Dive Brief:
- Women are under-represented in the workforce globally, and if organizations maintain the current rate of progress, female representation will reach only 40% globally in the professional and managerial ranks in 2025, according to Mercer’s second annual When Women Thrive global report.
- Mercer’s report finds that although women are 1.5 times more likely than men to be hired at the executive level, they are also leaving organizations from the highest rank at 1.3 times the rate of men, undermining gains at the top. According to the report, women make up 40% of the average company’s workforce. Globally, they represent 33% of managers, 26% of senior managers, and 20% of executives.
- Only 9% of organizations surveyed globally offer women-focused retirement and savings programs, with the US/Canada ranking first (14%), despite Mercer’s research proving that such efforts lead to greater representation of women.
Dive Insight:
The data from Mercer's survey paints a sad picture of gender issues globally in the upcoming decade.
Pat Milligan, Mercer’s Global Leader of When Women Thrive, says that traditional methods of advancing women aren’t moving the needle, and under-representation of women around the world has become an economic and social travesty. Also, Milligan adds that while leaders have been focusing on women at the top, they’re largely ignoring the female talent pipelines so critical to maintaining progress.
Milligan said that in 10 years, organizations won’t even be close to gender equality in most regions of the world. If CEOs want to drive their growth tomorrow through diversity, they need to take action today. “This is a call-to-action – every organization has a choice to stay with the status quo or drive their growth, communities and economies through the power of women,” she says.
