Blind spot on diversity as progress slows
Staff tend to see what they expect despite the evidence to the contrary, writes Jena McGregor.
Corporate executives like to say gender diversity is a top priority. They mount publicity campaigns, tout their equal pay measures, start up women’s networks to help promote female leaders.
But the view of those agendas – and companies’ success at achieving them – from the ground is starkly different when it comes to male and female employees, according to a new survey.
The survey, by consulting giant McKinsey and the Sheryl Sandbergfunded women’s organisation Lean In, shows a sharp divide between how men and women view their companies’ efforts at advancing women.
The annual report, which in 2017 surveyed more than 70,000 employees working at 76 companies, shows that 63 per cent of men surveyed said their company is doing what it takes to improve gender diversity, while 49 per cent of women said the same.
Fifty-five per cent of men said disrespectful behaviour in their workplaces is addressed quickly, while just 34 per cent of women said the same.
Half of men said managers consider diverse candidates for open jobs, compared with just 35 per cent of women.
While it may not be surprising that men and women have different opinions about gender diversity efforts in the workplace, the report also revealed conflicting views on what might be ‘‘enough’’ when it comes to the gender makeup of their companies.
For instance, in companies where just one in 10 senior leaders is female, nearly 50 per cent of men said women were ‘‘well represented’’ in the senior ranks, compared with only one-third of women who – somewhat remarkably – said the same.
‘‘It really speaks to a perception mismatch,’’ said Lareina Yee, a senior partner at McKinsey.
‘‘I think what this says is that when you see almost no women – and then when you see one out of 10 and you think they’re well represented – our mind is taking a bit of a shortcut. It’s settling into the status quo.’’
The report shows a similar disconnect to what previous reports have found about how much men and women think gender diversity is a big deal. Last year, a survey by PwC of more than 800 corporate directors found that only about a quarter of the men who responded thought gender diversity on the corporate board improved a company’s performance, while 89 per cent of female directors did. Only 38 per cent of the men said diversity improved a board’s effectiveness, compared with 92 per cent of the women.
McKinsey’s report says the pace is slow for women moving up the ranks, and maybe even stalling.
Their analysis shows that at every rank – from entry-level jobs to the corner office – the per centage of women holding jobs is either flat or up just one per centage point since last year, with the number of women at the senior vice-president level three percentage points lower than in 2016.
The survey points to employees’ and
‘‘If you perceive that it’s better than it actually is, then how urgent you feel it is to change is likely diminished.’’
Lareina Yee of McKinsey
their managers’ failure to grasp the magnitude of the problem as one reason for the glacial progress. ‘‘I don’t think there’s any [malicious] intent; it’s a pure blind spot,’’ said Yee.
In some companies, after decades of there being no women at the top, seeing even one among the executive bios on the website or sitting around the boardroom table can look like headway.
‘‘If you perceive that it’s better than it actually is, then how urgent you feel it is to change is likely diminished,’’ she said. –Washington Post