If U.S. businesses changed their culture, women would be five times more likely to become leaders.
That’s the conclusion of a major report by Accenture ACN, +1.90% into workplace culture in the U.S. and around the world. Accenture identified 40 factors that are statistically shown to influence advancement. They include a diverse leadership team that sets, shares and measures equality targets openly, family-friendly policies and practices, flexible work schedules and respectful policies such as not asking employees to conform to a dress or appearance code.
Accenture surveyed more than 22,000 working men and women with a college education in 34 countries — including 1,400 employees in the U.S. — to measure their perception of important issues that contribute to their workplace culture. Out of more than 200 personal and workplace factors, including policies, behaviors and collective opinions of employees, Accenture came up with a list of 14 factors that are most likely to affect change:
• Gender diversity as a priority for management
• Diversity target or goals shared outside the organization
• Clearly stating gender pay-gap goals and ambitions
• Progress in attracting, retaining and progressing women
• The company has a women’s network
• That women’s network is also open to men
• Employees avoid long-distance travel via virtual meetings
• Working from home when need be
• Comfortable environment to report sexual harassment
• Men are encouraged to take parental leave
• Never asking employees to change their appearance
• Employees feel free to be creative and innovative
• Remote working is widely available and commonplace
• Providing training to ensure staff skills stay relevant
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In workplaces where these factors were most common, women were four times more likely to reach senior manager and director levels — and five times more likely to reach these levels in the U.S. For every 100 male managers, there could be up to 84 female managers, compared with the current ratio of 100 to 34, and up to 87 female managers for every 100 male managers in the U.S. Globally, that equates to a lift in women’s earnings of $2.9 trillion or $20,000 per year for women in the U.S.
Currently, women are 22% less likely to reach manager level than their male peers, while men are 47% more likely to reach these positions than their female peers, Accenture found. In the U.S., women are paid 83 cents on the dollar compared to men, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The overall global gender gap can be closed in exactly 100 years across the 106 countries covered since the inception, according to the World Economic Forum‘s Global Gender Gap Index.
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Recent research supports Accenture’s findings. Women employed in male-dominated workplaces are more likely to say their gender has made it harder for them to get ahead at work and report gender discrimination at significantly higher rates, according to a survey released this week by the Pew Research Center, a nonprofit think tank in Washington, D.C. The survey was conducted last year before the allegations against movie producer Harvey Weinstein sparked a global movement.
And when women do join a male-majority team? Men change their attitudes about mixed-gender productivity and change their previously held views of gender roles, according to a new study by economists at University of California, San Diego, Ragnar Frisch Centre for Economic Research in Oslo and the Swedish Institute for Social Research at Stockholm University. They randomly assigned female recruits to boot camp squads in the Norwegian military, but not others.