surface, the product of these periodic meetings of the Deans of Business seems scant. Tangible outcomes are less clear than the benefits of sharing data about different faculties' approaches to particular matters. On the other hand, the broad ranging exploration evidenced in the report of meetings may well be a crucial preliminary step towards fruitful collaboration."

Associate Professor Colleen Liston, Director of Quality Review and Evaluation at Curtin University of Technology, spoke on quality and the benefits gained through benchmarking as these had been identified by the ATN Quality group:

Associate Professor Colleen Liston, Curtin University of Technology

Ideas for improving processes gained from better or best organisations
Sharing knowledge and experiences with others performing the same processes and practices that are critical to your success
Turning your area's focus towards efficiency and effectiveness to ensure that your processes and practices are competitive; to improve planning for targets and the management of resources.
Establishing the 'gap' between your own performance and that of other organisations to provide the opportunity of closing the 'gap'.
Continuous improvement as identified by clients and through performance information."

Maria Tarrant, General Manager, RMIT Training, spoke on the elements of success in entrepreneurial ventures, working with partners external to the ATN:

Alliances with external parties for commercial benefit require careful consideration and more specifically a partner who shares a common goal and some common values.
The proposed activity must be of sufficient size and scale to bring genuine advantageous outcomes for both parties.
There needs to be a mutual benefit and mutual dependency.
There needs to be trust and mutual respect. A highly legalistic, 'document every step of the way', 'protecting my patch' approach will not work."

Professor Helen Praetz, Pro-Vice-Chancellor, Teaching and Learning and Director TAFE at RMIT University, spoke about seamless links with VET, as alone among the ATN Universities RMIT had integrated TAFE faculties into its activities:

"Offering schooling, vocational education and training and higher education and drawing students and staff from diverse backgrounds and from around the world expands the horizons of students and staff. Such a system is to be characterised by innovation in learning, by experimentation with new structures to deliver learning and access for all regardless of their backgrounds and starting points.

"Managing this activity requires a focus on discerning the needs and aspirations of the community, industry and the professions and vocations; establishing the means to meet these needs and which offer opportunities for career long learning; performance monitoring; and extending relationships with the State and Commonwealth authorities. Creating comprehensive education in a sectary segmented world is not for the faint hearted."

Professor Eleanor Ramsay then spoke about the AVCC and the Colloquium of Senior Women Executives in higher education.

"One of our biggest projects and achievements to date is the AVCC's Action Plan for Women, adopted this year. The process by which this occurred began at the 1998 AVCC retreat in September of last year. The Colloquium was invited to do a presentation on the current position of and issues facing women in the sector, and to recommend what the AVCC should do about these. Margaret Gardner wrote a useful paper summarising current research on women in the sector and with Anne Edwards we presented the material and our recommendations on the role which the AVCC itself should play in achieving greater progress. These recommendations received broad support, and two more were added from the floor during the hour-long discussion. Subsequently the three of us worked with the AVCC secretariat to shape these recommendations into an Action Plan which then went through the Standing Committee on Education and Students, on to the Board and finally to the full AVCC plenary for endorsement at the end of last year. We are now working with the secretariat to achieve its implementation which will take several years. In fact the Action Plan has given the Colloquium and the AVCC a shared agenda for activities and strategies for the medium term, and for this alone it will be a valuable and useful tool."

In the afternoon Directors of Equity led a session on the situation for senior women within the ATN. They pointed out that: "

the proportion of all academics who are female in the ATN is at or above the national average.
The proportion of senior academics (above level C) who are female in ATN is higher that the national average.
Since 1996, the proportion of all general staff who are women in ATN has increased about 2% - more than the national average increase.
Since 1996, the proportion of senior general staff (above level 10) who are female in the ATN has increased significantly - more than the national average increase.
In the 'feeder' group, levels 9 and 10, the increase in female representation since 1996 is significant. "

Professor Alison Mackinnon, Professor of History and Gender Studies and the Director of the Hawke Institute at the University of South Australia spoke about academic women and restructuring.

"I wish to pose another hard question for academic women particularly. How are we going to 'reproduce' ourselves? Can we be sure that we will be able to reproduce the next generation of academic women? We are probably the largest cohort of senior academic women in history. Can we be sure that we will be followed by larger cohorts, or even the same numbers? As an historian of women's higher education I am conscious that there were considerable numbers of women in academic life in the 1920s, if not in Australia, at least in other English-speaking countries. Yet there was no inevitable progression: depression and war, and the generally conservative 1950s, made inroads into the expectation that women would be capable of and interested in academic careers. It is not unreasonable that in this climate of economic rationalism, globalization, and increasing managerialism, equity goals will lose much of their force."

Professor Belinda Probert, Professor of Sociology at RMIT and Director of the Centre for Social Research spoke on gender and pay equity. She discussed from the point of view of the ATN universities her NTEU national gender pay equity study in higher education published last year.

"Central to this project was a random survey of both academic and administrative staff at all levels in 18 universities, including all five ATN universities. It was, in effect, a study that sought to explain why there are so few women at the higher levels of both the academic and administrative career structures. It sought to answer questions like:

Do men get promoted more often than equally qualified women?
Do women have heavier teaching loads than men?
Do experience and qualifications count the same for men and women?

"The problem women face is more than simply one of gaining 'access'. The answer is not simply to get more women into management. The norm for the managerial occupation remains overwhelmingly 'male', and women are therefore going to have to pay a price if they seek acceptance. Equally important, many women will decide the price is too high, so allowing the maleness to continue unchallenged. Women are likely to seek individual solutions to these dilemmas, seeking neither to confront male power in the home nor in the workplace. Is power still inimical to the construction of femininity?

"In the current environment these problems may actually be getting worse as increased competition and reduced resources encourage more hierarchical and centralised management power structures."

Following her Penny Tripcony, Manager of the Oodgeroo Unit at QUT spoke on issues for Indigenous women:

Penny Tripcony, Manager, Oodgeroo Unit, QUT

"An Indigenous manager needs to possess the ability to view things holistically; to predict what is coming; to walk the fine line between what systems want - whether they are government systems or university systems; to listen to what communities want; to be the translator/interpreter between systems and communities (both ways the 'meat in the sandwich' having to answer to both); and in terms of our type of funding, to answer to several different groups of people."

Where we are representative of a small minority in a university, we need to be strategically placed within organisational structures in order to be effective. We need to ensure that Indigenous views are heard in major decision-making fora, by nominating (or approaching senior management to nominate/appoint) Indigenous people to membership of university and faculty committees and boards, such as academic boards, and committees that deal with teaching and learning, equity, research ethics. Indigenous manager needs to possess the ability to view things holistically; to predict what is coming; to walk the fine line between what systems want - whether they are government systems or university systems; to listen to what communities want; to be the translator/interpreter between systems and communities (both ways the 'meat in the sandwich' having to answer to both); and in terms of our type of funding, to answer to several different groups of people. "

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