- Internationalisation and opportunities for mobility, networks and research partnerships:
These contacts, not only provided resources, but also introduced women to new knowledge, contacts and professional approaches. - Institutional policies and practices including affirmative action, work/life balance and family-friendly interventions. However, it was thought essential that policies are accompanied by strategic implantation plans.
- Women-only leadership development courses that offer practical support, but are also at an appropriate theoretical and research-informed level for senior women academics.
- Mentoring programmes at formal and informal levels.
- Gender sensitisation programmes:
It was thought essential that women and men were made more aware of how gender operates as a verb as well as a noun in academic life. For example, it is not just about counting more women into existing systems and structures, but should include an understanding of how gender differences are produced and maintained by social and organisational practices. - Private higher education:
There is limited and somewhat contradictory literature on how the emergence of private education is affecting opportunities for women academics to enter leadership positions. For example, the Asian University for Women (AUW) in Bangladesh (a women-only university) and Symbiosis University in India both have female vice-chancellors. - Women-only learning spaces:
The preference for sex-segregated education in some contexts (often associated with religious belief systems) means that some single-sex higher education institutions are emerging. These create some opportunities for women to enter leadership positions, which can however be viewed as less prestigious that those in the co-educational sector. - Professional development, eg. opportunities for doctoral study and regular updating