Acquiring digital skills could close the gender gap as much as 40 years more quickly: Accenture

Source: Accenture. Closing the gender gap at work.

Digital skills and technologies are helping women in Singapore find, and advance at, work, but men remain the dominant wage earners, Accenture research* shows. Women’s success in becoming digitally fluent – the extent to which they embrace and use digital technologies to become more knowledgeable, connected and effective – moved Singapore to 5th place among 31 countries participating in Accenture’s research.

Getting to Equal: How Digital is Helping Close the Gender Gap at Work provides empirical proof that women are using digital skills to gain an edge in preparing for work, finding work and advancing at work. While women still lag behind men in digital fluency in all but a handful of countries, improving their digital skills can change the picture.

If governments and businesses can double the pace at which women become digitally fluent, gender equality could be achieved in 25 years in developed nations, versus 50 years at the current pace. Gender equality in the workplace could be achieved in 45 years in developing nations, versus 85 years at the current pace.

“Women represent an untapped talent pool that can help fill the gap between the skills needed to stay competitive and the talent available,” said Pierre Nanterme, Accenture’s Chairman and CEO. "There is a clear opportunity for governments and businesses to collaborate on efforts that will empower more women with digital skills – and accelerate gender equality in the workforce.”

Although digital fluency helps women advance in their careers, its impact has not closed the gender gap among executives – or extended to pay equality. In Singapore, men are still, by far, the dominant earners by household for all three generations. This will change as more millennial women and digital natives move into management. The research found that, in Singapore, seven in 10 millennial and Gen X women surveyed aspire to be in leadership positions.

Men use digital to prepare for and find work more frequently than women (100% and 90% respectively). Yet, the research found that, when women and men have the same level of digital proficiency, women are better at leveraging it to find work. Nearly six in 10 (58%) of all survey respondents in Singapore – men and women combined—agreed that digital enables them to work from home; 42% said it provides a better balance between personal and professional lives; and 48% report digital has increased access to job opportunities.

Women’s digital fluency is toward the lower ends of the scores in the research model and the gap between men and women is the second largest. The model helps measure how digitally fluent women are compared to men, as well as how much that fluency is helping to drive positive changes in their education, employment and advancement at work.

The scores for education are relatively low for women and Singapore is one of the countries where men outperform women, according to the model. But almost three quarters (74%) of millennial and Gen X women report having earned a university degree, compared to only 11% of their mothers. Despite the low scores for digital fluency and education, women here do reasonably well for employment and advancement at work. Singapore’s advancement score is the fifth highest in the model.

“Although Singapore has performed better than the global average in terms of overall gender diversity, the research also found that Singapore has one of the biggest digital gaps between men and women, in which digital fluency will undoubtedly play a bigger role in helping to close the gender gap,” said Teo Lay Lim, Accenture Senior Managing Director, ASEAN, and Country Managing Director, Singapore. “At Accenture in ASEAN, women currently make up 49.4% of our workforce, and we are committed to grooming the next generation of women leaders. This means meaningful investments in building women’s digital skills – through education, training and on-the-job learning – which will help speed their progress at every career stage.”

This is the first time that Accenture has published its ASEAN gender workforce demographics and statistics. Moving forward, Accenture intends to report annually on its progress across diversity and inclusion globally.

“By taking a bold step towards increased transparency around our gender diversity statistics, Accenture is strengthening our commitment to levelling the playing field for women in the workplace. With access to an increased talent pool in the region, this will allow us to better serve the needs of our clients, people and communities. Encouraging young women and girls to develop science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) skills is critical to both our business and the region’s continuous development, and I believe that women have a lot to contribute in this area,” Teo added.

*To identify and better understand the role of digital fluency in workforce gender equality, the Accenture Digital Fluency Model was developed. A survey was conducted in December 2015 and January 2016 of more than 4,900 women and men in 31 countries to assess the extent to which people are using digital technologies in their personal and home life, as well as in their education and work. The sample included equal representation of working men and women, representing three generations (Millennials, Gen X and Baby Boomers) across all workforce levels at companies of varying size. The margin of error for the total sample was approximately +/- 1.4%. Digital technologies include virtual coursework, digital collaboration tools (webcams, instant messaging), social media platforms and use of digital devices, such as smart phones. Survey responses were combined with published reports and publicly available information on education, employment and leadership and research from the World Bank, the OECD, World Economic Forum and the ITU World Telecommunication. Countries included in the model are: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Greater China (includes Hong Kong and Taiwan), India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, the Nordics (Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden), Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, UAE, the UK and the US.

Philippines, New Zealand and Australia are top three for gender equality in APAC

The global gender gap has barely shrunk in nine years. According to the Global Gender Gap Report 2014*, launched today, the gender gap for economic participation and opportunity now stands at 60% worldwide, having closed by 4% from 56% in 2006 when the World Economic Forum (WEF) first started measuring it. With all else remaining equal, it will take 81 years for the world to close this gap completely, the organisation said.

“Achieving gender equality is obviously necessary for economic reasons. Only those economies who have full access to all their talent will remain competitive and will prosper. But even more important, gender equality is a matter of justice. As humanity, we also have the obligation to ensure a balanced set of values,” said Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the WEF.

The WEF points out that healthy and educated women are likely to have healthier and more educated children, creating a virtuous cycle for any community or country. When the number of women involved in political decision-making reaches a critical mass, their decisions – which take into account the needs of a wider segment of society – lead to more inclusive results. Companies that recruit and retain women, and ensure that they attain leadership positions, outperform those that do not. 

The report, an initiative by the Gender Parity Programme, measures the gender gap in 142 countries, and says it is narrowest in terms of health and survival. "This gap stands at 96% globally, with 35 countries having closed the gap entirely," said the WEF in a statement. Three countries closed the gap in the past 12 months. 

The gap for educational attainment is the next narrowest, at 94% globally, and 25 countries have closed the gap entirely. The gap for political empowerment, meanwhile, is only at 21%, but has seen the most improvement since 2006. 

The WEF notes that the trends are not always positive. Nearly 30% of the countries covered have wider education gaps than they did nine years ago, and over 40% of countries have wider health and survival gaps than they did nine years ago, the organisation said.

In Asia and the Pacific, the Philippines remains the region’s highest-ranked country (no. 9), followed by New Zealand (no. 13) and Australia (no. 24). Only one other nation, Mongolia (no. 42), is in the top 50. Singapore, the People’s Democratic Republic of Laos and Thailand come next in 59th, 60th and 61st place, respectively. Japan has gone up one place to 104th; China has fallen 18 places to 87th, largely due to its very low sex ratio at birth; and India is now the lowest-ranked BRICS nation at 114th. India is also one of the few countries where female labour force participation is shrinking.

In the Middle East and North Africa, Kuwait, at 113rd, is the highest-placed country in the region, after making significant gains in overall income, including for women. The UAE, at 115th, second highest-ranked. It is lower in the rankings but has shown major improvement relative to its past performance on economic and political participation. The lowest-ranked country in the index, Yemen, at 142nd, has remained at the bottom of the index since 2006; but it has significantly improved relative to its own past scores.

“Much of the progress on gender equality over the last 10 years has come from more women entering politics and the workforce. While more women and more men have joined the workforce over the last decade, more women than men entered the labour force in 49 countries. And in the case of politics, globally, there are now 26% more female parliamentarians and 50% more female ministers than nine years ago. These are far-reaching changes – for economies and national cultures, however it is clear that much work still remains to be done, and that the pace of change must in some areas be accelerated, ” said Saadia Zahidi, Head of the Gender Parity Programme at the WEF and lead author of the report.

Key findings for Asia Pacific and the Middle East include:

The most improved country relative to its starting point nine years ago for economic participation and opportunity is Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates for political empowerment. In absolute terms, the most improved country is Nepal for educational attainment.

Within the economic participation category, Nepal was one of the countries globally which had the most absolute gain in terms of increased rates of female labour force participation. Kuwait and Singapore have seen the largest absolute gains on women’s income.

The countries with the most losses relative to their past performance are: Jordan on economic participation, and India on health. 

The least-improved countries in absolute terms are: India for health and survival, and Sri Lanka for political empowerment.

Read the full report here. 

*The Global Gender Gap Index ranks 142 countries on the gap between women and men on health, education, economic and political indicators. It aims to understand whether countries are distributing their resources and opportunities equitably between women and men, irrespective of their overall income levels. The report measures the size of the gender inequality gap in four areas:

• Economic participation and opportunity – salaries, participation and leadership
• Education – access to basic and higher levels of education
• Political empowerment – representation in decision-making structures
• Health and survival – life expectancy and sex ratio

Index scores can be interpreted as the percentage of the gap that has been closed between women and men, and allow countries to compare their current performance relative to their past performance. In addition, the rankings allow for comparisons between countries. Thirteen out of the 14 variables used to create the index are from publicly available hard data indicators from international organisations such as the International Labour Organization, the United Nations Development Programme and the World Health Organization.