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‘Gender is not even a side issue…it’s a non-issue’: career trajectories and experiences from the perspective of male and female healthcare managers in Kenya

Women comprise a significant proportion of the health workforce globally but remain under-represented in the higher professional categories. Concern about the under-representation of women in health leadership positions has resulted in increased research on the topic, although this research has focu...

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Autores principales: Muraya, Kelly W, Govender, Veloshnee, Mbachu, Chinyere, Uguru, Nkoli P, Molyneux, Sassy
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Oxford University Press 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6661539/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31329845
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/heapol/czz019
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author Muraya, Kelly W
Govender, Veloshnee
Mbachu, Chinyere
Uguru, Nkoli P
Molyneux, Sassy
author_facet Muraya, Kelly W
Govender, Veloshnee
Mbachu, Chinyere
Uguru, Nkoli P
Molyneux, Sassy
author_sort Muraya, Kelly W
collection PubMed
description Women comprise a significant proportion of the health workforce globally but remain under-represented in the higher professional categories. Concern about the under-representation of women in health leadership positions has resulted in increased research on the topic, although this research has focused primarily on high-income countries. An improved understanding of the career trajectories and experiences of healthcare leaders in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), and the role of gender, is therefore needed. This qualitative case study was undertaken in two counties in coastal Kenya. Drawing on the life-history approach, 12 male and 13 female healthcare leaders were interviewed between August 2015 and July 2016 on their career progression and related experiences. Although gender was not spontaneously identified as a significant influence, closer exploration of responses revealed that gendered factors played an important role. Most fundamentally, women’s role as child bearers and gendered societal expectations including child nurturing and other domestic responsibilities can influence their ability to take up leadership opportunities, and their selection and appointment as leaders. Women’s selection and appointment as leaders may also be influenced by positive discrimination policies (in favour of women), and by perceptions of women and men as having different leadership styles (against women, who some described as more emotive and reactive). These gendered influences intersect in relatively invisible ways with other factors more readily identified by respondents to influence their progression and experience. These factors included: professional cadre, with doctors more likely to be selected into leadership roles; and personal and professional support systems ranging from family support and role models, through to professional mentorship and continuing education. We discuss the implications of these findings for policy, practice and research, including highlighting the need for more in-depth intersectionality analyses of leadership experience in LMICs.
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spelling pubmed-66615392019-08-02 ‘Gender is not even a side issue…it’s a non-issue’: career trajectories and experiences from the perspective of male and female healthcare managers in Kenya Muraya, Kelly W Govender, Veloshnee Mbachu, Chinyere Uguru, Nkoli P Molyneux, Sassy Health Policy Plan Original Articles Women comprise a significant proportion of the health workforce globally but remain under-represented in the higher professional categories. Concern about the under-representation of women in health leadership positions has resulted in increased research on the topic, although this research has focused primarily on high-income countries. An improved understanding of the career trajectories and experiences of healthcare leaders in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), and the role of gender, is therefore needed. This qualitative case study was undertaken in two counties in coastal Kenya. Drawing on the life-history approach, 12 male and 13 female healthcare leaders were interviewed between August 2015 and July 2016 on their career progression and related experiences. Although gender was not spontaneously identified as a significant influence, closer exploration of responses revealed that gendered factors played an important role. Most fundamentally, women’s role as child bearers and gendered societal expectations including child nurturing and other domestic responsibilities can influence their ability to take up leadership opportunities, and their selection and appointment as leaders. Women’s selection and appointment as leaders may also be influenced by positive discrimination policies (in favour of women), and by perceptions of women and men as having different leadership styles (against women, who some described as more emotive and reactive). These gendered influences intersect in relatively invisible ways with other factors more readily identified by respondents to influence their progression and experience. These factors included: professional cadre, with doctors more likely to be selected into leadership roles; and personal and professional support systems ranging from family support and role models, through to professional mentorship and continuing education. We discuss the implications of these findings for policy, practice and research, including highlighting the need for more in-depth intersectionality analyses of leadership experience in LMICs. Oxford University Press 2019-05 2019-04-25 /pmc/articles/PMC6661539/ /pubmed/31329845 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/heapol/czz019 Text en © The Author(s) 2019. Published by Oxford University Press in association with The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Original Articles
Muraya, Kelly W
Govender, Veloshnee
Mbachu, Chinyere
Uguru, Nkoli P
Molyneux, Sassy
‘Gender is not even a side issue…it’s a non-issue’: career trajectories and experiences from the perspective of male and female healthcare managers in Kenya
title ‘Gender is not even a side issue…it’s a non-issue’: career trajectories and experiences from the perspective of male and female healthcare managers in Kenya
title_full ‘Gender is not even a side issue…it’s a non-issue’: career trajectories and experiences from the perspective of male and female healthcare managers in Kenya
title_fullStr ‘Gender is not even a side issue…it’s a non-issue’: career trajectories and experiences from the perspective of male and female healthcare managers in Kenya
title_full_unstemmed ‘Gender is not even a side issue…it’s a non-issue’: career trajectories and experiences from the perspective of male and female healthcare managers in Kenya
title_short ‘Gender is not even a side issue…it’s a non-issue’: career trajectories and experiences from the perspective of male and female healthcare managers in Kenya
title_sort ‘gender is not even a side issue…it’s a non-issue’: career trajectories and experiences from the perspective of male and female healthcare managers in kenya
topic Original Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6661539/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31329845
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/heapol/czz019
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