WBC Staff

Published for PR Newswire in February, 2021 — Study also finds that staffing industry lacks diversity, an issue women in leadership are more likely to prioritize

WASHINGTON, Feb. 26, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — The WBC Staffing Council – a workstream within the Women Business Collaborative (WBC), in partnership with executives representing staffing industry associations American Staffing Association (ASA), National Association of Professional Staffing (NAPS), Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA) and TechServe Alliance,  today announced the dissemination of their initial survey of 489 companies on gender diversity and equity within the U.S. Staffing Industry. The survey found that the percentage of women executives in the staffing industry is not above 20%

In late 2020, the WBC Staffing Leadership Council launched its efforts to accelerate diversity, equity and inclusion in staffing industry.  Their initial efforts called for a coordinated approach to providing the awareness of the status of diversity across the industry, as well as subsequent efforts to guide efforts towards a more balanced environment. The initial survey results largely reinforce our perception of opportunity to improve both representation and compensation equity from a gender diversity perspective.  Key observations from the survey include the following:

There is a profound pay gap between women and men – both within the industry and across the U.S. as a whole.

The staffing industry has a fair balance of men and women across its workforce, however imbalance occurs as leadership levels increase, with an underrepresentation of women in senior leadership roles.

Women CEO's bring a unique perspective to leadership – they are more likely to drive initiatives that create a stronger more balanced culture (including priorities around diversity).

There is a lack of racial diversity across this industry with people of color comprising well under 10% of all staff.

"The data in this survey and dashboard this represents a significant opportunity to drive opportunity for promotion and pay equity in leadership roles" states Edie Fraser, CEO of the Women Business Collaborative.  "The staffing industry supports the employment of nearly 10 million job workers on an annual basis.  By encouraging a more diverse and equitable workforce composition across those businesses supporting this industry, we will by default better represent the workers we employ."

The WBC Staffing Leadership Council has made the results of the survey available for review and analysis through a dynamic data analytics dashboard.  Over the next several months the Council will begin to release a series of insights and observations resulting from our review of the survey results. This work will be done in collaboration with the work along the 9 Action Initiatives of the WBC which focus on ensuring equal position, pay and power for all women across all industries and throughout the pipeline.

To learn more about the WBC Staffing Leadership Council and how you can get engaged, please visit  www.wbcollaborative.org or contact Kip Wright, CEO Genuent, and Co-Chair for the Staffing Council.

About the Woman's Business Collaborative
The Women Business Collaborative is an alliance of 44+ women's business organizations working together to achieve equal position, pay and power for all women in business. We are a business movement consisting of millions of diverse, professional women and men, business organizations, public and private companies and the media leveraging the power of collaboration to accelerate change.

SOURCE Women Business Collaborative

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At the Women Business Collaborative(WBC), we are joining millions of others and the Marriott family, mourning the loss of Arne Sorenson, President, and CEO of Marriott International and recipient of our 2020 WBC CEO Leadership Award for Gender and Diversity Excellence. The outpouring of support of the Marriott workforce and the private sector overall is compelling for this extraordinary leader. Sorenson became the first person outside of the Marriott family to hold the title of CEO. Under his leadership, he expanded the company and was recognized repeatedly as a true champion for all women in the workforce and an exceptional executive.

In a company statement, Marriott International remarked on his ability to steer Marriott’s extensive progress for diversity, equity, and inclusion (2/16/2021).  Sorenson received great recognition for his leadership, being named CEO of the Year by Chief Executive magazine and was placed on Forbes’ list of America’s Most Innovative Leaders and Barron’s list of World’s Best CEOs.  At WBC, we were thrilled to join the list of prestigious awards given to Sorenson, recognizing him as a leader committed to gender equity and creating an inclusive environment for all employees. 

We had the pleasure of spending an hour with Sorenson, where he shared his admiration for Marriott’s tradition of empowering all people–men and women– through opportunity. He remarked, “Today, that commitment includes our Women’s Leadership Development Initiative, which aims to increase the presence of women in management or decision-making positions through mentoring, networking, and new opportunities. We’re working to achieve gender representation parity in global company leadership by 2025.” As a leader, he called on his peers to be authentic leaders. Sharing, “People notice. Over the years, I’ve found the presence of women executives on my team and across the company has attracted more women job candidates. Women can see a concrete path to opportunities here, and that’s critically important.” We hope that other executive leaders will follow in Mr. Sorenson’s footsteps and embrace their responsibility to provide critical opportunities to those often overlooked.
Thank you to two of our WBC board members, Becky Shambaugh, whose firm has partnered with Marriott for over 15 years in growing their women talent and for your championing of Arne for the WBC CEO award, and to Sharon Reynolds for your work with Marriott and its commitment to diversity and equity. 

We are honored to have met Arne Sorenson and recognize his leadership contributions. We believe that executive leadership has the power to reshape our world. With leaders like Arne, we will see our mission of Equal Position, Pay, and Power for all business women come to fruition. 

You can watch Arne Sorenson’s panel discussion at our 2020 Summit Here. 

Published on PR Newswire January 21st, 2021 — More diverse leadership in 2020

WASHINGTON, Jan. 21, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — As we reflect on the challenges we faced and opportunities 2021 brings, the Women Business Collaborative (WBC) and Equilar share good news from the private sector:  the number of women and diverse women appointed to board of public companies continues to increase.  In December 2020, public companies appointed 107 women to Boards of public companies as compared to 175 men.  Women comprised 37.8% of overall board appointments.  This reflects an upward trend in the 4th quarter of 2020 with women comprising on average 41% of appointees.

The appointments of women of color continues to rise. In December, 28 of the women appointed identified as women of color with women identifying as African American leading the way with 13 seats.  Nine of these African American women are first time board members – the pool of women holding board seats of public companies is growing. This is exactly what the WBC and its partners and champions are calling for – parity in leadership positions on all boards.

Edie Fraser, CEO of the WBC, said, "The latest data reflects that more companies are adding women, and the private sector is taking major steps towards true representation coupled with calls from groups such as Nasdaq to include at least one board member of diversity."

This upward trend demonstrates the attention the private sector is paying to calls for diverse leadership on boards. The call is for boards of public companies to look more like the composition of the population, communities, customers and public.

During 2020 the trend toward parity was positive.  Women gained a net of 1,055 seats on board of public companies and replaced 115 seats previously held by men. Overall, women gained 2.3% points of seats going from constituting 19.2% of board seats at the end of 2019 to 12.5% of board seats at the end of 2020.

Directors identifying as people of color comprised 12.5% of all the appointments in 2020. As this information is self-reported, it is important to note that the percentage of people of color appointed to public boards could be higher.

The overall trends across companies shows an increase in both the number of women and people of color appointed to boards of public companies. Equilar and WBC are tracking and analyzing the appointment of directors in terms of numbers, diversity and profile; but also, the companies and industries in which female board members are present and how many of the overall board seats are held by women. The time is now for women to sit across all companies, boards, and sectors.  Please, join us in celebrating, tracking, analyzing, and promoting women on boards of public companies.

ABOUT WBC
The Women Business Collaborative (WBC) is an unprecedented alliance and a business women's movement focused on equal positions, pay and power for all business women.   https://www.wbcollaborative.org/

SOURCE Women Business Collaborative

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Published for PR Newswire January 2021 — UPS, Clorox, Citigroup, CVS, and Dick's Sporting Goods named women CEOs pushing women into 7.8 percent of top corporate leadership. Additionally, women of color joined boards at record levels ensuring gains are widely shared.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 4, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — While the challenges of 2020 have led some women to leave the workforce due to the pandemic, others are rising to top levels of business, according to a new report. Women made gains in leadership roles in all sectors but private industry truly stepped up in the last year. This was more than simply platitudes and commitment statements but included accelerating the pace of appointments of women to the highest levels, showing results and being more flexible with its workforce during the pandemic.

"2020 might have been a difficult year, but this demonstrates that the time is now for women to move from C-Suite to CEOs and boards and all sectors," says Edie Fraser, CEO of the Women's Business Collaborative (WBC) which presented the report. "We expect accelerated progress in 2021. Expect accountability! Expect more good news."

Number of Women CEOs has risen from 6% 2019 to a projected 8.2% by Feb. 2021: WBC with C200 and Catalyst published the Women CEOs in America Report and website, the first report tracking women CEOs across public and private companies. In December 2019, Women held 30 (6.0%) of CEO positions in S&P 500 companies. At the start of 2020, women comprised 6.7% of CEO positions, and at the close of 2020, women, hold 7.8% of CEO positions. The numbers are rising with UPS, Clorox, Citigroup, CVS, and Dick's Sporting Goods naming women CEOs. We expect women CEOs to constitute 8.2% of CEOs by February 2021 and 15% of Fortune 500 and S&P roles by 2025 with 10% of those being women of color.

Women of Color and Women Overall are Taking Seats on Boards of public Companies: WBC and Equilar joined forces to publish a monthly report, Women Joining Public Boards – the first report listing and tracking women named to public company boards. In the last three months, an average of 40% of appointments are women with one-third of those identifying as women of color. In November 2020 of the 113 women appointed to public boards, 44 identified as women of color. This is historic given that in January 2020, no women were appointed to boards of public companies in the Russell 3000 index.

NASDAQ put forth its commitment requiring its 3,000+ companies listed to improve boardroom diversity by appointing at least one woman and at least one minority or LGBTQ+ person. WBC and members of its Women in the Boardroom Initiative (a total of 11 partner organizations) voice support for NASDAQ's commitment.  WBC calls for women to hold 30% of Fortune 500, S&P and Russell 3000 seats by 2025 and 10% of those women be women of color.

"As vaccines are dispensed, food insecurity and economic pressures becomes acute, racial inequities and injustice laid bare and the Black Lives Matter movement recognized, this is truly good news of the accelerated results for women's leadership in the private sector, particularly for women of color," concluded WBC COO Gwen Young.

SOURCE Women Business Collaborative

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WASHINGTON, Dec. 18, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — WBC announced the appointment of Rebecca (Becky) Shambaugh to its Board of Directors, effective October 2020. She has been an active member of the Advisory Council, acts as the Co-Chair for the popular CEO Roundtable series and helps steer the Board's Corporate Development Committee.

Edie Fraser, the CEO of WBC, says: "The WBC is thrilled to have Becky as a member of our Board and Advisory Council as her deep expertise and decades of experience as a notable thought leader in the advancement of women leaders will help us drive progress for women in business everywhere."

Becky Shambaugh is an internationally recognized leadership expert, author, and keynote speaker on 21st Century Leadership. She is President of SHAMBAUGH Leadership, a consultancy firm that serves a global, F 500 client base, known for its results-focused solutions for creating inclusive work cultures that propel equity for all. Becky is the founder of Women in Leadership and Learning (WILL), one of the first executive leadership development programs in the country. She has been showcased on CNBC, TED Talks, NPR, and ABC and featured in the Harvard Business Review, the New York Times, Washington Post, Huffington Post, Time and Fortune magazines. She is author of the bestselling books, "It's Not A Glass Ceiling, It's A Sticky Floor" and "Make Room for Her: Why Companies Need an Integrated Leadership Model to Achieve Extraordinary Results," both published by McGraw-Hill.

Becky partners with clients such as: Capital One, Cisco, IBM, J&J, Leidos, Marriott, Mastercard, and Microsoft. She is a member of the National Press Club and Economic Club of Washington, D.C. and is an award recipient for Smart CEO Brava! and Women Who Mean Business.

The Women Business Collaborative (WBC), an alliance of 43+ women business organizations and many business and individual collaborating together to achieve equal position, pay and power for all business women. #WBCFasterTogether

SOURCE Women Business Collaborative