Repairing broken rungs

A report by McKinsey in collaboration with LeanIn.org argues that the biggest hurdle to women climbing the proverbial corporate ladder isn’t the glass ceiling, as is generally believed, but the “broken rung” phenomenon. Based on data collected on working women in the United States and Canada, the report argues that women’s advancement is stymied early in their careers.

The scales are tipped to favour men from the first jump, from an entry-level position to a manager. For every 100 men who get promoted, only 87 women make their way up. This trend has been observed for nine years in succession. Alarmingly, for women of colour, there has been a downward spiral.

Unfortunately, this early setback impacts women adversely as they tend to remain behind the pack. Even if companies try to ‘fix’ the glass ceiling problem by promoting women to senior-level positions, that is only a temporary measure. Unless the broken rungs at the bottom are fixed, fewer women can ascend at the same pace as men.

In The Harvard Gazette, Christina Pazzanese interviews Iris Bohnet, an expert on gender equity in the workplace, who agrees with the broken rung hypothesis. She mentions that in one company in Europe, women shied away from being promoted to a managerial role because they had very few role models. Interestingly, the women were willing to be promoted, provided they didn’t have to manage teams.

Research also supports the idea that female bosses are less popular than male counterparts. Both men and women dislike taking orders from women. People tend to judge women bosses more negatively. Female faculty members receive more stringent ratings than men.

Bias against women isn’t just top-down, from top management, but also bottom-up, from colleagues. Robert Booth writes in The Guardian that in a survey of HR managers in England and Wales, 20% revealed that they were diffident about hiring women they thought might “start families” soon.

Aalarmingly, younger HR personnel exhibited more bias against women than older ones. Given this bleak scenario, what can companies do to mend the problem of broken rungs?

Fixing the scene

In a blog post in Training Magazine, Meredith Lepley and Lauren Young argue that this is a complex issue that requires a multipronged approach across all levels of an organisation.

Kim Elsesser notes in Forbes that when companies commit to enhancing gender diversity, more women can rise to the ranks. Some strategies that reduce gender bias involve “setting targets” and holding “managers accountable”.

Additionally, Lepley and Young observe that women are not mentored or coached as much as men. Righting this imbalance would be part of the solution. Moreover, companies may address sociocultural factors that are elemental in keeping women behind. Besides training and sensitisation programmes, an organisation’s culture has to reflect gender-inclusive policies and practices.

For example, Anushruti notes in a blog post of The Novice HR that providing paternity leave may be one more way to tackle this issue. By prioritising maternity over paternity leave, companies are signalling that women are the primary caregivers while fathers play a less pivotal role in child-rearing.

Granting men and women equal amounts of leave when a child is born implies that both parents share the onus of caregiving equally. Further, women tend to return to work sooner when their partners avail of paternity leave. Anushruti points out that while maternity leave is mandated by law in India, paternity leave is left to the “discretion of the employer”.

Repairing broken rungs at the workplace involves systemic changes and seismic shifts in cultural tropes about men’s and women’s societal roles.

(The author is a psychologist and writer)