Gender Balance Strengthens Organizational Performance

As many companies scale back their inclusion efforts—and as near-stagnant advancement of women in leadership positions continues—WXN (the Women’s Executive Network) and its Global Alliance for Inclusive Leadership partners have unveiled The GAIL Report: An Actionable Guide to Advance Women in the Workplace, urging organizations to double down on inclusion.  

This report examines the mounting body of research that shows diversity strengthens company performance, profitability, and culture, and offers tangible steps to help companies of all sizes implement evidence-based strategies to take advantage of those benefits.  

“This is a critical moment of reckoning for companies across North America and the world. Women’s progress is already glacial at best, with parity on boards a decade away and well over a century before gender parity is achieved across the globe. But the longer organizations wait, the longer and the more they can suffer,” says Sherri Stevens, owner and CEO of WXN. “The GAIL Report underscores that, when women rise into leadership roles, they drive broader success for both profit and people.” 

The GAIL Report outlines the concerning state of women in the workplace, with data showing that full gender parity may be 95 years away in North America – and 131 years away on a global scale. While women hold just over one-third of board seats in Canada’s biggest companies, racialized women have just 4.1% representation on S&P/TSX Composite company boards, and for Black women, representation is a mere 1.2%. Today, just one in ten Canadian CEOs and one in four executives are women. 

Additional key findings from the report include the following.  

• Boards with a critical mass of at least 30% women outperform all-male boards or board where women hold only token roles.  
• Female CEOs are linked with a 20% boost in stock price momentum, and female CFOs correlate to a 6% rise in profitability.  
• This unique phenomenon is exacerbated by recent cuts during company layoffs that target DEO roles at nearly double the rate of other roles.  
• Women shoulder much of the work to bridge gender disparities, yet male allies have the greatest opportunity to advance women.  
• A highly effective way to develop skills, boost reputation, and drive market growth are employee resource groups (ERGs), and there is a high cost to getting ERGs wrong.  
• Diverse teams can create a competitive talent advantage by driving better retention rates, employee engagement, innovation, and more.  
• Companies that don’t address critical Gen Z challenges risk losing out on opportunities for innovation, technological advancement, and reach.