South Africa’s private sector has yet to replicate the public sector’s performance in attaining something close to the country’s 50:50 gender parity threshold. The public sector has performed commendably in facilitating the rise of women to positions of influence, sort of setting a benchmark. But it is organisations in the private sector space that should be worried, for failing to meet the set targets, as it could potentially impact on their bottom lines.
Global advisory group notes that while the gender make-up of the boardroom globally is evenly balanced. Pitifully, the same can’t be said about in the average South African corporation, where empowering appears to be woman is the least of priorities.
It is for their own good that South African companies should embrace diversity for them to navigate in a ruthless business terrain, according to findings of a survey by advisory firm PwC’s 18th Annual Global CEO. This could help them handle competition in new industries/geographies, serve new customer needs and innovate and leverage technology such as Big Data and analytics.
Workplace diversity should embrace race, gender and age. Most importantly, it insists that the criteria for appointing female members should be their corporate governance skills, not only gender.
