“In order to get more compensation, in order to move into leadership, (women) need to have P&L responsibility”: That’s what Peggy Berg, president of the Castell Project, recently told a large group of women gathered at the American Hotel & Lodging Association’s ForWard conference in Chicago. Berg is president and founder of the Castell Project, a nonprofit aimed at advancing women in hospitality leadership roles. If women want to get promoted, they need to get comfortable with numbers – and below, Berg discusses why that’s so important.
Anna can’t do math. Specifically, she confessed over coffee at Starbucks, she can’t do fractions and decimals. Apparently, decades ago, she decided that there was a choice between boys and decimals, and she chose boys.
Those boys are long forgotten, but the mental limitation she placed on math became a serious roadblock to career advancement in hospitality. Blocking out fractions can be detrimental in an industry where metrics-driven decisions are key to organizational success.
According to the National Council of Teachers of Math, gender differences in math performance between boys and girls are small. Mean performance is about 0.1 to 0.3 standard deviations apart – averages small enough to be irrelevant for any individual boy or girl. But research suggests that social expectations relating to math have a greater impact, creating anxiety and lack of confidence for girls. This is particularly true among the highest-performing students, including women who should go on to leadership.
This plays out as a predictor of math-related career choices. We often talk about math-related career choices in terms of STEM – science, technology, engineering and math. But, in the hospitality industry, taking P&L responsibility is based on early career choices that rely on confidence with math. And, P&L responsibility is at the core of every career track to leadership.
The chart (see below) shows fields where women do, and do not, build careers. Looking at the numbers with math in mind shows that fields where P&Ls are fundamental still lag in terms of opportunity for women.
So let’s get real about math and P&L responsibility in the hospitality industry. Math for a career in STEM starts with calculus and goes on to subjects like quantum mechanics, topology and number theory. In contrast, to be good at math for a hospitality industry financial management requires adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing. Nothing rational about this skill set is keeping women from P&L responsibility.
In my job interview for accounting firm PKF, I remember telling my future boss, “I’m not good at math.” Then as we learned to use our computer system, I realized that, while quantum mechanics is tough for me, I’m good at business math. My lack of confidence was misplaced. I still hear capable women say “I’m not good at math” exactly as I did in that first job interview. It’s a reflex, and it’s often misplaced.
Anna had never learned how dividing can be written as fractions and decimals. By the end of our coffee, she could calculate occupancy, average rate and RevPAR. She practiced for the next two days and became solid on fractions and decimals.
Many of the talented women we work with at the Castell Project still lack confidence in math. Although they use math constantly in their jobs, they don’t recognize that the work they are doing is the math they need to be “good at math” in business. This contributes to a situation where too few are given, or take, P&L responsibility. They can add, subtract, multiply and divide, and are very good at interpreting numbers. Those that take the chance on P&L responsibility have no problem with the math.
At Castell Project, we are promoting discussion with women about confidence in working with the P&L and the balance sheet. For mentors working with women, expressing confidence in a mentee’s math capability, and pressing women to undertake math-rich assignments, is beneficial. The math limitation has timed out. Let’s share the knowledge, take the responsibility and move women into leadership.
Anna is working in the hotel business now. She knows she can learn any specific math skill and practice until she’s good at it. I expect her to work her way up to general manager. She’s very good at managing people – and the math is not an obstacle anymore.
