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Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney had barely gotten the phrase “binders full of women” http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/10/16/binders-full-of-women-trending/ out of his mouth at his Oct. 16 debate with President Obama before the Internet started buzzing that the former Massachusetts governor was sexist and out of touch with women.
Romney’s “binders” comment was in response to a town hall questioner asking the candidates about equal pay for women http://ebn.benefitnews.com/blog/ebviews/professional-life-equal-pay-lily-ledbetter-todd-akin-2728154-1.html?goback=%2Egde_1749077_member_174626311, which is an issue all to itself and certainly one well worth debating http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Where-do-you-stand-on-1749077.S.174626311?qid=bad9e5bc-ac8d-4ffa-89ba-b24b21aba1b0&trk=group_items_see_more-0-b-ttl.
Rather, the separate, underlying issue of the binders brouhaha is recruiting talented, qualified female candidates for top positions http://ebn.benefitnews.com/news/women-gender-equality-leadership-business-2719010-1.html. In a new editorial, Heather Landy, editor-in-chief of American Banker magazine, says that while Romney flubbed his delivery on how he went about considering women for positions in his cabinet, she didn’t have a problem with the approach of the women’s group who presented Romney with the now infamous binders.
In the editorial, titled “Bring on the binders,” http://www.americanbanker.com/bankthink/bring-on-the-binders-1053703-1.html?ET=americanbanker:e12836:2024333a:&st=email&utm_source=editorial&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=AB_Intraday_102412 Landy writes that “to get more women in important roles, you need the decision makers to be looking at female candidates. And oftentimes for that to happen, you need to deliver the resumes of female candidates directly to the decision makers, who don't always have gender equity at the top of their mind when making their picks, and whose own awareness about the field of candidates is probably a lot more limited than you'd think.”
She continues: “It's hard to come up with a significantly diverse field of significantly credible candidates unless someone is out there scouting for them, compiling their dossiers and in a position to advocate for them at the point when the decision gets made … In other words, get out those binders.”
On the flip side, after discussing the “binders” issue with my husband, he plainly said, “I think the real problem with why he needed the binders isn’t that Romney didn’t look for qualified women, but that no qualified women even applied. What stopped them?”
I can see good intentions and sound reasoning on both sides. What do you say? What’s the real problem — that Romney said “binders full of women,” or that the binders existed in the first place? Or, do you agree with Landy that binders aren’t so bad? Share your thoughts in the comments.
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney had barely gotten the phrase “binders full of women” out of his mouth at his Oct. 16 debate with President Obama before the Internet started buzzing that the former Massachusetts governor was sexist and out of touch with women.
Romney’s “binders” comment was in response to a town hall questioner asking the candidates about equal pay for women, which is an issue all to itself and certainly one well worth debating.
Rather, the separate, underlying issue of the binders brouhaha is recruiting talented, qualified female candidates for top positions. In a new editorial, Heather Landy, editor-in-chief of American Banker magazine, says that while Romney flubbed his delivery on how he went about considering women for positions in his cabinet, she didn’t have a problem with the approach of the women’s group who presented Romney with the now infamous binders.
In the editorial, titled “Bring on the binders,” Landy writes that “to get more women in important roles, you need the decision makers to be looking at female candidates. And oftentimes for that to happen, you need to deliver the resumes of female candidates directly to the decision makers, who don't always have gender equity at the top of their mind when making their picks, and whose own awareness about the field of candidates is probably a lot more limited than you'd think.”
She continues: “It's hard to come up with a significantly diverse field of significantly credible candidates unless someone is out there scouting for them, compiling their dossiers and in a position to advocate for them at the point when the decision gets made … In other words, get out those binders.”
On the flip side, after discussing the “binders” issue with my husband, he plainly said, “I think the real problem with why he needed the binders isn’t that Romney didn’t look for qualified women, but that no qualified women even applied. What stopped them?”
I can see good intentions and sound reasoning on both sides. What do you say? What’s the real problem — that Romney said “binders full of women,” or that the binders existed in the first place? Or, do you agree with Landy that binders aren’t so bad? Share your thoughts in the comments.
