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Careers

Ethnic minority women think racism rather than sexism limits career progression

BMJ 2014; 349 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.g6890 (Published 18 November 2014) Cite this as: BMJ 2014;349:g6890
  1. Abi Rimmer
  1. 1BMJ Careers
  1. arimmer{at}bmj.com

Women from ethnic minority groups think that racism, rather than sexism, limits their career progression, delegates to the Medical Women’s Federation autumn conference have heard.

Speaking at the conference in London on 7 November, Abeyna Jones, an occupational medicine registrar, discussed barriers that ethnic minority women face in medical leadership roles. She said that to encourage ethnic minority women to take up leadership roles “we need to avoid a single access approach, such as just advocating for women’s rights or just advocating for racial equality.”

Jones said that although white women believed that sex was one of the key factors influencing career progression, women from ethnic minorities believed that racism was more likely to have a negative effect on their career. Cultural factors were also an issue, she added. “You find that segregation, in some ethnic groups, can also try and preserve the woman’s role as the nurturer rather than the breadwinner, and this can prevent women from pursuing high level roles,” she said.

“Racial discrimination in recruitment is an ongoing concern, and not much has changed since the racial equality action plan [was published in] 2004. So the new NHS workforce racial equality standards, which are being introduced by NHS England, aim to promote transparency by benchmarking by key standards—for example, percentage of BME [black and minority ethnic] staff in high bands, compared with the overall workforce,” she said.

She added, “There are still relatively few black leaders in the NHS, so we should create a cross sector mentorship programme for all staff, and selecting an approved mentor should be trainee led.”