Gender Equality Across Australian Workplaces: A Critical Reflection of the Initiatives Undertaken
摘要
Gender discrimination in the workplace is a critical concern despite the major advancement toward equality in recent years. Moreover, gender equality and representation became a key issue during the COVID-19 pandemic in Australia. Additionally, it is reported that nearly 54% of the women lost their jobs during this pandemic, and several others had to face pay cuts and were burdened with childcare responsibilities due to social distancing guidelines. As a result, this study seeks to provide a scoping review of how far the various policies and initiatives are established to ensure gender equality across multiple business sectors in Australia. The current study employs a bibliometric approach using Scopus databases to refine articles related to policies and initiatives that ensure that gender equality is well established across various sectors in Australia. In doing so, the findings of this study are visualised with VOSviewer, which showcases the four key clusters that are related to (a) Government initiatives (i.e., Work from home) that were undertaken within Australian workplaces during COVID-19 to promote gender diversity and improve their well-being (i.e. Red Cluster); (b) Enhancing career growth, job satisfaction and decision-making opportunities, female-oriented initiatives should include flexible parental leave, education and training opportunities (i.e., Green Cluster); (c) Empowering gender equality and leadership, higher participation among females within the higher education sector and sports sectors in Australia (i.e., Blue Cluster); (d) Violence and emotional abuse experienced among young female adults that hinder women’s empowerment (i.e., Yellow Cluster). Lastly, it is suggested that the government should evaluate the effectiveness and implementation level of various policies and oversee whether these policies are implemented in various workplace organisations. Moreover, organisations should ensure that several policies (i.e., Parental leave/Childcare policies) that are more inclined towards females are enforced so that they are able to work with flexible options across the Australian workplace.