SUE UNERMAN SHARES HER TACTICS…

There is no shortage of advice on how to get ahead as a woman in the workplace today. But how much of it is actually helpful? The statistics make depressing reading. The gender pay gap, while virtually non-existent for a 20-something woman, will only widen for a woman in her 30s, and becomes wider still for a woman over 40. Boards and senior management jobs continue to be dominated by men. So what is going on?

According to the authors of a new book, The Glass Wall, women in the workplace are still coming up against an invisible barrier: a glass wall that we can see through, but can’t quite shatter. The authors, Sue Unerman and Kathryn Jacob, are both working mothers with impressive CVS who have reached senior positions in the advertising industry, and now they want to throw down the ladder for other women to climb up.

‘I think we all know that we should network more, raise our hand more, and push ourselves forward more, but it’s not all that simple,’ says Sue. ‘For the book, we interviewed over 100 men and women working in all kinds of industries, and what’s clear is that the situation for working women is far from fair. There are societal and cultural influences that run very deep, and to succeed you need to have a set of tactics.’

GH asked Sue how to break through that glass wall, and here is her advice…