The rise of a new generation of women running for office this year is sometimes likened to a wave, an abrupt reaction to the cultural moment in which we find ourselves. I prefer to see it as a larger shift in the seas. 

Waves come and go, but I am hoping for something more permanent, a rising tide finally sweeping away ancient fears of powerful women and tired beliefs that female leaders subtract from men’s opportunities rather than add to the broader good.

As a woman who grew up in India’s strict patriarchy, and who despite that has often found herself frustrated by the gender bias that still exists in a supposedly more liberated America, I am deeply heartened by the current crop of women mobilizing for political action. 

But there is a danger in viewing 2018 as yet another “year of the woman,” which seems to suggest a single moment of hopeful triumph in what really needs to be understood as a much longer struggle toward a healthier and better society for us all, regardless of our gender.

In my role as CEO of Leadership Pittsburgh, I am privileged to meet and work with some of our community’s most engaged present and future leaders. We work hard in our programs to recruit classes every year that reflect the diversity of our region. We know from experience that leaders in our programs will benefit and grow from being exposed to people from different companies, backgrounds, beliefs, races, ethnicities, religions and, yes, genders.

Until fairly recently, it was more difficult to attract strong women into our programs than to recruit capable men. About seven or eight years ago, however, long before the current moment, that began to shift. Talented women with remarkable credentials started applying in higher numbers to both our flagship program and our emerging leaders program. Today, the scales have moved and we have to work harder at recruiting strong male leaders, especially in our emerging leaders program, to maintain the balance we want in our programs.

Why the shift? It isn’t that men have suddenly become less capable or women more so. The tendency to view power as a zero-sum game in which women rising means men losing is part of what so hobbles progress in our society, and it simply isn’t rooted in the kind of reality I get to see every day. 

The men in our programs remain as impressive and dynamic as ever. What has changed is that now they are matched and made even better by a group of equally gifted women.

As I talk to the women in our programs, here are the three primary factors that I think are driving this change:

• First, women keenly appreciate access to the kind of robust professional networks and information that programs like ours make possible. 

Men have long had access to these resources almost as a matter of course, while women have had to fight their way in or to build their own, especially outside of their own disciplines. At a time when there are more women in the workforce than ever before, women with their sights set on professional growth actively seek out the knowledge and networks that will support them along their path.

That’s not to say men don’t, but perhaps based on history, men seem more certain that doors will open for them — and the women, now no longer willing to be patient and “wait their turn,” are knocking harder.

• Second, more employers are opening up leadership development opportunities to the women in their ranks. 

Partly that’s driven by the women themselves, who increasingly are demanding to be taken seriously as leaders or potential leaders and to be given access to the same professional opportunities that men enjoy. The women in our programs are grateful for the employers who support their participation, but in growing numbers they expect that support just as men do.

But this trend is also driven by employers, male and female, who are actively incentivizing managers to seek out professional development opportunities for women who work for them. Women building their professional portfolios are getting noticed for their extraordinary efforts in these times when productivity is so key to the bottom line. 

Smart employers recognize that cultivating talented, driven women is good business and essential to building the kind of workforce they will need to remain competitive.

• Third, women, especially in our emerging leaders program, seem to be getting more help from their partners at home. 

A major reason that women used to shy away from committing to non-traditional development programs like ours, despite their value to career growth, has been that women traditionally bear the brunt of caregiving, attending to children or simply maintaining a home. This is still the case, but the women in our programs increasingly report that supportive spouses or partners are sharing in those duties so they can attend to their professional development.

All of this matters now because we need to view women’s emergence as leaders as more than a momentary reaction to intolerable abuses, and so much more than the work of a single, galvanizing year. 

The outrage women feel today isn’t the product of a single moment but of a deeply embedded culture that tolerates their abuse, harassment and marginalization, and that even now shrugs off how women remain overrepresented in poverty and domestic shelters and underrepresented in corporate boardrooms and the C-suite.

Women’s call to leadership today is so much more than a wave; it is the slow fulfillment of a destiny that was always meant to be shared with all of humanity. What women are clamoring for and working toward is not the Year of the Woman, but the Era of Everyone, when we will choose our leaders in politics, business, and all walks of life based not on their gender or race or religion, but on how well they can do the job.

Aradhna Malhotra Oliphant is presidentand CEO of Leadership Pittsburgh (Aradhna@lpinc.org).

First Published: June 3, 2018, 4:00 a.m.