By Ila Ananya
Today we saw three reports about women in the workplace. One looks at women in leadership positions, one at women’s salaries, and the last, although slightly unconnected, stated that more than 80 percent of families believe the men should be the first to have life insurance because they’re the “bread winners”. If we look at all these studies together, it’s no surprise that it still seems like women in the workplace aren’t really moving forward.
According to the report, a study by LinkedIn, has found that there has been an increase in hiring women to leadership positions in India. The increase is by 25 percent, but the report also says that just because the momentum at which women are being hired is higher, the number of women currently holding leadership positions is still among the lowest in the world. It doesn’t necessarily mean that women at the workplace are getting everything they should be.
Of course, we all do know how many times, companies have simply stated that it is too difficult to hire women to leadership positions because there aren’t any women. Obviously this also means that companies aren’t really looking hard enough — a lot of the times, it seems like male board members have simply hired women from their families to be a part of the board, just to meet the regulations. And if we compare LinkedIn’s report to a new study by Monster Salary Index from 2016, we also know that men earn 25 percent more than women do. According to the report, men in 2016 earned a median gross hourly salary of Rs 346, while women earned only Rs 260 in comparison.
So please, before everyone starts rejoicing about how there has been an increase in women being hired to leadership positions, also look at their salaries and other consistent barriers that have constantly stopped women from moving up in their jobs.