Page 5 - WOMEN IN BUSINESS

WOMEN IN BUSINESS

Are Certain Types of Businesses Harder for Women to Break Into?

One of the most popular slogans of the women’s liberation movement of the 1970s was, "You’ve

come a long way, baby." Fast forward to the present day and that might hold true in some
businesses, but there are some which seem to maintain a closed-door policy and a glass ceiling

that women are still battering themselves against more than 40 years later.

Technology

The most obvious types of businesses that are harder for women to break into are tech-related.

Tech seems more of a boy’s club than an industry in which women can achieve equality. While a
recent report from Pew Research has shown that the majority of Americans think women are just

as capable in terms of leadership as men, very few women hold positions as CEOs in general

(only 26 out of the Fortune 500 companies), and women as leaders in tech companies is even
more rare.

The skewing seems to start at a young age, with schools encouraging boys in math and science
and girls in softer subjects like liberal arts. This bias continues in high school and the trend is

maintained at college level as well, with very few women majoring in computer science or
technology. An "old boy network" shuts them out still further.

Financial Corporations

In financial institutions, women seem to have to do more to prove themselves than men, and to
have to keep on doing it over and over again. They often work harder, for one-third lower wages,

and are held to a higher standard than men. Even if they try to make a real difference, this can

often be held against them.

In a recent opinion piece published in the New York Times, studied showed that if a male

executive expressed their ideas freely, they got a 10% better competence rating in their annual
review. By contrast, if a woman did the same, they received a 14% lower rating. If a man and

woman both express the same idea, the man gets a higher performance rating, while the woman’s
stays the same.

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