Gender parity is an important achievement that strongly influences whether economies and societies advance. Successfully harnessing and mobilising half of the world’s total talent pool has a huge impact on the growth, competitiveness and future-readiness of economies and organisations across the globe.

Global Gender Gap report provides a robust benchmark

The Global Gender Gap Report benchmarks 144 countries regarding their progress on gender parity via four main themes: Economic Participation and Opportunity, Educational Attainment, Health and Survival, and Political Empowerment. There's also data around the dynamics of gender gaps across industry talent pools and occupations.

Unfortunately, data shows that the gender gap is widening, so there desperately needs to be new ways of thinking if the world is to close the gender gap. Progress is regressing and moving backwards. Instead of taking 170 years to close the gap at the current rate of progress, it is estimated that gender parity across the world will take over two centuries, 217 years to be exact.

Women leaders hire more women

Could the key to closing the gender gap be though putting more women in charge? While women worldwide are closing the gap in critical areas such as health and education, significant gender inequality persists in the workforce and in politics. The rate of progress for women has been slow over the past decade with the proportion of female leaders increasing by an average of just over 2 per cent across 12 industries studied by the World Economic Forum (WEF).

WEF's data shows that when women are more present and participating in leadership roles, more women are hired right across the board at all levels. This detail holds true even when taking into consideration the disparities in the size of female talent pools across various industry sectors. If the proportion of women in leadership is not increasing fast enough, yet we know that diversity in leadership positions is a critical factor in closing the economic opportunity gap, then it is clear that women's participation at the most senior levels of leadership and management swiftly need to increase and accelerate.

How is your employer helping forge gender parity?

The International Women's Day 2018 campaign theme is #PressforProgress and worldwide activity sees groups and organisations across the world continue to launch new gender parity initiatives, celebrate women's achievements, call for greater action and more. Employers across the world will support the campaign as they do what they can to actively engage and harness their workforces and communities to forge gender parity.

The Global Gender Gap Report was first published in 2006 by the World Economic Forum. It covers major and emerging economies and provides the Global Gender Gap Index that to measures gender equality.
 

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