Skills for women tradies in regional Australia: a global future

ABSTRACT

To date, there has been little examination of those who complete training in male-dominated sectors and continue to work in these sectors within regional Australia. Therefore, in this preliminary qualitative study, we examine the attraction and retention issues of women entering male-dominated trades within regional NSW. This paper reports on findings from our initial industry consultation sessions of 35 participants within regional areas of NSW. Findings highlight retention issues such as workplace cultures, spotlighting, expecting women to fit into dysfunctional cultures and lack of career pathways. While these are preliminary findings and generalizations cannot be made for all regional areas, implications for practice and future research are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Apprenticeship training
• gender
• work
• regional development
• skills
• Australia

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Stacey Jenkins

Stacey Jenkins is an Associate Head of School for the School of Management and Marketing at Charles Sturt University. Her research interest is in the areas of employee wellness, work-life balance, mentoring, diversity and inclusion, and evaluating and measuring HRM effectiveness. She is a member of the Charles Sturt University Workforce Wellness Research Unit and some of her projects are focussed on women in male dominated trades and the examination of social sentiment (trust), social networks, and individual awareness of supports and services in the area of workers compensation.

Larissa Bamberry

Larissa Bamberry is a Senior Lecturer in Management and Marketing at Charles Sturt University.  Her research interests include the intersections between organisations, labour markets and gender relations in regional Australia.

Donna Bridges

Donna Bridges is a gender and work theorist and a feminist, qualitative researcher. Her work focuses on gender norms in society, gender constructions, workplace inequality, discrimination and harassment. Donna is currently involved in three projects: “Women in Regional Trades: Understanding Resilience” exploring the experience of women who work in the manual trade industries in Australia, specifically factors that contribute to women’s resilience and success in the manual trades; “Women and the process of integration in the Australian Defence forces” a project about the traditional roles of both genders, exploring organisational and cultural change as well as barriers to change; “The Gendered Spaces of Social Work” research that analyses the gendered nature of the social work profession and focuses on gendered power and gendered dynamics in a female dominated profession. 

Branka Krivokapic-Skoko

Branka Krivokapic-Skoko is an Associate Professor in Management at Faculty of Business Justice and Behavioural Sciences, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst, Australia. Branka’s research interests are around the revitalisation of regional and rural Australia. Some of her research projects are on psychological contracts in the context of theory and practice of management as well as on assessing  contribution of temporary migration scheme such as Working Holiday Makers and Pacific Island Seasonal workers to Australian agriculture.