TORONTO – Hollywood Suite chairman and co-founder Jay Switzer recalls in mid-April first taking notice of an important industry signpost: Canadian television's small club of network heads are now all women.
"Satisfying that almost nobody has noted Canada's big 3 MediaCo’s & CBC now run by smart leaders who happen to be women. #took50 years," Switzer tweeted at the time.
Bell Media president Mary Ann Turcke (lower left, in our photograph) in April joined (clockwise) Rogers Media vice-president of TV and broadcast operations Colette Watson, CBC executive vice-president of English Services Heather Conway, Shaw Media president Barb Williams, and Groupe TVA president and CEO Julie Tremblay (pictured below) in the C-suite pipeline.
To be sure Switzer, the former president and CEO Canadian broadcaster CHUM Ltd., realizes the five women have landed the top jobs at five networks with very different needs and strategies. "Each position in my opinion is a company-specific situation with different challenges. Each company's solution is solved by the promotion of a well qualified leader – all of whom happen to be female," he told Cartt.ca.
But if it's all a coincidence – and it's also highly symbolic for an industry looking to narrow a gender gap in the ranks of top management.
"I think it's wonderful that all of the networks are being run by women today, but not because we're all women. It's about picking the right person," Colette Watson, who oversees programming, production and operations at Rogers Media, told Cartt.ca.
In her case, Watson sees herself as a change agent for a Rogers Media looking like rival networks to get round the digital bend in the face of stiff competition. "I have a particular skill set in change management, and that what's required at our place; leadership qualities with respect to change and operational knowledge," Watson, who oversaw Rogers' 42 local community TV stations and CPAC before relocating from Ottawa to Toronto, explained.
The CBC's Conway noted the women promising to lead conventional TV networks to a better place have mostly come from different parts of the business. She has a background in strategy, branding and communications, Watson came from Rogers’ cable side, Shaw Media's Williams is a veteran programmer, Bell Media's Turcke had an engineering background before joining Bell in 2005 to become group president of media sales for local TV and radio, and TVA's Tremblay was with Sun Media before heading up the TVA Group.
Williams agreed each major network pursued the experience and job qualifications it felt were required to secure its future, and each of the people it ultimately placed in top positions just happened to be women. "Each company went out to find that unique skill set that they thought needed most, because the skill sets of the women running all these networks are so different," she said.
The women in top TV posts are also mostly long-time executives with their media organizations, which could bring continuity to broadcasters increasingly buffeted by change from all directions. "When so much is changing around you, there can be some security in putting someone in a senior role that has been with the organization for a long time, and who really understands that organization and helps to counter-balance some of the changes going on," Williams said.
"The Canadian media industry requires transformative thinking from good leaders, men and women, at all levels.” – Mary Ann Turcke, Bell Media
Bell Media's Mary Ann Turcke in a statement to Cartt.ca called for inclusiveness at the top of Canadian broadcasting during a time of challenge and change. "The Canadian media industry requires transformative thinking from good leaders, men and women, at all levels. As leaders, we must aspire to support and elevate our industry as a whole, and I hope to achieve this in my new role at Bell Media," Turcke said.
While each company hired the right person for the job, there's also a sense the rising female presence in Canadian TV is not entirely coincidental.
The CBC's Conway argues the major networks aggressively target key female audiences (as they are the primary purchasers for most households) for advertisers across their expanding array of platforms. "We as a business must reflect our audiences, as audiences have become more diverse, and multiple screens have come into households and advertisers are looking to reach certain demographics groups, those are areas that broadcasting 
has to excel in," she said.
As well, Williams said the major networks are promoting women today that might not have risen as high a decade or two earlier. "There might have a been a time in years past when, even if that quality was there, a female executive wouldn't necessarily have been recognized and promoted, and companies, including mine (Shaw) are much more open to promoting talent when it's there," she said.
To that point, Heather Webb, executive director of Women in Film & Television – Toronto, while welcoming more women in top executive posts, insists no glass ceilings in Canadian TV stand to be broken any time soon while company boardrooms that decide on budgets and deals remain dominated by men.
"It's really important that there is diversity, not only for women, but cultural and racial diversity, reflected at the highest board level. That's where strategy gets set," Webb argued.
She did add, however, more women in top broadcasting jobs helps trigger a discussion on narrowing the gender imbalance in Canadian TV's ranks.
