Medical Women’s Federation Autumn (MWF) Meeting Friday
13th November 2009
The Chief Medical Officer made recommendations
about increasing the number of women in leadership roles in his recent report
entitled Women Doctors: Making a Difference. The MWF Autumn Meeting focused
on “Women as Leaders”.
The first keynote speaker Professor Dame Carol Black spoke about professionalism
and prominent leadership, investing time, “trade offs” and a high
degree of single mindedness. She also said that women need encouragement and
support and that good careers advice and mentoring should be available. She
stated that action is necessary and urgent.
Professor Jenny Simpson, CEO British Association of Medical Managers (BAMM)
gave an account of her medical journey “Survive, thrive and Change the
World”. She encouraged juniors to get involved in management and mentioned
the junior groups BAMdots and Bammbino.
Dr Jo Nurse, National Lead for Public Mental Health and Well-Being, DH gave
a captivating description of her medical career and her current role towards
working to provide a well-being framework and influencing polices.
The workshops provided debate and discussions particularly the Mentoring skills
workshops run by the London Deanery. The other popular workshop was provided
by Dr Peggy Frith from Springboard on developing leadership skills.
The Autumn Meeting ended with the launch of the joint BMA/MWF report on the
Pay Gap for women in medicine and academic medicine. The report was produced
by researchers Dr Sara Conolly, Economist and Emeritus Professor Anita Holdcroft
who led the Women in Academic Medicine project. The results showed that there
is a gender pay gap of £15,245 or 18% . Dr Helen Goodyear, President
of the Medical Women's Federation said that pay reviews and yearly salary
negotiations at appraisal are necessary. Women should not be afraid to document
their work load in order to achieve pay parity.
A full
report will appear in our bulletin Medical Woman.
Click
here to see some photographs of the meeting
>>
A copy of the papers referenced in Jo Nurse's talk can be downloaded here:
Flourishing
People, Connected Communities
The Health
Impact of Climate Change
