Diversity in the workplace has for the past 10 to 15 years been one of acknowledgment and reassurance: Yes, women represent only a small fraction in senior posts worldwide, but give it time. It’ll change. After all, women also make up just less than half of the global workforce, with significant growth in certain countries. They are earning top professional degrees in record numbers and in some areas surpassing men. Companies have implemented programs to fix structural biases against women and support their full participation in leadership. Women are finally ready to make it to the top, the reassurance goes. Not quite yet, but soon.
It is not true. Research shows that among graduates on MBA programs around the world—the high fliers that companies are counting to solve the stormy economy over the next decade - women continue to lag men at every single career stage, right from their first professional post. Reports of progress in advancement, compensation, and career satisfaction are at best exaggerated, or just plain wrong. It is very disturbing that after a decade of serious efforts to create opportunities for women, inequity remains deep-rooted. Companies have failed on this front, they must learn why they haven’t succeeded, and come up with better programs to help talented women advance.
After starting their careers behind, women don’t catch up. Men move further up the career ladder - and they move faster. Does this reflect the presumption that men are qualified and ready but women have to prove themselves first? The gender difference in career progression reflects another problem: bad first bosses. Over a quarter of women left their first job because of a difficult manager—nearly as many as those who moved on for more money or for a career change. Only a small percentage of the men left because of a difficult manager. Of course, these results suggest that women and men may be treated differently by their first managers.
Diverse talent supports innovation and business success, yet organizations devalue their highest-potential female talent. Given the commonly held misperception that the talent pipeline is healthy, companies are at risk of allowing complacency to inhibit their competitive advantage. While progress has been made in many firms, more work clearly needs to be done. Even among the best and brightest managers, gender equality has yet to be attained. Despite genuine efforts to ensure fairness, some businesses may be inadvertently overlooking bias that creeps in at initial job placement. Others may underestimate early managers’ impact on employees’ career paths. Others may have neglected the topic of gender equality in recent years, considering it an issue of the past. Women need to give their companies a wake-up call, and organizations need to answer it with renewed efforts to combat systemic gender inequity. Not soon, now.
Find the right program for the management skills you need, Explore our training portfolio
