Holly Corbett* discusses why women leaders are leaving companies at higher rates than men.
We are in the midst of a “Great Breakup,” where women leaders are demanding more from work, and are more likely to switch jobs to get their needs met, according to the just-released Women in the Workplace Report 2022 from LeanIn.Org and McKinsey & Company, the largest study on the state of women in corporate America.
“We know women leaders are as ambitious as men, but they’re leaving their companies at the highest rate we’ve ever seen, and at a higher rate than men are leaving,” says Rachel Thomas, co-founder and CEO of LeanIn.org.
“The scale of it is surprising.
“Women leaders are clearly voting with their feet to say they’re not comfortable with the status quo and they don’t want to return to business as usual.
“That’s pretty disastrous for organizations because women continue to remain underrepresented in leadership, and now companies are losing their precious few women leaders.”
It’s 2022, yet the fact remains that only one in four C-suite leaders is a woman, and only one in 20 C-suite leaders is a woman of colour.
Moreover, we still have the issue of the “broken rung,” where less women than men are promoted into management positions: For every 100 men who are promoted from entry-level to manager, only 87 women are promoted—and that number is only 82 for women of colour.
In addition to Thomas, I also spoke with Women in the Workplace 2022 co-author Lareina Yee, a senior partner at McKinsey & Company, to help unpack what’s driving the trend behind women leaders leaving their companies.
Here are some of the biggest factors.
Women are still experiencing microaggressions
According to the report, women leaders are as likely as men at the same level to want to be promoted into more senior-level roles, yet they are more likely than men to experience microaggressions that undermine their authority.
For example, the report finds 37 per cent of women leaders have had a coworker get credit for their idea, compared to 27 per cent of men leaders, and women leaders are two times as likely as men leaders to be mistaken for someone more junior.
We saw heightened awareness about the importance of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in the workplace during the pandemic.
At the same time, women were being pushed out of the workforce in greater numbers and a national racial reckoning was happening.
The result may be that more women leaders today are willing to walk away from workplaces that don’t have inclusive cultures for those that do.
“When you ask why women want to break up with companies, it’s important to look at what’s happening with their day-to-day experience,” says Yee.
“They’re not leaving the workforce; they’re breaking up with the companies in search of better opportunities.”
Women are not being compensated for DEI work
Another key finding in the report is that women leaders are two times as likely as men leaders to spend a significant amount of time on DEI initiatives, yet 40 per cent of women leaders say their DEI work isn’t acknowledged at all in performance reviews.
At the same time, this unpaid office housework may be one factor contributing to burnout: 43 per cent of women leaders are burned out, compared to only 31 per cent of men at their level.
“Companies are saying it’s important to create an inclusive environment and they would like to see their diversity outcomes increase, and women are listening to that and stepping up to the challenge,” says Yee.
“On the other side of it, like we saw last year, [women are] not actually recognized or rewarded for that—the burden isn’t spread equally.”
Women already do more unpaid labour at home compared to their male counterparts, and failing to compensate women for DEI-related tasks at work can further amplify inequities.
“It’s not surprising that women, and particularly women with other traditionally-marginalized identities, are more attuned to the importance of DEI, because they face more biases and barriers in the workplace,” says Thomas.
“Over the last two years, companies have reported they’re expecting more from managers when it comes to people management and DEI, and more of employees generally.
“Now they need to stand behind that with recognition, reward, and extra pay.
“Organizations need to look across all of the dimensions of work that employees are doing, and make sure they’re thinking about how it is rewarded fairly.”
Lack of manager training on how to build belonging
Managers are essential drivers of workplace culture for all employees, and especially for women: Having a supportive manager is one of the top three factors women consider when deciding whether to join or stay with a company.
Yet there’s a growing gap between what’s expected of managers and how they’re being trained and rewarded.
According to the report, less than 50 per cent of manager trainings address topics such as how to prevent employee burnout and make sure promotions are equitable.
Moreover, only 25 per cent of companies factor employee retention and 34 per cent consider progress on DEI in managers’ performance evaluations.
An important step may be training managers on how to make remote and hybrid working environments more inclusive.
Employees who can choose how they work best—whether remote or on-site—are less burned out, happier in their jobs, and much less likely to consider leaving their companies, the report finds.
“We really have to figure out how to make remote or hybrid environments effective, and equip our frontline and senior managers with the tools to support this new way that we work,” says Yee.
“It’s great to say at a high level, ‘We’re going to be more flexible,’ but what are we doing to train managers?
“Very few managers say they’re receiving this training, and very few are seeing the kind of tracking that enables them to understand how effective they are.
“For example, is your company measuring attrition between those who are offsite and onsite?
“Only 17 per cent of companies in the report actually do that.
“We have to lean into the execution of this much stronger.”
To retain women, companies need to level the playing field for remote and hybrid employees, who are more likely to be women or other people with traditionally marginalized identities.
“This means putting safeguards in place to make sure employees who take advantage of remote and hybrid work options are evaluated based on measurable results, not where or when they work,” says Thomas.
“It means making sure managers know to watch for flexibility stigma, which is the unfair judgment of employees who work flexible hours or from home and often face more doubts about their commitment and productivity.
“Then going back beyond that, how are companies continuing to create a sense of connection for employees who are working remote and hybrid?”
Young women will leave if there is not work-life balance
The research finds that young women under 30 are prioritizing work-life balance more highly than other women: Almost two-thirds of women under 30 say they would be more interested in advancing if they saw senior leaders who had the work-life balance they want.
At the same time, they’re ambitious: 58 per cent of women under 30 say advancement has become more important to them over the past two years, compared to 31 per cent of women leaders.
Young women may be redefining what an effective leader might look like.
“What young women are saying is, ‘We’re highly ambitious and we want to work, but we want to work in a way that accounts for our wellbeing to make sure that we can fit work into our lives in a way that’s sustainable,’” says Thomas.
“I think they have it right; this should be the future of work.
“Companies should be evaluating employees based on what they’re accomplishing, how effectively they’re leading, and how effectively they’re achieving business results rather than on where and when they work.
“It’s time to move beyond this antiquated, old-school performance measurement based on the need to be in the office for a certain amount of time each day, and really move us to a focus on results.”
*Holly Corbett is Director of Content at Consciously Unbiased.
This article first appeared at forbes.com.
