Leading with the heart and/or the head? Experiences of women student leaders in top world forestry universities

ABSTRACT

Women have been historically underrepresented in the forest sector. Given a graying workforce, there is a significant opportunity to diversify the sector via a younger generation entering the industry. To a large extent, the gender situation in the forest sector is influenced by the education of employees in the sector. Therefore, it is beneficial to know the perceptions of women student leaders, as future industry leaders, about gender diversity and equality in forestry universities. Utilizing interviews, we found that although our respondents perceived increase in the proportion of women students in forestry higher education, this is not proportionately reflected in the forestry workforce. Our respondents emphasize that women can be good leaders utilizing skills of listening, collaboration, and organization and it is not necessary to show agentic qualities to be considered a good leader.

KEYWORDS:

• Gender diversity
• leadership diversity
• diversity in higher education
• women leaders
• college women student leaders
• college student leadership
• student organizations

Acknowledgement

The first author would like to thank Lyndall Bull (University of Melbourne), Gun Lidestav (Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences), and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.

Disclosure statement

There is no conflict of interest although authors are affiliated with one of the universities population. The funder had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript, or in the decision to publish the results.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by LPDP/Indonesia Endowment Fund for Education.