WUNRN
ILO – International Labour Organization
Direct Link to Full 195-Page 2015 ILO Report:
Women
in Business and Management: Gaining momentum
WOMEN IN BUSINESS &
MANAGEMENT: GAINING MOMENTUM
This report brings together available data and ILO statistics to provide a comprehensive, up to-date and global picture of women in the business world and in management positions.
As women overtake men in education, they
are running a third of the world’s businesses. However, women business owners
are concentrated in small and micro-businesses, and still only 5 per cent or
less of CEOs of the largest global corporations are women. This report
highlights the business case for gender diversity and the obstacles women still
face as well as ways to move ahead, underlining the fact that women’s presence
in the labour market is increasingly significant for economic growth and
development at both enterprise and national levels. It advocates for a greater
role for national business organizations, which can assist their member
companies with putting in place policies and measures to recruit and retain
talent. The report also shows that women still have to deal with a number of
hurdles to reach positions as CEOs and company board members. While women have
advanced in business and management, they continue to be shut out of higher
level economic decision-making despite activism in the last decade to smash the
“glass ceiling”. The report calls for a closer examination of the career paths
of women and men to ensure that subtle gender biases are eliminated, proposing
an array of initiatives that challenge gender stereotypes and corporate
cultures, and that seek to reconcile work and family responsibilities.