6.3 Leadership, management and entrepreneurship as masculine
6.3.5 Men represented as competent, with the necessary educational skills
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As can be seen from the examples, male entrepreneurs presented as running successful businesses are attributed with positive characteristics (ambitious, passionate, creativity, calculated risk, exceptional). The overt meaning that the authors want to project is that typical entrepreneurs need to have the characteristics described by the above adjectives. The covert message in this particular depiction is that such entrepreneurs are male. There is a subconscious and implicit link that men are successful entrepreneurs.
In all of the case studies, there is silence on how success is measured. The authors emphasise the notion of success as it relates to entrepreneurs, presenting the image of entrepreneurship as being successful in every instance, in an effort to persuade learners to believe this. The presupposition of the case studies is that entrepreneurial success leads to expansion of businesses. This is seen as a positive aspect, as through expansion of businesses is likely to create job opportunities. However, how the businesses are expanded and the cost of such expansion is kept in the background. This is an attempt to present entrepreneurship as a salient feature of success.
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Figure 6.10: Image of two males is presented as the ‘skilled people’
Firstly, the presupposition is that in order for businesses to function, skilled people are required.
Van Leuween (2006) argues that presuppositions are notoriously manipulative because they are difficult to challenge. Many readers are reluctant to question statements that the author appears to be taking for granted. In this case, the author presents skill as the main trait required for all businesses, while omitting the type of skill required and other traits that could also affect daily operations of businesses. Skill is foregrounded as an important feature of entrepreneurial success. The statement also comes across as a strong categorical fact, because of the absence of words suggesting modality or tentativeness (e.g. perhaps, should, surely). The writers of these textbooks present a perspective of entrepreneurial skill as if there are no other influences or factors that may inhibit entrepreneurial success.
Secondly, excluding females from the images implies that women are not sufficiently skilled to own and maintain businesses; this is a distortion of what is actually the case in society, where it would be a misinterpretation to regard one gender as economically and educationally inactive.
The following examples further highlight depiction of men as skilled and successful in their entrepreneurial endeavours:
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Rashid was pleased with himself. In his first month of trading he has sold and fitted ten satellite dish receivers, two more than originally forecast in his business plan. Rashid’s electrical skills and his friendly personality had impressed his customers. (Zimbabwe, p. 528)
Bill Yang is a qualified engineer. He started his own business – Furniture Metallica. His firm built up a reputation for excellent quality products and the ability to adapt its basic furniture design for each customer. He is now considering extending his market range (Lesotho, p. 256) Paul has been educated abroad … He wanted to develop and train younger staff to manage cinemas and to stamp their own personality on them. (Zimbabwe, p. 218)
Zakes and Katlego want to start a partnership to open a printing and publishing business.
Zakes is a qualified manager who specializes in marketing. Katlego once worked at one of the Swaziland printing businesses (Swaziland, p. 290)
In summary, men were represented 43 times as qualified, competent entrepreneurs in case studies across the four textbooks, with eight examples of a woman as entrepreneur, not all successful. These examples influence the biased assumption of a sexist ideology that men are more capable and competent to run successful businesses, and the writers do nothing to trouble this perception. Males have been stereotyped as having characteristics that are more valuable for running successful businesses than women, implying that men are successful entrepreneurs.
The authors in all of the textbooks portray males as experts in the economic sphere, yet to my knowledge, there are also powerful females who are successful, qualified entrepreneurs, who the authors have not included. This is an example of what Fairclough (2003) refers to as omission. The authors could have cited women as competent entrepreneurs but they chose to cite male economic experts in each case. Additionally, males in entrepreneurial roles were described in more detail and with more descriptive terms than females in entrepreneurial roles.
Men were also described as competent to train other entrepreneurs who lacked skills.
Stories of female entrepreneurs were few in number and did not contain the detail of the stories about male entrepreneurs. The case studies that did feature women entrepreneurs presented them as reliant on the help of male support, as the example below shows:
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June Wong was pleased with herself since setting up the business called Health and Beauty for you. With her brother’s assistance, the business kept going through three very difficult years.
(Zimbabwe, p. 56)
In another case study on Gita Fashions:
Gita has never worried too much about finance because this had always been looked after by her business partner. He recently left the business taking his share of the capital. Gita now has no idea how the business has reached such a poor cash position. (Zimbabwe, p. 504)
The implicit message is that women cannot set up and run a successful business on their own;
they depend on men who have adaptable skills and the potential to liberate women successfully in the business environment. Furthermore, males have the ability to create the conditions for women to be successful. What is also implied is that if it were not for the intervention of men, women would not be successful. While the intervention itself may have had a positive outcome, the way in which the authors present the information paints the image of omnipotent men intervening to assist the less competent women.
The authors construct women as deficient and therefore needing expertise to help them acquire knowledge. Women are presented continuously and repeatedly as incompetent and uninformed in making business decisions. This consistent stereotyping is likely to make an impression on learners, promoting the idea that women in the workplace will always be in a subservient position, with an especially negative effect on the self-esteem of any female learner who might aspire to invest in or open a business.
In all four textbooks, women have been presented as less successful on their own because they lack entrepreneurial skill and education. The authors construct women as not knowledgeable about business-related activities and in need of advice on how to manage a business successfully. Unlike male entrepreneurial success, women were categorised as involved in small businesses with the ‘hope of success. The data below reflect this:
Carnela has just opened a beauty salon in her hometown. Carnela is hoping her business will be able to attract enough customers so that her business can be successful. (Lesotho, p. 36) Saabira is an unemployed school leaver. She has identified a gap in the market for the delivery of freshly made sandwiches, snacks and cakes to nearby office workers. However, Saabira
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cannot be a sole trader because she doesn’t have enough money to start her business and doesn’t have the skills, time or energy to manage it. (Lesotho, p. 119)
Sam has a unisex salon that has been operating at a taxi rank. He is an excellent hairdresser and has regular customers. Sam’s two sisters are unemployed and have been begging Sam to train them so they can work for him and have a regular income. (South Africa, p. 191)
Sabina is the owner of Titaya Fabrics, a small company that manufactures a range of clothing.
… Sabina is unsure of the meaning and importance of several items found in her accounts.
Advise her on what a fixed asset is? (Lesotho, p. 229)
Deft Design is a small business owned by Precious Williams from a small rented art studio.
Precious needs help producing a cash flow forecast so that she can manage her business better.
(Swaziland, p. 306)
Valentia owns and runs a small coach hire business. Her business makes a very small profit and she has very little money of her own savings. Her business is in trouble! (Zimbabwe, p.
196)
Drawing from the data above, the representation of women in small businesses reinforces an implicit limitation in the textbooks about women’s skills, competence and ability. The examples cited imply that women are not sufficiently skilled to own and maintain large businesses; this is a distortion of what is actually the case in society. It reinforces the dominant idea that there are more men than women in business. This skewed representation of women’s engagement with the business world could reinforce stereotypes and demotivate female learners from becoming business owners of large industries.
The authors also represent the women as incompetent through showing reliance on men’s guidance and support in understanding business-related issues such as fixed assets and cash flow forecasts within the business environment. Women in all four texts were represented in ways that reinforced and replicated a gender bias that maintained the ideology of a deficit positioning of women in the business environment. These stereotypes about the potential and competence of women may continue to be entrenched, and thus it may be difficultto promote equality.
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The barrier to women’s entrepreneurial success is backgrounded. There is a notable silence or exclusion in these textbooks as to the unequal access to finance opportunities that women are faced with, which serves as a possible barrier to entrepreneurial success. There is a noticeable difference in the case studies of male and female entrepreneurs’ experience in the process of accessing finance.