Look at the picture below. Every dot is a corporation. I have sorted these predominantly large corporations by the percentage of women in the top management group. The vertical dimension is how people in these corporations identify with the corporate values. The response to the question: Are they with us?
Noone should be surprised that it is easier to identify with a company that has a mixed management group. After all, few companies are made up of 100 percent men. Still, heavily male dominated management groups remains the norm, even in Sweden. This is the seed of an “us and them” between management and the crew. Skewed recruitment becomes a latent value that everybody sees, except management themselves. Since people in general do not agree with that value, it means top management may be working without some of the confidence capital they need in hard times.
The same thing probably applies to companies where a sizeable portion of the employees are immigrants. Everyone needs to see that they are not excluded from equal opportunity. A mixed management group means that everyone can reach top management, no matter where you are born or what you have in your pants. The glass ceiling is always visible from below.
The good news is that this is fixable. Replacing a couple of men with a couple of women has short term and long term effects. People will see right away that the glass ceiling has been cracked. One latent value has changed.
The long term effect seems to do more with culture. The data does not yet allow me to see if the introduction of women in top management makes the company more in line with people’s values, or if it is the other way around.
Is it because women bring a different set of perspectives to discussions in top management? That may cause decisions to take a little longer, but loads of research prove this makes these decisions better. Recent research from Credit Suisse and McKinsey point out that companies with women in top management and boards do better, especially in these hard times.
Or is it because modern companies simply find it natural to recruit women for top positions? The chicken or the egg? I really don’t care all that much. My point remains the same. Get some women into that management room. This is not the only thing that gets better. More on that later.