When I opened this year’s Women in the Workplace report from McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.org, I felt disappointment but no real surprise. The data on gender equity in corporate leadership hasn’t shifted nearly enough to change the status quo.
Back in 2018, just 79 women earned promotions to manager for every 100 men who moved into the role. This year, that marginal progress only pushes the number to 81. This persistent "broken rung" at the first critical step of the leadership ladder means men vastly outnumber women at the manager level from the very start of leadership tracks. That early gap makes sustained, meaningful progress toward gender parity at more senior levels nearly impossible for most companies.
I’ve thought constantly about what’s holding us back from fixing this broken rung, especially because my company’s core mission is supporting high-performing women leaders. Drawing on our hands-on experience across industries, here are two key recommendations for companies looking to help more women clear this barrier and climb the leadership ladder.
Rethink what a leader looks like
In organizations that have always been led predominantly by men, bias against women—whether conscious or unconscious—frequently distorts promotion and development decisions. This cycle is easy to spot: we shape our idea of what an ideal leader looks like based on the leaders that have come before us. This default leaves teams predisposed to identify men as high-potential candidates worthy of investment in leadership growth.
Many equity advocates argue the fix here is simply redefining what counts as high performance at an organization. But I argue we need a far bigger, more transformative shift: what if we discarded the long-held rule that leadership development is reserved only for a small pool of pre-selected "star" employees?
This open, inclusive approach simply wasn’t feasible in the past, when tight training budgets limited companies to small, exclusive development programs. But the modern tech revolution in learning and development has delivered scalable, affordable solutions that open growth opportunities up to a far wider pool of potential leaders.
Choose development options that fit packed schedules
Name a woman who doesn’t juggle an overloaded calendar of overlapping responsibilities. On average, women in the U.S. work slightly fewer paid hours per week than men, but they spend far more time on unpaid labor: household work, parenting, and caregiving for aging family members. Squeezing formal, time-consuming leadership development into that already packed schedule is often out of the question.
That’s why I believe micro-learning opportunities are uniquely valuable for supporting women’s advancement. At my company, we’ve watched women overwhelmingly embrace the quick, bite-sized lessons our learning platform provides—most clock in at just two to seven minutes, short enough to fit into a gap between meetings or a daily commute.
Rethink what a leader looks like
