KIM LANDERS: An Australian study examining what's stopping women from being equally represented in senior management roles has revealed that men are the ones who're facing discrimination.

It's found that women who adopt flexible work hours are more likely to move into senior leadership roles.

But men are being discouraged from taking up flexible work arrangements and if they're do, it's held against them.

Lucy Carter reports.

LUCY CARTER: Heart and lung surgeon and workplace gender equality advocate Dr Nikki Stamp says the healthcare sector is notorious for being difficult about providing flexible work arrangements.

NIKKI STAMP: Basically it tends towards being actually very poor at offering flexible training options, particularly for young doctors. So it's a real problem because most of our young doctors are training during their fertile time - and that goes for men and women.

LUCY CARTER: However Dr Stamp says from what she's seen, it's far easier for women to be granted flexible work arrangements.

NIKKI STAMP: Absolutely. I think women are starting to get a lot more vocal about demanding flexibility - and that doesn't mean it's perfect. Like I say, in health for example there's a lot of room to move. But I do get the impression from talking to my male colleagues that they are judged quite harshly for wanting to take time out to be dads.

LUCY CARTER: Dr Stamp's experience echoes the findings of a study from Chief Executive Women.

More than 1000 men and women were surveyed, with over 40 per cent from senior management or executive positions.

Report co-author and spokeswomen for Chief Executive Women Meredith Hellicar says some of the findings were a pleasant surprise.

MEREDITH HELLICAR: What we discovered surprisingly was that it was a incredible advantage to businesses for women to work flexibly. They're advocacy and support for their organisations were three times stronger for women that work flexibly, versus women that not, and 59 per cent of respondents said that productivity increased.

Very importantly, it debunked the myth that women who work flexibly are less ambitious. Indeed, we found they were at least as ambitious if not more ambitious that women that weren't working flexibly.

LUCY CARTER: However it was a very different picture for men.

MEREDITH HELLICAR: Men who worked flexibly are six times less advocacy for their workplaces than those that don't work flexibly.

LUCY CARTER: So what does that mean?

MEREDITH HELLICAR: Well it means that men are experiencing a lack of senior level support for working flexibly, and receiving quite negative views from their peers about working flexibly.

LUCY CARTER: Are men being discriminated against because of this?

MEREDITH HELLICAR: Yes. Yes and indeed the Human Rights Commission shows that 27 per cent of fathers and partners returning to work after parental leave are discriminated against, and men are two times more likely to have their request to work flexibly rejected.

LUCY CARTER: The Director of the Workplace Gender Equality Agency Libby Lyons says some of this report's findings are at odds with research her agency conducted last year.

In that project, six men were filmed regularly as they worked flexibly.

LIBBY LYONS: What we found was that with being given permission and support from the organisation and from management, flexibility worked really, really well. But I guess the point here is that it is about organisations giving permission for people - and when I say giving permission, what I mean about that is, it's about work places embracing and embedding flexibility in their workplace to support men in particular.

LUCY CARTER: Ms Lyons says many workplaces still treat men and women differently when it comes to flexible hours.

LIBBY LYONS: It's now normal for most women if they wish to, to work flexibly. It's not for men. So I think you're absolutely right, I don't think the support is there in most organisations for men to work flexibly. It's just not the norm.

LUCY CARTER: So what needs to be done to improve that?

LIBBY LYONS: I think, again as I say, we've got to have the policies and strategies in place, that's really important number one.

Number two is, we have to lead by example, so leaders in the Australian workplace have to start looking at their work life balance and understanding that we all have care and responsibilities, we all have lives we lead outside of work and to embrace a more flexible way of working to suit families, lifestyle and the workplace.

LUCY CARTER: Chief Executive Women's Meredith Hellicar agrees that it's about cultural change within the workplace.

MEREDITH HELLICAR: Bit of a reflection of social attitudes. We've had a big journey for people to understand that women can combine family and work and the next stage of the journey is helping society and employers understand that men can, want to, and need to combine family and work - and indeed millennials want to combine work with all sorts of other aspects of their lives, so I suspect they're just experiencing 10 or 15 years later what women have been struggling with in trying to work flexibly.

KIM LANDERS: Meredith Hellicar from the group Chief Executive Women ending that report from Lucy Carter.