The annual report “Women in the Workplace” is published by McKinsey and Company and LeanIn.Org. The report examines the status of women in the U.S. workforce and is based on data from 270 companies employing over ten million people, a survey of over 27,000 employees, and interviews.
This year’s report focuses on the barriers women face in the labor market, but reports from previous years clearly show that women’s career development is different from that of men. Although the proportion of women in senior management positions has fortunately increased, there are still proportionally fewer women in senior and middle management positions than men.
The report begins by discussing and debunking four “known” myths/statements that explain why women’s career development is different from men’s.
| Affirmation | Reality |
| Women have less ambition when it comes to career advancement now than before. | Women are more ambitious when it comes to their careers than ever before. The flexibility that now exists with work from home and remote jobs has only fueled women’s ambitions. |
| The biggest obstacle for women when it comes to career advancement is the glass ceiling. | Women face more obstacles than men at the beginning of their careers (the broken rung). |
| Microaggressions have little impact on women in the workforce. | Bullying has a profound and lasting impact on women in the labor market |
| It is mainly women who want and benefit from flexibility in work. | Both women and men consider flexibility in work to be very important. When asked, 78% of women and 60% of men believe that flexibility in work is important, and 68% of women and 54% of men believe that the ability to control when and where you work is important. Flexibility in work is therefore important for both women and men. |
Section 2 deals with what is known in English as ” The Broken Rung “, i.e. the obstacle that women face at the very beginning of their careers, an obstacle that men do not experience to the same extent.
The following figure is taken from a McKinsey & Company report.
Here you can see how the ratio of men and women is fairly equal at the beginning of their careers (Entry Level), but then the proportion of women decreases as they move up the organizational chart, with women making up 28% of those on the executive boards of the companies that participated in the survey.
In Iceland, 21% of CEOs are women, 25% of managers in the business sector are women, and 49% of managers in state-owned enterprises are women . [1] It is therefore likely that women in the Icelandic business sector also face the same invisible barrier as women in the United States.
Is this just a law of nature?
No, not at all. This trend can be reversed with targeted actions. But first we must acknowledge the problem and then work systematically towards change, and the McKinsey and Company and LeanIn.Org report also recommends the following actions to combat this:
- Introduce regular measurements in human resources matters. This way, you can regularly monitor how the gender pay gap is developing, how promotions are developing by gender, gender participation in education and training, whether there is a difference in job satisfaction between men and women, etc. But measurements alone are not useful; the measurements need to be followed up with actions.
- Emphasize diversity and inclusion training for both managers and employees. Annual diversity and inclusion training alone will not lead to change; a meaningful conversation about diversity and inclusion must take place among managers.
- Inform employees about how career development within the company is structured, what paths are available, and what opportunities are available for people to grow professionally, whether it is by taking on tasks that involve greater responsibility or increasing their specialist skills.
- Increase pay transparency in companies. It will be interesting to monitor the impact of new pay transparency rules within the EU.
- Have clear processes in place for hiring and transfer decisions to ensure that such decisions are made objectively and provide ongoing training on potential biases in hiring. There is evidence that women are hired based on past performance while men are hired based on their expected performance. This attitude needs to be changed through training and discussion.
Sources:
https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/diversity-and-inclusion/women-in-the-workplace#/
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/broken-rung-real-barrier-womens-progression-workplace-cookson/
https://fka.is/tähää/jafnvaegisvogin/
[1] Source: FKA Balance Scale Dashboard
