THERE’S no doubt that women have made a step up on the corporate ladder over the years – female prime-ministers and what not, but despite this progress, the battle in the boardroom still persists, and the glass ceiling – so sturdy and strong – refuses to crack.
This has nothing to do with ability or skillset, research findings suggest.
According to recent findings* of a U.S survey, women are considered every bit as capable in the corporate world as their male counterparts. Ticking all the right boxes in political leadership as well as dominating businesses, highlighting key leadership traits such as intelligence, capacity for innovation, compassion and organisation.
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Pew Research Centre
“It’s not that the public thinks women aren’t qualified,” said Kim Parker, Pew’s director of social trends research. “The public is really pointing to deeper societal barriers.”
When asked what’s holding women back when it comes to executive business positions, 43 per cent say that not only are women held to higher standards, but society is still not ready to hire/elect women leaders.
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Women account for just 4.6 per cent of the chief executives and 19.6 per cent of the board members of companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500 index, according to a census of women in business released by the nonprofit research group Catalyst.
“Because there have been so many men in visible leadership roles the idea of what leadership looks like tends to be stereotypically male,” said Deborah Gillis, Catalyst’s chief executive. “We have to break that down.”
**These findings are based on a new Pew Research Center survey of 1,835 randomly selected adults conducted online Nov. 12-21, 2014.*
