Structure.
Over time, what you see is women disproportionately end up in those staff roles (and not line roles) that don’t lead to the C-suite and other senior roles.
Too many are stuck in middle management positions or opt out of career advancement because they lack corporate support to balance family obligations with professional aspirations.
Many companies offer gender parity programmes aimed to keep talented women engaged with their careers, but these programmes haven’t solved the problem.
The structural barrier that women encounter is the need to balance work and family commitments, which slows the progression of their careers. And while this issue increasingly affects both sexes, it still has a highly disproportionate effect on women. Balancing domestic responsibilities with professional obligations often causes women to opt out of opportunities to take on broader or more challenging roles at work.
Bias.
Cultural and Gender biases in an organisation, in system and in minds of employees (Male and Females both).
Long dominated by men, the business world still retains a bias towards the leadership style more commonly possessed by men. In that traditional male culture, senior men are more likely to appoint or promote those with a style similar to their own.
Other workplace traditions also create barriers for women. Gender stereotypes persist, of course. The fact that both men and women have biases—intentional and unintentional—is well established, and preconceived.
The study concludes with a “gender bias primer” from LeanIn.Org. It identifies forms of bias that parallel the unconscious mindsets - “double bind,” they refer to as “likeability bias”: A woman can be seen as competent or nice, but not both. A label “unconscious images,” they include in “performance evaluation bias.” This is differences in the perceived performance of men and women, which explains why women are hired and promoted based on accomplishments “while men are hired and promoted based on their potential.” (Part of this phenomenon is what I call the “comfort principle.”)
Transparency.
Unavailable gender related statistics as certified sources within and across organisation like pay gap, gender ratio, gender attrition make gender parity business case not strong or pressing enough.
Culture.
Culture being how things are done or happen within organisation is key of change in approach towards gender parity. At this most organisation have very monotonous and male gender fitting culture.
Role-Model.
Missing women role model is very significant as it have affect which is very long term and generational like missing women role model in field of STEM makes young girls believe that it may not be the best field for them.