Ursula Von der Leyen, president of the European Commission; Roberta Metsola, president of the European Parliament; Christine Lagarde, president of the ECB. At the head of Europe, in one of the darkest moments in its history after Russia’s attack on Ukraine, there is a clear majority of women. In fact, of the four top figures of the EU, counting Charles Michel as president of the European Council, three are women. In some European countries, moreover, especially in the Scandinavian countries, the leadership of the government has also been the prerogative of women for years. Think of Angela Merkel’s Germany, chancellery for over 15 years, or the Finnish Sanna Marin, the youngest head of government in the world. It is an important pink revolution precisely for the new style, for the ability to identify and search for cohesion, characteristics that female leadership brings with it and that can make the difference in such a delicate historical moment.
He explains it well Claudia Parzani, the only Italian in the Women role model 2021 ranking, president of Allianz in Italy as well as partner and global business development & marketing head of Linklaters: «I believe that women not only have to have their say, but must be an active part. We need women who have a very firm voice, who raise their hand and step forward to take more and more space. We need truly different leaders, with listening skills and remarkable synthesis; on the other hand we need people who have compassion, who are able to look beyond stereotypes. After having summarized, after having had heart, a decision must be made, and they must be very firm decisions because people are afraid, they are shaken. They need a sure hand to guide them. It is no longer the time to divide ».
In the face of an increasingly pink EU leadership, in Italy the famous crystal ceiling, especially in politics, has not yet been broken. In fact, we have never yet had a woman head of state or government. In 2016 a gallery was dedicated in Montecitorio, near the Queen’s room, to the first women who joined the institutions. Alongside the portraits of Tina Anselmi, the first woman to become a minister, and Nilde Iotti, the first speaker of the Chamber, there are important empty boxes to fill in: the first president of the Council of Ministers and the first president of the Republic, even if never like in the last toto-Quirinale came close to choosing a woman. «I do not miss the symbolic and concrete element embodied at the same time by women who manage to impose themselves with their own strength. It’s important, I know it in my own skin. But we know that in itself it is not enough. What have we achieved so far? That just over a third of parliamentarians are female, in a fairly homogeneous way between the various camps, thanks to interventions on the electoral law requested by us. Enough? Absolutely not »he underlines Pina Picierno, Vice-President of the European Parliament, who continues: “But just as the reduction of the gender gap is not only in favor of women but serves to change our whole society for the better, so a greater presence of women must serve to change all politics . Starting, for example, with local realities and municipal administrations, where women in institutions, especially in the South, are very few and where the need for representation is closest. The commitment of all of us is being measured, day after day, on this, on the widespread diffusion of women in institutions and on the reduction of conflict in politics.
From politics to management
Things are a little better in the corporate boards, thanks to the effects of the Gulf-Moscow law which has had a positive impact on female empowerment, so much so that according to Consob data women on the boards of listed companies are 40.8%. The scales are lowered again to the detriment of women if we look, however, at executive roles: in Piazza Affari there are only 16 managing directors, equal to 3.9%, while the presidents are 31, equal to 7.5%. Odds that tend to diminish if not to disappear if we think about the most important realities. Furthermore, in all sectors and roles, women are promoted at a slower pace than men. According to McKinsey’s Women in the Workplace report from 2021, only 86 women are promoted to managers for every 100 men at the same level. The gender gap widens for tech roles, with only 52 women promoted to manager for every 100 men. Finally, the research shows that diversity pays off: the companies that protect it are 48% more likely to perform better than companies with a lower gender diversity.
Another discourse, then, are the elected positions to the verses of associations or professional orders. Few women have held these positions so far, from sports federations (see adjacent article) to national professional councils. Recently the appointment of Maria Masi | to the president of the National Bar Council, the first woman in the history of the order. “Women are underrepresented not only when the top position is the result of elections but also in cases in which it is necessary to be chosen, hired, promoted in the workplace. In the first case, the corrective measures functional to the pursuit of equilibrium, like it or not, continue to be the famous odds, at least to have the possibility of being there and proving to be valid. As for the difficulty of being chosen, unfortunately the construction of that healthy awareness that finally attributes the right value to gender equality, that is to allow the whole society to be able to enjoy the effects of recognized and not merely granted opportunities, cannot yet be said to be complete. to women”.