Breaking the glass ceiling

The “glass ceiling” in many of the country’s executive suites is slowly being broken.

Glass ceiling is a figure of speech often used to describe “the invisible barrier women and other marginalized groups face when trying to reach higher levels of professional success.”

That obstacle is not written in black and white in corporate manuals or openly discussed, but it is implicitly enforced in organizations that discriminate against some classes of people from going up the corporate ladder regardless of their qualification.

By and large, the term is principally applied to women who, regardless of their professional competence or qualifications, have to go through the wringer before they can be appointed to high executive positions or elected to the board of directors on account of their gender, unless they are major stockholders or wives or daughters of the business owner.

It’s a carryover of the patriarchal or male-oriented belief that a woman’s place is in the home or that she is considered the weaker sex.

To the credit of the Philippines’ business community, that practice has, in recent years, not gained traction as shown in the increase in female corporate executives.

A survey conducted in 2022 by audit firm P&A Grant Thornton on Women In Business showed that the number of female leaders in senior management positions in the country rose to 48 percent in 2021 from 39 percent in 2020.

In comparison, the average in the Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) region is 30 percent.

This development had been attributed to the local companies’ sustaining “… the momentum in employing women in senior management roles, which led to the rise of more empowered women in male-dominated positions.”

And this is validated by the fact that, unlike in the past, the assumption by female executives of positions of high responsibility in the country’s Top 50 companies no longer comes as a surprise or considered as a defining moment. It’s hardly a big deal at all.

Because of that, any male executive who makes disparaging remarks about the management capability of his female counterpart could find himself in serious reputational trouble.

In addition, his disrespect of gender equality could adversely affect his professional advancement.

In Spain, the reputed cradle of machismo, or strong and aggressive masculine pride, breaking the proverbial glass ceiling has evolved into national policy.

Recently, the Spanish government announced that, in addition to its existing gender equality laws, an Equal Representation Law would soon be enacted that would require, among others, women to make up 40 percent of the management of any listed company with more than 250 workers and an annual turnover of 50 million euros, or the approximate equivalent of P2.3 trillion at the present exchange rate.

With the compulsory membership, the standard rule that representation in the company’s board is primarily based on stock ownership shall be modified to allow female representation with or without meeting that stock requirement.

By Philippine standards, that representation criteria would apply only to business conglomerates that have extensive interests in banking, real estate, food production and other profitable business activities.

To the credit of those conglomerates, some of their executive and boardroom positions are presently held by females, although their percentage is far less than that envisioned in Spain.

Corollary to mandatory corporate management participation, the Spanish law would also make it compulsory for professional associations to have at least 40 percent of their board members to be women.

This back-to-back membership requirements would ensure that female members would not be left out or ignored on matters that relate to the exercise or regulation of their professions.

If our Congress enacts a law similar or close to that mentioned above, gender equality in the country’s business community would be a reality. The struggle toward that goal continues. INQ

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