Tales from the top: Gender diversity

What does it take to be a female senior executive in the modern world of business? In association with our Leading Women series, we speak to seven international women about their careers and the world of work.

What progress has been made?

No two careers are the same. As a business that is built upon and around talent, we know that every individual is uniquely skilled. However, we all live in a world where nearly half of those individuals in work are consistently and unfairly disadvantaged. Thankfully, things are beginning to change.

While much work must still be done towards equality, the landscape of senior executive positions, company directors, non-executives and business managers is quite different from how it appeared only decades ago. That change has involved overcoming cultural stereotypes – proving that gender is not an indication of capability – a continuing battle against an unconscious bias, and a lack of confidence that can often undermine even the most successful employee.

A global campaign

Is it hard not to be intimidated if your colleagues are predominantly male? How often do you encounter dated views regarding women in the workplace? Can business be balanced with family life?

The senior executives we feature have established their careers in major companies and institutions in different parts of the world, from Europe to South America and Asia. Each offered her own unique perspective on what it takes to make it, suggesting that there is no one way to the top, whether you are in banking or in medicine, in London or Beijing.

Their insights touch on issues such as the loneliness at the top, the challenge of selling your abilities to yourself before you can sell them to others, how geography can mean new cultural hurdles, and the ways to overcome them.

The universal advice is that being true to your abilities, showing honesty and behaving in a professional manner are the best ways to get ahead in business. And, best of all, those are rules that apply whatever your gender.

Author

Barney Ely

Director at Hays

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Barney is Director at Hays Human Resources, the leading UK HR recruiting experts, leading a team of 80 HR recruitment consultants in 40 locations across the UK.

Barney also has operational responsibility for Hays offices across the South of England, with responsibility for teams placing professionals in over 20 industry sectors, from accountancy and finance to construction, IT, marketing and education. Across many of these sectors, Hays also has further teams dedicated to public services, not-for-profit, executive and international recruitment

Barney is an active partner to the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), sitting on the CIPD People Management Awards panel.

Barney joined Hays in 1993 as a business graduate and has spent much of his career recruiting for blue-chip organisations and SMEs.