Are employers locking women out of leadership positions?

Women account for 44% of the global workforce but only 31% of roles at the vice president level or above, according to new research from social media platform LinkedIn. “After years of steady gains,” LinkedIn notes,” progress has slowed to a near standstill.” Across 16 major economies around the world, the share of women in new leadership hires peaked in 2022 at 34.8%. That dipped to 32.9% last year. It’s not that women are applying less — in some professions they’re applying at higher rates, suggesting the slowdown is coming from employers. "Now, almost no organization has a meaningful management development track," Korn Ferry Global Vice Chair of Consultancy Jane Edison Stevenson says. “It’s a problem in general, and it’s especially a problem for women.”