Remove hurdles that stop women from going up leadership ladder

The recent announcement that PepsiCo’s CEO, Indra Nooyi, will be stepping down has caused a stir in corporate leadership circles. Nooyi has been one of the global faces for women in leadership. Her identity as an Indian and a woman – recognising the intersectionality of gender and race – makes her more inspiring.

Nooyi’s exit brings to the fore the important subject of women in leadership. The New Yorker article, Indra Nooyi and the vanishing female CEO, generated a heated conversation. Despite the progress women have made in the workplace, they still account for a small share of top leadership roles. There is a consistent pattern in today's large organisations; as women climb up the ladder they vanish. Women get into entry-level positions successfully, but when they get to middle management, things stall. This is true across different fields including corporate, non-profit, politics and government and academia.

UPWARD TREND

Studies show that while the percentage of female CEOs has been on an upward trend for many years, the progress has been uncomfortably slow. In Africa, McKinsey’s Women Matter 2016 report found that few leadership positions are made available to women. According to the report, only five per cent of CEOs, 22 per cent of Cabinet members, and 24 per cent of parliamentarians in Africa were women. These low numbers aligned with statistics from US, where only five per cent of CEOs and 27 per cent of Cabinet members were women. Recent reports show that the numbers largely remain the same.

Why is the case, and what can be done?

PIPELINE PROBLEM

There is a pipeline problem. We need women to come into leadership roles in bigger numbers and at a faster rate than they are today. Nooyi rightly observed while there are plenty of women in entry-level positions, the arrival of children, which coincides with the stage when people typically move up the career ladder, their 30s and 40s, halts their career growth. These are also the years parents are ageing and more likely to need extra care. We recently reflected on how common this is among our age group after rescheduling a board meeting to allow a female colleague to respond to her father’s medical emergency.

Besides care-giving, there are other setbacks that women face on their way up. Bias (conscious and unconscious) that assumes men are ready for promotion when women are not is acknowledged.

There have been increased voices drawing attention to other hurdles. One of these is language. Gillian Wilmont, an experienced board director committed to supporting under-represented groups aptly said, “words matter — especially with referencing, which is key to progression”. Often the same behaviour will be described differently for men and women with positive words for men and negative ones for women.

MANIPULATIVE

Chimamanda Adichie cited some examples during her Chatham House 2018 speech. A man is confident, while a woman is arrogant; a man is strategic, while a woman is manipulative.

Thankfully, efforts to advance women’s leadership have been on the rise. Where deliberate and sustained effort has been put, there has been notable progress. In his oath of office in 2016, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres made clear that achieving gender parity was a top priority. A Gender Parity Task Force was set up to come up with a roadmap, benchmarks and timeframes. In February, Mr Guterres announced that gender parity had been reached in the leadership of the UN secretariat, with a 50/50 representation of men and women in senior management.

PERSPECTIVES

However, the goal is not just about hitting the numbers; it is about changing institutional cultures so that organisations can access and capitalise on their full potential. Diversity and inclusion – noting that diversity does not equal inclusion; and gender is just one component – are critical. In today’s volatile, uncertainty, complex and ambiguous world, it is important to build a pipeline of talent that features the full range of complementary skills and perspectives. The success of women in leadership requires a concerted effort on the part of governments, families, societies and organisations.

Government is responsible for providing an enabling environment. The two thirds gender principle in the Constitution and the Capital Markets Authority guidelines support this. The 2017 Board Diversity and Inclusion study of listed companies found that Kenyan boards are more diverse than the global average. However, the balance is still heavily skewed in favour of older men.

TRAINING

Families and society need to change their attitude towards domestic and caregiving work, and champion the sharing of this work with men.

Organisations also need to create more welcoming workplaces that support women as they rise and also become mothers. They should grow a pipeline through offering training programmes for women in leadership and on boards, increasing the proportion of women in senior “operating roles”— the kind that often lead to CEO positions, basing employee’s career progress on results, rather than their presence at the office, offering training on unconscious bias; and providing a safe environment, including by addressing sexual harassment.

Role modelling remains key. The more you see someone like you do something, the more you believe it’s possible. We need to unlock the enormous strength of sisterhood. The authors of the recently launched Women Kind — Dr Kirstin Ferguson & Catherine Fox — show the tangible good that comes from women supporting other women and sharing some useful tips. Give referrals and exploit the amplification effect of social media — like, a retweet, comment, endorse, share, buy.

SPONSORING

Men too have an important role to play by mentoring and sponsoring more women for opportunities.

What gets measured gets done. We must improve our ability to measure progress, including deciding what to measure and how. Kiersten Barnet, who leads the Bloomberg LP Gender Equality Index, captured this well in her Women’s Equality Day message on August 26, “Without measurement, gender equality progress is just a feeling”.

Ms Oyaro is an international development expert. [email protected]