Accelerating women's empowerment in business

It has often been thought that once companies globally attain gender balance, gender gaps will close, and bias will reduce. Management across numerous companies have gone for the 'adding women and stirring' approach, believing that having more women in the company would promote change.

However, simply adding more women in the workplace does not change the system and deliver the organisational structure that benefits everyone.Hiring and fostering professional development of women is only a small part of the solution.Unfortunately, disparities against women persist in the corporate world despite the increasing focus on women's empowerment. The current rate of women's participation is insufficient to address these disparities effectively.

According to the United Nations (UN), despite the progress made over the years on women's empowerment, the world, unfortunately, is not on the right track to achieve gender equality by 2030. On average, women still earn 23 percent less than men globally and spend around three times more hours in unpaid care and domestic work than men. Current projection says, it will take about 140 years for women to be heralded equally in leadership positions and power in the workplace. We must go beyond mere rhetoric to expedite women's participation and empowerment in the corporate sector. We must adopt exemplary practices from diverse cultures and ensure gender diversity in leadership.

Over the years, women have remained under recognised across industries. However, a slight change has been witnessed. A 2023 McKinsey research shows, the number of women in leadership or C-Suite has increased from 17 percent in 2015 to 28 percent in 2023. The study found that the representation of women at higher positions like Vice President and Senior Vice President levels has promisingly improved. The data is encouraging but fragile as the slow progress in the leadership levels has unfortunately created a weak middle part in the pipeline for employees, who represent the majority of women in all corporates across the world. Fewer women in leadership positions can discourage and dishearten other female employees.

A work environment that fosters inclusion, continuous development, trust, and empowers women, can witness sustainable growth. Empowered women can help any corporation to thrive. Some researchers have recently discovered that multicultural and gender-diverse teams are more profitable. Regardless of the industry, women bring different and transformational skill sets and perspectives, which have been seen to drive more effective solutions. As reported, nine in 10 women under the age of 30 years aim to be promoted to the next stage, and three in four aspire to become senior leaders. So, we should create an organisational work environment that will help women reach the highest levels.

Women empowerment and gender equality are not about fairness but have become crucial to building inclusive and diverse cultures and organisations. We must ensure that companies promote equal opportunities, gender equality, address biases, dismantle barriers, and create a diverse and inclusive work environment. Diversity brings creativity and innovation, which can strengthen the growth of a team.

During the hiring process, we often tend to recruit those who resonate with us; however, hiring people from similar backgrounds or specific profiles poses the danger of lacking diverse ideas and solutions within the team. It is also critically important that organisations' leadership teams reflect a healthy level of diversity; Employees need to see and feel representation as part of their leadership, to aspire and believe that they too can make it leadership roles.

I have had the opportunity to work in five different countries on three continents, which allowed me to gain international experience and broaden my horizons on the unique perspective on different cultures, languages, and work practices. Indeed, these learnings and insights played a crucial role in accelerating my personal and professional development.

Diversity creates better opportunities for creativity, problem-solving, smarter decision-making, reduced employee turnover rates, and, most importantly, increased profits and productivity. When we focus on elevating diversity, gender diversity is often considered taboowith negative emotions around quotas and affirmative bias aimed at boosting diversity targets and KPIs (key performance indicators). But it shouldn't be a taboo subject anymore as it is critical to strike a good balance for the betterment of companies, industries, and nations.

Decades of studies show that women in leadership roles help increase productivity, enhance collaboration, improve fairness, and inspire organisational dedication. Despite the proven research, only 10 percent of Fortune 500 companies are run by women CEOs. This is a problem; companies are missing out on important competitive advantages by not addressing diversity barriers.

We must create policies that will allow women to feel comfortable to grow their careers. For example, at BAT, we have been following flexible working policies to encourage and nurture the right environment, which allows our female employees to balance and manage their professional and personal responsibilities. Additional-ly, according to the McKinsey study, flexibility and hybrid work have helped one in five women to stay in their jobs, avoid reduced hours, lower fatigue, and increase productivity.

Likewise, the government of Bangladesh considers women's engagement in economic and political activities to be a cross-cutting issue and one of the primary drivers of transformation for the nation. The government has been relentlessly working to ensure women's overall development by enabling their active and equal participation in socio-economic activities and removing numerous hindrances that might negatively impact their empowerment. The government has reserved 50 seats for women in Jatiya Sangsad (national assembly) to promote women's empowerment.

Similarly, a transformative shift has started taking place in Bangladesh's corporate landscape, with more women taking influential leadership roles and breaking the barriers. Currently, 7.2 percent of businesses in Bangladesh are reportedly owned by women. While it may not appear to be a significant percentage, it demonstrates changes towards a brighter future for women within the country.

Still, we need to do more. All of us must promote diverse leadership behaviours at all levels. We all should openly discuss diversity and why inclusivity is essential, actively seek out diverse opinions, and pay attention to the impacts occurring or should occur across organisations. We all should be working to attain gender equality and women empowerment to create an inclusive society and workplace.

We only have seven years remaining to fulfil Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 5 (gender equality), and unfortunately, a mere 15.4 percent of data are on track, according to the UN. Every organisation globally is responsible for contributing to achieving it. We must institutionalise practices that will create opportunities for women in the corporate world.

The theme of International Women's Day 2024 is Inspire Inclusion. But what is an Inclusive Leader? Inclusive leaders authentically invest in diversity and inclusion and promote and foster equity. They seek to comprehend other cultures, challenge the status quo, and be an apostle of equity for all.

Are you an Inclusive Leader?

Nirala Singh is Head of Finance at BAT Bangladesh.