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BY PAT MITCHELL | It’s challenging to find positive stories today about progress for women entering top leadership positions in business. Earlier this year, the number of women CEOs leading American companies rose from 8 percent to 10 percent. Five new women are leading Fortune 500 companies, bringing the total number to 53.
Progress, yes… although it’s hard to get too excited about a meager 2 percent rise—even though 10 percent is the highest percentage of women CEOs ever recorded in the U.S.
But this month, in an unexpected place, given its much ballyhooed patriarchal culture and often documented misogynistic government, there is an even more positive gender equity story to report: in Australia.
The number of women leading Australia’s largest listed companies has risen from a dismal 5 percent in 2020 to 30 percent today, according to the Financial Times—boosted by the promotion of Vanessa Hudson to Qantas CEO. (Notably her competition for the job were two other women.) Her biggest business rival company, Virgin Australia, is also led by a woman, Jayne Hrdlicka.
The rapid ascent is a welcome surprise. It was just last year that the Australian advocacy group Chief Executive Women (CEW) “warned it would take 100 years for corporate Australia to achieve a gender balance of 40 percent,” reporter Nic Fildes wrote.
In spite of this good news for top Australian women in business—and the good news that the Labor Party in Australia also met its internally set quota of 50 percent female representation in its delegation—the country’s working women still face many challenges. There is a gender pay gap (13 percent), and a lack of support for childcare and other family support systems, including paid parental leave. These are the same challenges that women face in the U.S., despite study after study recognizing these barriers to gender equity in business.
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