In America 80% of consumer good buying decisions are made by women. In Japan, two third of automobile customers are women. In 147 out of 150 of the biggest cities in the U.S, young women’s median full-time salaries are 8% higher than those of the men in their peer group. College campuses used to be almost 60 – 40 male-dominated; now the ratio has reversed. Close to half of law and medical degrees go to women, up from fewer than 10% in 1970. 15% of executive committee members in the top American companies today are women. And still there is a huge barrier looming over corporate and business houses that is stopping them from accepting this paradigm shift and preparing to adapt inorder to stay successful or should we say survive?
We cannot agree more with Avivah Wittenberg-Cox, CEO of business equality consultancy 20-first, who at the recent The Economist’s Human Potential conference pointed out, that “I have a lot of trouble with that word, diversity,”Whoever thought of calling 60% of your talent and 80% of your customers a diversity? They are your future.” Avivah is the author of ‘Why Women Mean Business’ a thought provoking literature helping you in understanding the emergence of the next economic revolution. The book was awarded the prestigious MANPOWER Best Book of the Year prize in 2009 and was selected as a business book of the year by Conference Board Review in 2010.
It might not be refusal to change, as much it is the ignorance of the emergence of women as powerful decision makers and ‘decision influencers’, which is causing the socio-economic power houses to stay numb even at this point. Taking the current marketing practice in perspective, 85% of big agency creative departments are men. Which means most of the people writing most of the ads for women, aren’t women. This is the issue agencies like Womenkind are trying to help marketers with. When they realized that more than 90% of women felt that advertisers don’t understand them at all, they formed an all women team, to harness the wisdom of women and generate fresh ideas for connecting women to companies, women to brands, and women to one another.
After sounding off the world about the reality of progression of women and the economic importance of women through comprehensive analysis of gender as a business issue, Avivah has just launched her second book, ‘How Women Mean Business, which is a step by step guide to profiting from gender balanced business.
The world could only be better with more women in leadership, decision making and decision influencing roles, then why this resistance?
Watch this interview with Avivah Wittenberg-Cox where she shares her view.
