Gender Gap at the Top: Striving for Equality in the Corporate Suite

Women are pushing through the glass ceiling and moving into executive roles like CEO, CAO, CFO, but their path to the C-Suite comes with considerable sacrifice, and often a longer journey to get there. These are some of the findings in a recent report led by the University of Manitoba with Toronto Metropolitan University.

"Yes. we are seeing progress, but it's moving at a bit of a snail's pace," said Larissa Kanhai, research lead for "Bridging the Gender Gap: Skills for the Advancement of Women"

"There is an unspoken societal expectation of women, built into organizational systems, that are actively working against women, and diverse peoples, to access a seat at the executive table...It's really quite riveting that this continues to be the case."

The report, spanning 74-pages was jointly created by the University of Manitoba and Toronto Metropolitan University's Diversity Institute. It involves research conducted through comprehensive interviews with 50 senior executives. Women from diverse industries and backgrounds across Canada. The study identified career obstacles, including gender pay disparities, barriers to advancement and a deeply entrenched bias that, although diminishing, persists to this day.

"Women are subject to workplace contradictions, through penalties for being mothers, for NOT being mothers, for speaking up, for not speaking up, for being too feminine for not being feminine enough. Never mind daring to speak with an accent," Kanhai said.

Researchers found many women said their advancement to corporate positions often took longer than their male colleagues. In some cases, the women weren't offered the same mentorship opportunities. Some women described education as a hurdle. Being the only woman in an all-male classroom.

"This is a unique study in that we focused our interviews with women at such a high level," Kanhai said. "So, for them having reached the position of CEO, or being the only woman at the global board for their corporate entity, sometimes the men they are working with never worked with women before. In some cases, some of these older generations, haven't seen their mothers working, they haven't seen their wives working. So, this experience is a new one."

The report is peppered with quotations from the women interviewed, speaking to the challenges they've faced moving into executive roles. One woman said she was told to return to work for an AGM two days after giving birth. Others described feeling like they had to put forward a tough exterior to fit in. While some women said their gender didn't create barriers, many other women talked about the "boys' club" mentality they experienced in the C-Suite. The report says women "downplayed" life at home to ensure their professional visibility.

Women are underrepresented in executive roles. A 2021Harvard study found women lead only 8% of Fortune 500 companies in the U.S and less than 1% of those executives are racialized women. A 2021 Statistics Canada report shows the average female worker earns 89 cents compared to the average man's dollar.

The study provides recommendations for action at both societal and organizational levels to support women's advancement. Societal policies and programs should challenge stereotypes, while organizational strategies look at policies around governance and leadership, ways to embed gender and diversity throughout the value chain.

"It is more than just having another women's leadership program offered at your workplace," said Kanhai. "While it's a positive thing, it is not the one panacea or solution to fixing gender bias in the workplace, because its suggesting there's something wrong with women, and that women have to fix themselves."

Corporations can act immediately, she says, by signing onto the 50-30 challenge, to increase both gender and diverse representation at the board level. Or conduct a diversity assessment from Toronto Metropolitan University.

Kanhai says she hopes people will take the time to read and learn from the report.

"Let's see how we can make everyone succeed, because helping individuals succeed will help the organization to succeed."