The Sunday Story | Closing the gap: Advancing women's leadership in India

We have seen tremendous progress when it comes to women and girls in India, be it delayed age at marriage, increased female voter turnout or access to higher education. There is near gender parity in higher education, with almost half of university students being women. However, this dividend begins to slip when we look at the quality of women’s workforce participation and leadership: While women’s work participation rate is about 40 per cent, a disproportionate share of this comes from drudgerous work in agriculture and self-employment. 

In the formal sectors of the economy — corporate India, micro, small, and medium enterprises, and startups — we have seen a great deal of economic vibrancy. Women constitute 26 per cent of the workforce, reflecting their growing contribution to organised industries. Women make up nearly half of entry-level hiring in IT, banking and finance, manufacturing and healthcare, according to Foundit, a job platform. Male-dominated sectors such as engineering and production are seeing incremental increases, with 8% representation of women this year, up from 6%. 

While we see workplaces opening up, boardrooms remain extremely masculine spaces. Only 13% of senior leadership positions and only 5% of CEO roles are held by women, according to a Prime Database Group report. While India has been a leader in mandating women on boards, implementation has been tepid and compliance-driven. 

In healthcare, for instance, women represent 29% of medical doctors, 80% of nursing staff, and nearly 100% of ASHA workers. However, only one in five leadership positions in this sector are occupied by women. Women also earn 34% less than their male counterparts. 

A newly released McKinsey study puts some numbers and definitions around what is happening —  it finds women’s representation in India drops sharply as we move up from entry to manager, and continues to drop into senior leadership roles. Women’s trajectories across sectors are characterised by high attrition and limited promotions.  

Behind the numbers

The reasons are manifold and layered. While employers lament the availability of women, the real picture is more complex, reflecting deep-rooted biases and inadequate support structures along the career pipeline.

Studies have shown that employers often hold unconscious biases and stereotypes about women’s supposed lower commitment and effectiveness. 

The lack of care support is a systemic issue. One needs to address organisational biases on the one hand, and on the other, confront the reality that Indian society continues to see care work as women’s work.

With the exception of a two-week paternity leave policy in government organisations, India does not mandate parental leave policies, only maternity leave, again reinforcing that childcare is ‘mother’s work’. This grossly disadvantages women as they move up the career ladder.

Relatedly, returning mothers often have a tough time accessing jobs, partly due to assumptions that they are less committed and not up-to-date with market requirements. These perceptions, especially around career breaks for childcare, lead to significant barriers in hiring, often accompanied by lower salaries and limited opportunities.

Secondly, there is a scarcity of mentorship opportunities for women to navigate workplace hierarchies. Women drop off at multiple points in the career journey, and very few organisations design career mobility pathways. 

Women have limited networks, less time to socialise at and after work and low access to informal spaces and social capital networks. Therefore, they are unable to leverage the well-known ‘network effect’ that advantages men moving into leadership. 

There also seems to be a perceptual bias that women are only hired for diversity. The prevailing belief that diversity initiatives do not enhance profitability can be a conversation and action killer at a time when we need more and richer conversations around the value of diverse leadership. Finally, organisations attempting to have ‘gender-blind’ policies in promotion and advancement can crowd out deserving women candidates.  

The situation is not completely bleak, though. The Banking, Financial Services, and Insurance sector leads in women’s leadership, with about one-fourth of corporate executives being women. Forty-two percent of startups have at least one woman in a directorial or founding position, reflecting a significant growth in female leadership.

The IT sector has also seen progress, with women holding 23% of senior leadership roles in 2024, up from 19% in 2023. These advancements highlight the impact of targeted initiatives and the importance of continued efforts to promote gender diversity in leadership across all sectors.

Industrial and organisational psychologists have long emphasised that closing the gender gap requires intentional, evidence-based strategies at the organisational level. Structured mentorship and sponsorship programs have proven impact — formal mentorship alone can increase the share of women in management by up to 15%, according to National Institutes of Health (NIH) studies. Parental leave and flexible work policies are another key lever. A study by the Centre for Economic Data and Analysis found that over 34% of women in India leave their jobs due to work-life balance issues, compared to just 4% of men. 

In South Korea, parental leave policies implemented through an ‘opt-out’ rather than an ‘opt-in’ framework resulted in greater retention of women in the workplace.  

Shifting mindsets within organisations through male allyship is also essential — particularly men being actively engaged in gender inclusion efforts. Inclusive hiring and promotion practices that mandate diverse candidate pools help counter women’s exclusion due to bias and ensure more equitable advancement.

Enabling conditions essential

To shift the needle meaningfully at scale, a set of enabling conditions must come together. Foundational workplace policies — such as compliance with the Prevention of Sexual Harassment (POSH) Act, maternity and care leave, and safety measures — must be in place and implemented with intent. 

While the Indian government has implemented various policies to support women’s participation in the workforce, such as the Equal Remuneration Act, 1976, POSH Act, 2013, and mandatory creches under the Factories Act, there is a large gap in implementation. Surveys find that less than 50% of companies are compliant with these laws. 

In 2024, the central Labour Ministry released an ‘advisory’ aimed at encouraging employers to promote and enhance women’s participation in the workforce. The advisory should be accompanied by a dashboard tracking companies on their compliance and adherence to gender-supportive measures. 

Globally and in India, women’s leadership has been supported by mandatory quotas. Our own experience of quotas for women in panchayats has borne incredibly powerful results — nearly one million women are elected into power every five years, a growing proportion in unreserved constituencies; and there is evidence of effective expenditure and improvements in outcomes such as education and infrastructure when women make decisions.

Data and monitoring systems that enable organisations to track progress and course correct are also essential. The Business Responsibility and Sustainability Reporting (BRSR) framework developed by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has made a start by mandating disclosures on gender representation. Industry bodies could create a women’s leadership tracker using existing public data from BRSR reporting, and encourage further reporting from their member networks. 

Such soft accountability mechanisms can create transparency and shared accountability for progress. Equally important are deeper sector-wide dialogues on significant barriers and bold solutions like parental leave policies, incentivising organisations that are women-led through policies and tax breaks, establishing industry-specific benchmarks and building communities of practice for sharing strategies. 

Decades of studies show women leaders help increase productivity, enhance collaboration, inspire organisational dedication and improve fairness. When more women are empowered to lead, everyone benefits. 

(Yamini Atmavilas is director and gender equity lead at Dasra.)