Women facing "broken rung" in careers, missing early promotions, according to report
BOSTON - There are more women working than ever before but a recent report shows they still face barriers to advancement.
McKinsey and Company's 10-year report revealed several startling findings, mostly notably that getting behind early has impacts well into a woman's career.
"Ageism is impacting everyone right, men and women, but young women disproportionately," said Lucy Perez, senior partner at McKinsey. "What we have found over the years is it's actually the first promotion from that entry level role to your first managerial position that tends to be the most challenging and we see a lot of women not making it."
Women in the C-suite
This is what's called "The Broken Rung." For every 100 men who are promoted, only 81 women get the same opportunity. For Latinas, it's 65, and only 54 for Black women. By the time they reach the executive level, women make up only 29% of the C-suite.
"A massive amount of value is lost when we aren't fully tapping into the available talent in our organizations" said Susan MacKenty Brady. She's part of the 29% as CEO of the Simmons University Institute for Inclusive Leadership. MacKenty Brady is using the data to help women and organizations mend the inequities.
Early career promotions for women
"The traction of early promotion is where we need to mend, and where we need to lift up and create more resources and more opportunity for women," she said.
MacKenty Brady said organizations need to do their part, but that there are resources for women to take control of their own agency like mentorship, employee resource groups, and external programs.
"We also have programming here at Simmons University," said MacKenty Brady. "We have our Strategic Leadership Accelerator program, that's for early career professionals who are looking to accelerate their own advancement."
She said for all women, the time to act is now.
"It's critical. It's critical. What changes me, changes we," she told WBZ.
Simmons will host its annual Leadership Conference on March 20.