Women in Business: Success or Stagnation?

Community Manager — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 13:59:00 GMT

Former eBay head Meg Whitman was recently named CEO of Hewlett Packard, a feather in her cap and one more crack in the glass ceiling for women breaking into the highest echelons of business. Still the number of women CEOs overall has remained stagnant. Only twelve women run Fortune 500 companies, fifteen less than the previous year.

What gives? Why aren't more women running major companies? When one considers that women are outperforming men at college and grad schools and are enrolling in greater numbers than their male counterparts, the disparity between ability, interest and outcome is confounding.

Two recent articles that have blown up in the blogsphere examine the topic of women in business, glass ceilings and how to change the status quo. While neither piece pretends to have all the answers, both provide food for thought.

How Women Can Flourish in the Workplace: Harvard Business Review blogger and CEO of a global tech company Vineet Nayar argues that the corporate world has failed women. Nayar argues that women managers are usually required to fit into organizational molds that force them to opt out of the workforce. The result? A leaking leadership pipeline and few women in the C-suite.

Nayar also advocates specific steps to bridge the gender divide including:

Grass root-level mentoring and coaching in the education system
Do away with the expectation that employees should be available anywhere, anytime
Change the unwritten rules of workplace engagement favoring men
Coach women to assume additional responsibilities, advocate for themselves and aspire for more

A Woman's Place: Veteran journalist Ken Auletta writes a profile of arguably one of the most powerful and closely watched women in technology: Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook.

By any measure, Sandberg's career is stellar: an Ivy League education, senior roles at the Department of Treasury under financial powerhouse Larry Summers and at Google and the COO job at Facebook.

Yet Sandberg says "women are not making it to the top." She adds, "a hundred and ninety heads of state; nine are women. Of all the people in parliament in the world, thirteen per cent are women. In the corporate sector, women at the top-C-level jobs, board seats-tops out at fifteen, sixteen per cent."

Sandberg believes that women need to take three steps to ameliorate the problem:

Sit at the table. Take your rightful place among the players, negotiate your salary and own your power. More than 50 percent of men negotiate salaries while less than 10 percent of women do so.
Make sure your partner is a real partner. Women wind up shouldering a majority of the child rearing duties and house chores, even when they work. A true 50-50 split is needed.
Don't leave before you leave. Women often stop gunning for promotions and projects when they contemplate having a family. Sandberg says women shouldn't "lean back" but should rather keep full steam ahead and not undermine their careers even before the take a break for family.

Sandberg concludes with the following counsel: "Don't worry so much about balance. Work hard, stick with what you like, and don't let go."

Sound advice, no matter your gender.

Beyond Folders : women in business, glass ceiling

Women in Business: Success or Stagnation?