Women in Business Advancement

If you REALLY want to support women in the workplace, you need to start: → Offering flexible work arrangements, especially to support mothers. → Encouraging women to go for internal promotions → Paying women fairly and transparently → Creating environments where women’s voices are heard → Calling out microaggressions and biases when you see them → Offering leadership training and mentorship for women → Rethinking how performance and ambition are measured (not just who shouts the loudest) → Making networking and career progression opportunities accessible to all → Championing women even when they’re not in the room → Reviewing your hiring and promotion processes to eliminate bias → Creating policies that support women through all life stages (not just maternity leave) → Holding senior leaders accountable for diversity and inclusion goals → Ensuring workplace policies support women’s health, including menopause and period policies International Women’s Day should be about real, tangible action. Too often, we see businesses celebrating IWD while their leadership teams are still male-dominated, pay gaps persist and workplace policies don’t support women’s real needs. So, if you’re a business leader, hiring manager, or even a colleague... Ask yourself: What are you actually doing to make the workplace more equitable for women? 🤔

LinkedIn asks you to post today to celebrate "a woman who's made an impact on your career." But these kinds of posts, even earnestly written, tend to leave us feeling hollow. If we're looking for real progress towards fairness and equality at work, here's what to do instead: 🪴 Did you know that if there's only one woman on a shortlist of qualified candidates, she has a whopping 0% chance of being hired? Simply expanding shortlists to include more than one woman (and for that matter, people from historically marginalized communities) helps counter biased decision-making. 📋 Standardized process can be a surprisingly easy way to mitigate bias. Structured interviewing, standardized skill-based assessments directly related to job tasks, and standardized scoring rubrics can make comparisons across candidates more fair and substantially reduce subtle gender discrimination. 🌻 Incentivize flexibility for ALL workers, not just women. In a vacuum, harmful norms may arise that imply these arrangements are only utilized by those who "don't value their careers as much," penalizing workers of all genders. Celebrate senior leaders, especially men, who model greater flexibility and wellbeing so that all workers are licensed to do the same. 🔍 Conduct a pay equity audit, seeking to examine not only outcomes like total compensation, but also distribution of candidates across roles. If men and women in the same role are getting paid similarly, but women are dramatically overclustered in low-paying roles, you've still got a problem. ❤️🩹 Create an anonymous and/or informal process to report and addressing discrimination and harassment. A lower-stakes way to address harm, in addition to training bystander intervention and modelling respectful communication, accountability, and timely feedback from the top, can mitigate daily harms for all workers. Some folks hesitate to push for these practices because they feel more committing than just posting on social media. They're right — because with more effort comes more impact. So reach out to a few of your colleagues and advocates within your workplace to work together on pushing for these changes. Ten posts in isolation pale in comparison to the impact ten peoples' collective organizing might have on your workplace and everyone in it! Remember: International Women's Day is a chance for us not just to celebrate women, but to sharpen our advocacy alongside women, to build a future that's better, brighter, and more fair for all of us.

Why is it that even in industries dominated by women employees, men rise to the top of the most prestigious and influential organizations? One answer is career escalators. “Career escalators” points to the practices, structures and norms that move a person upward in their careers. However, as research by many, including Prof. Christine Williams shows in her research, “glass elevators” are hidden advantages for men to advance in women-dominated fields. As Cathleen Clerkin, PhD reveals, a broad look at nonprofit workers reveals a slight advantage for men in leadership. Women represent about 70% of employees yet only 62% of leaders. The real gap, however, shows up when you look at size of the non-profit, as measured by revenues. Men nonprofit CEOs oversee nearly twice the revenues as women (~$11M vs. ~$6M). And men CEOs earn on average +27% more than women CEOs. Having worked with many nonprofit boards on their hiring practices, bias is a concern in recruiting CEOs and board directors. Preference for the “think leader, think male” can give an implicit advantage to White men, resulting in disadvantages or de-accelerators for women and BIPOC men. Often those concerns are expressed in donor networks, strategic thinking, vision and public persona -- all of which are important and yet the evaluation of who can do them can be fraught with biases. What can you do? The author suggests many important strategies. ✔ Check for biased language and treatment in the hiring process.  ✔ Track demographic data.  ✔ Be transparent about pay.  ✔ Create clear career matrices.  ✔ Have explicit conversations about career goals.  ✔ Sponsor women and give them challenging opportunities. When we make these often invisible accelerators visible--and work towards creating clear, equitable and transparent access to them--we can come closer to achieving our intention of creating remarkable and inclusive organizations.  Research by Candid. Article published in Harvard Business Review.

I’m the CEO of a $10M startup with 250+ employees. And yet, because I’m a woman, I’ve been downplayed and told to “bring my boss” on intro calls more times than I can count. It’s 2025, and the same old biases and stale stereotypes blow my mind. And this is exactly why it’s more important than ever for women to build WILD confidence and own their work. Because with all the pressures, expectations, and scrutiny we face, the last thing we can afford is holding ourselves back with self-doubt. Yet here’s the reality: - 60% of women have never negotiated pay - 43% have never asked for a raise The biggest reason → low confidence. But here’s the wild part: - Women-led startups exit at 1.4x higher valuation multiples. - Companies with female CEOs outperform the S&P average in revenue growth. - Women-led startups make 78 cents per $1 raised (men make 31 cents) We don’t have a skill gap, we have a mindset gap. We can’t sit around hoping the culture will shift in our favor. We need to take up space right now. • Ask questions • Volunteer to lead projects • Promote your work • Share your wins • Speak up in meetings • Build your network strategically Train yourself to step into opportunities, spotlight your impact, and lead LOUDLY. That’s how you grow, and that’s how we change the game.

What if the biggest economic opportunity of our time is the one we keep overlooking? A number stopped me this week: 455,000. That's how many women left the U.S. workforce between January and August 2025. Outside of the pandemic, it's one of the largest declines in recorded history. Women not fully participating in the workforce costs the U.S. economy up to $650 billion a year. This matters, not just morally, but economically. The human stories behind this number are powerful. Childcare costs surpassing mortgage costs. A federal employee whose flexible role was eliminated. A Black woman with 30 years of experience struggling to find her next opportunity. The data tells a sobering story. Black women's unemployment rate reached 6.7%, more than twice that of white women. Caregiving was the number one reason women cited for leaving. When women participate fully in the workforce, economies grow. The World Bank estimates that closing the gender gap could increase global GDP by more than 20%. And research consistently shows that diverse leadership drives stronger business outcomes. Talent alone is not enough. We need systems that support women at every stage: affordable child care, flexible work models, equitable pay, and leadership that sees inclusion as a competitive advantage, not a compliance exercise. As someone who has always believed in the power of business to serve people and society, I am convinced that the companies who get this right will not only retain their best talent, they will outperform. What role is your organization playing in keeping women in the workforce? Sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics, CNN, CNBC/Catalyst, National Partnership for Women & Families, McKinsey Women in the Workplace 2025, Deloitte, World Bank #SheEconomy #CloseTheGap #WomenInTheWorkforce #WomenLeadership #GenderEqualityNow Credits: Getty Image CNN

One of the hardest lessons I’ve learned in my career is this: No one will advocate for you the way you can advocate for yourself. When I first entered the professional world, I thought my work would speak for itself. I believed that if I put my head down, worked hard, and delivered great results, recognition and opportunities would naturally follow. But here’s what I discovered: While hard work is essential, visibility is just as important. It took observing how others approached their careers to realize this: The people who often get ahead aren’t just hardworking — they’re intentional about making their contributions known. They speak up in meetings, share their goals openly, and make sure their achievements don’t go unnoticed. That realization changed the way I approached my career. I began to see the importance of not just doing the work, but owning my voice and advocating for myself. Here’s what I’ve learned along the way about self-advocacy: 1. Track your accomplishments. I started keeping a journal where I noted key projects, results, and positive feedback. When performance reviews came around, I didn’t have to scramble to prove my value. I had it documented. 2. Ask for what you need. Whether it’s a promotion, mentorship, resources, or even a clearer direction, I learned to be upfront about my goals. 3. Speak up. This was the hardest for me. I used to hold back, worried my ideas weren’t “good enough.” But I realized that staying silent wasn’t helping anyone, not me, not my team, and not the organization. Advocating for yourself isn’t about arrogance or entitlement, it’s about honoring your value. It’s about recognizing that your hard work, skills, and ideas are worth being seen, heard, and rewarded. If I could go back and tell my younger self one thing, it would be this: Don’t wait for someone else to notice your potential. Take the first step. Speak up. Celebrate your wins. Ask for what you need. Your career is yours to build, and no one else will fight for it as fiercely as you can. #StephSynergy

India does not have a “women don’t want to build” problem. The data says the opposite. More than 73,000 recognised startups in India have at least one woman director. That is almost half of India’s recognised startup ecosystem. So women are entering the room. But here’s the contradiction: For every ₹100 raised by startup founders in India, women-led startups receive only ₹4. And in Indian unicorns, women hold only 10% of C-suite roles. So the real question is not: “Where are the women?” The real question is: Why are women present in the ecosystem, but still missing from the highest-leverage rooms? 🔴The funding room. 🔴The founder room. 🔴The decision-making room. 🔴The cap table. 🔴The CXO table. And this is where the Indian context matters. For a lot of women, ambition has always existed. But ambition alone doesn’t build companies. •Access does. •Access to operators. •Access to founders. •Access to investors. •Access to real business problems. •Access to rooms where you are not just observing, but owning outcomes. That’s why I find the approach of Mesa School of Business interesting. Their outcomes are not built around classroom learning alone. Students work on founder-facing roles, startup problems, business strategy labs, venture building and operator-led mentorship. Mesa’s own outcomes report highlights women like Krishnavi Parekh building Sakhi , Parul Sharma scaling Aerie Architecture, and several women moving into product, growth, operations, AI and founder-facing roles. That is the shift we need more of. Not women being “included” in startups. Women being backed to build, lead and own. Because the next decade of Indian startups will not be won by the ecosystem that simply has more women in the room. It will be won by the ecosystem that gives more women power in the room.

Had the most invigorating conversation with Alison Moore, CEO of Chief, about something she calls "The Great Career Molting." Here's what caught my attention: Record numbers of CEOs are leaving their posts (373 public-company chiefs last year—24% more than 2023). While this exodus includes both men and women, Allison's take on what's driving executive women was striking: "The executive woman's journey is not linear anymore. They're molting." Molting. Like shedding skin that no longer fits. These aren't departures born of failure—they're rejections of entire frameworks. Executive women are moving from Fortune 500 C-suites to entrepreneurship, from corner offices to portfolio careers. "They're giving themselves permission to be a baller and not be a title with an office." Here's the shift: Instead of climbing ladders alone, executive women are building what Allison calls "hives"—communities where cross-pollination of ideas, industries, and experiences creates collective intelligence. The hive model isn't just about networking—it's about creating wealth-building systems where women control the capital flows, the opportunities, and the success metrics. They're proving that when women with economic power collaborate intentionally, they don't just support each other's careers—they amplify each other's earning potential exponentially. From "What's your next role?" to "What impact do you want to make?" I'm so excited by the evolved direction Chief is taking with new leadership. 🚀 🚀 🚀 Catch our full conversation on YouTube and the analysis on The Next Big Think. https://lnkd.in/eFwXvwPW ( 💥 Sign up for free weekly insights💥 ) #FutureOfWork #WomenInLeadership #CareerEvolution #Chief #PortfolioCareers #Community

Dr. Yvonne Greenstreet climbed 10+ major leadership roles across pharma over 30+ years → now CEO of Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, a $40B biotech company. Today she is the only Black woman leading a major U.S. biotech company and 1 in 6 woman leading major pharma in the world. Born in Ghana, she later moved to London, became a physician, and realized she wanted to impact more than 100 patients at a time. So she climbed from medicine into enterprise leadership. Here is how she got there: → International medical affairs foundation Built early experience across global medical affairs, health management, and clinical development inside GSK → Director level leadership 1996 to 2000 Led clinical development teams and moved closer to enterprise drug strategy and commercialization → Vice President expansion 2000 to 2004 Oversaw UK medical operations before becoming Chief Medical Officer for Europe with cross regional accountability → Senior Vice President growth 2004 to 2010 Led medicine development strategy globally and expanded into enterprise pharmaceutical leadership → Enterprise pharma leadership 2010 to 2013 Joined Pfizer as SVP and Head of Medicines Development with responsibility tied directly to pipeline execution → Founder transition 2014 to 2016 Launched her own advisory firm before returning into enterprise operating leadership → C suite acceleration 2016 to 2022 Climbed from COO to President and COO at Alnylam Pharmaceuticals (Cambridge, MA) while helping scale one of biotech’s most important RNA companies → CEO appointment 2022 Named Chief Executive Officer after decades leading medicine development, operations, and enterprise strategy at scale That is more than 10 major leadership expansions across 30+ years. That averages a major promotion or expanded scope roughly every 2 to 3 years. Each move increased proximity to enterprise risk, drug commercialization, or company wide strategy. Each role expanded the scale of decisions she was trusted to make. Each step made her visible to the people deciding who could lead globally. If you want to follow this path, focus on 3 things. → Build expertise in parts of the business tied directly to enterprise outcomes → Move toward roles with broader operational and strategic accountability → Stay long enough for leadership to repeatedly see your judgment under pressure This is how someone becomes an obvious CEO choice. Salute, Dr. Yvonne.

You’re in the right seat - but still not invited to drive. That’s the reality facing many women on the path to CEO. According to the Eos Foundation’s 2025 Women’s Power Gap CEO Report, women now hold 24% of the critical ‘launchpad’ roles - that is, President, COO, Division Head - in S&P 100 companies. These are the roles that traditionally lead to the CEO role. Yet only 8% of CEOs appointed from these launchpad roles are women. The issue isn’t readiness. It’s access. Women are showing up in the right places. But when it comes to final decisions the system still tilts against them. The study found: 👉 Women CEOs are equally, if not more qualified (than men) 👉 Women are 32% more likely to have to serve an extra step en route to CEO 👉 Women are over-represented in non-P&L roles 👉 Women face a 67% drop off from launchpad roles to CEO 👉 Women of colour are barely represented in the most senior ranks 👉 CFO roles are good launchpad roles for women To close this gap, the report suggests 4 key actions: 1. Ensure women and under-represented groups get P&L experience 2. Tackle selection bias head on 3. Formalise sponsorship programmes for under-represented talent in the leadership pipeline 4. CEOs and the C-suite should act as Chief Talent Officers with personal involvement in nurturing succession talent, particularly those from minoritised groups. They should also role model family-friendly work practices What is your organisation doing to prepare women for C-suite and CEO roles? I'd love to hear some best practice sharing on this. #GenderEquity #WomenInLeadership #SuccessionPlanning #ShapeTalent