Standing out in a crowd
Publicerat 23 Jan, 2006
480 women sounds like a fairly large group of people, but compared to 18 000 men it is perhaps not so large after all. Jenny Öhlund, one of Sweden’s female housepainters, enjoys being a little special and different.
Almost 18 000 male housepainters are members of the Swedish Painters’ Union, while the union has only 480 female members. Over the years, women have been a rather unusual phenomenon in the Swedish construction industry, but recently there has been a gradual increase in the number of young women on vocational housepainting courses, according to Katja Ivarsson of the Joint Vocational Training Council of the Painting Industry.
She believes that this increasing trend stems from the fact that the organisation has managed to convey what the profession entails and what it has to offer, and that female teachers on painting courses have inspired several young women. In most of the different occupational areas covered by the Swedish Building Workers’ Union only around 30 of the members are women, apart from the group of construction site cleaners which includes approximately 400 women.
“I think this may partly be because several television series on interior design and decoration have been presented by women,” says Jenny Öhlund, who decided early on that she wanted to work with painting. She chose the Art and Design programme at upper-secondary school and followed this up with a year on a decorative arts course in Norrköping. There are a total of four women at her company, together with 80 men, but it is seldom that more than one woman works at the same site.
She tries to avoid renovations or new construction projects and prefers to paint flats.
“My bosses are very obliging. If I treat them fairly then they treat me fairly, and it is really decorative painting that I want to do.” Jenny admits that the job is physically demanding and after a year in the industry she took up weight training so that she could cope with the job and avoid occupational injuries.
Jenny believes that women who choose an occupation like this, in which men predominate so much, make a very deliberate and conscious choice. They do not take up the profession by chance, as she believes that men sometimes do. She says that she almost always feels welcome when she comes to work, although some older men have made sarcastic comments about the amount of work she can or cannot do. She sometimes feels that there is a little bit of a strained atmosphere and that the older men, those who are 50 or above, can look askance at her.
The best thing about being a woman among a lot of men, according to Jenny, is that the men treat her a little bit better than their male colleagues. At the same time, she thinks it is a pity that they treat her differently and that they can change the topic of conservation as soon as she enters the room. The men she works with are often wary and make sure that she is allowed to change into or out of her work clothes first, although she says that she is not shy and could easily change at the same time as the men.
“Of course, the language can be a bit strong sometimes, but I don’t mind. I enjoy listening to them talk, although it’s mostly about cars and football so perhaps it would be fun if there were a few more girls.”
Helena Hugosson, helenahugosson@gmail.com
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The aim of the Umbrella Project is to increase interest, awareness and knowledge about diversity at work and the processes behind exclusion and discrimination.