Cracks in the Glass Ceiling | Visier Insights Report

As organizations seek to drive greater Inclusion and Diversity (I&D), I continue to make posts on this topic, a few of which have recently been in the context of women’s advancement to senior roles. Examples of these posts include Lean In’s Women in the Workplace Report and The Real Reason Women Aren’t Advancing. In this additional report by Visier that studied men’s and women’s advancement into management roles, two findings have emerged. 1) In upper management, women are much less likely to succeed a male than men are to succeed a female 2) However, one promising sign (not sufficient but encouraging) is that at all manager populations, there is statistical evidence that females are moving upwards in replacing males. The report offers three steps that can be taken to drive greater female representation at senior levels in the organizations, including #2 Apply and scrutinize data across the employee lifecycle –comprised of three broad categories–attraction, development, retention. This section begins on page 8 and includes a series of questions across the three areas.  1) Attraction – e.g., Where do females drop out of the hiring funnel? 2) Development – e.g., Are performance reviews conducted fairly without bias?) 3) Retention – e.g., Are females participating in key meetings and networks where critical business decisions are being made? Organizations can use these and other questions to derive insights that lead to impactful actions.