Meg O’Neill is set to become the first and only female CEO of a major oil company when she takes the helm of London-based bp next month.
Her appointment highlights a persistent gender gap in corporate leadership. According to LinkedIn, women comprise 44% of the global workforce but hold less than one-third of vice-president level and above roles.
Progress toward gender parity in top management has slowed significantly. From 2015 to 2022, the share of women in top-level management rose from 27.9% to 30.7%, but it increased by only 0.1 percentage point in the last year.
Hiring trends for senior roles show a recent decline. Across 16 major economies, women’s share of new senior leadership hires peaked at 34.8% in 2022 and fell to 32.9% in 2025.
A shift to a slack labor market is associated with a roughly two-percentage-point drop in women’s leadership representation. This change erases three years of progress, according to the research.
Women face significant barriers at key promotion stages. Globally, representation drops 18% from senior individual contributor roles to first-line manager roles and falls by 30% from VP to C-suite roles.
Employers are rolling back programs that support working caregivers. Research from McKinsey shows that 13% of employers scaled back or discontinued flexible work arrangements in 2025.
Additionally, 25% of employers reduced or eliminated remote or hybrid work options. Two in 10 employers admit they are placing little or no priority on women’s career advancement.
Women are 55.2% more likely than men to take career breaks, averaging 19.6 months out of the workforce. About one-third of those women cite full-time parenting as the primary reason.
“Now almost no organization has a meaningful management development track,” said Jane Edison Stevenson, global vice chair at consultancy Korn Ferry. “It’s a problem in general, and it’s especially a problem for women.”
“If there isn’t a specific intentionality about making sure that spots are filled by women, then we could lose ground,” Edison Stevenson said.
Women remain deeply invested in their work. LinkedIn’s Workforce Confidence survey shows 65% of women in the U.S. say their job is an important part of their identity, compared to 60% of men.
Entrepreneurship is becoming a clear expression of women’s ambition. Over the past decade, the share of global founders who are women has jumped over 5 percentage points, with women now comprising nearly 30% of founders worldwide.
Generational shifts are also underway. The drop in women’s representation from the workforce to top leadership is 31.5% for baby boomers, compared with 21.7% for Gen Z.
Women now make up 48% of Gen Z workers globally, compared to just 27.4% of baby boomers. This suggests younger cohorts are entering the workforce on more equal footing.
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