Today's senior leadership operates in a landscape in flux. They face a convergence of geopolitical escalations, technological disruptions, digital transformation, climate change, and shifting workforce demographics. Leaders are burdened with ever-demanding responsibilities and multiple shareholder expectations, while traditional business models face intense pressure in competitive markets. This presents an urgent need to redefine pathways to the top and to build a diverse talent pool, irrespective of nationality, caste, gender, or sociocultural background.
As work redefines itself in the emerging future of work, organisations wrestle to sustain resilience amid economic and political uncertainty. In such a context, organisations must rise above barriers and bias to leverage their available talent not only as a matter of fairness but as a strategic competency and source of competitive advantage. Over the past decade, women's representation at the top has increased from roughly 15% to 30%. However, CEO hires and board appointments for women have largely plateaued since 2022, and women remain underrepresented across all industries.
The global gender gap report released by the World Economic Forum (WEF) states that women face compounded disadvantages related to gender, religion, region, language, race, ethnicity, socioeconomic background, and disability. In most economies, the majority of tertiary students are women; however, they remain underrepresented, accounting for less than half of the global workforce and one third of top management roles. These findings suggest that educational attainment alone does not translate to workforce participation and leadership representation. The leadership gap for women is uneven across industries and geographic regions, with Latin America and the Caribbean, Northern America, and Europe leading at 34.6%, 33.7%, and 29.7%, respectively, followed by the Middle East and North Africa at approximately 20.6%, and South Asia recording the lowest at 15%.
An important insight is that women's representation is uneven not only across industries but also within them. In oil, gas, and mining, women's representation accounts for less than 30% of individual contributions, and their share drops by one-third upon the transition to middle-level management, with a further decline at the top. In sectors such as accommodation and food service, administrative and support services, entertainment providers, government administration, and retail, the decline in individual contribution is greater than at the mid to top level of management. In education, women make up half of the workforce at the entry and mid-levels. Still, their participation sharply decreases in senior roles, underscoring how the “drop to the top” plays out differently across sectors.
Another equally noteworthy insight is that the pattern of decline in women's representation at the entry, mid, or senior levels of management has not changed from 2015 to 2025, suggesting that organisational structural barriers to women's advancement persist. Even in the C-suite positions in the industry and hiring trends, women's participation is restricted to certain emerging and operational functions, specifically roles with minimal strategic influence and limited long-term institutionalisation within organisations. This pattern is also present in the political sphere.
One positive development is that women's representation in senior leadership has risen from around 27% to 30%, and the share of board seats has increased from about 15% to 29% between 2014 and 2024. The composition of board seats has also substantially shaped perspectives and informed consequential decision-making, planning, and the development of future leadership. Though the statistics indicate progress, the momentum has slowed. Closing the gender gap will require participation and collaboration with policymakers, government, and organisations to remove structural disadvantages and adapt to their industrial contexts and strategic PR, thereby increasing women's representation in the workforce.
Oman Observer is now on the WhatsApp channel. Click here
