Humor me on this cloudy Friday morning by taking a wild guess at how many women CEO’s there are in Fortune 1000 companies in 2009.
Catalyst, the organization that has been tracking this for years, has released the number for 2009. So, go ahead, take a shot.
How many of the 1000 CEOs are women? You can pick a number or a percentage.
And your answer is? Do post it in the comments so we know how close (or far off) you are to the right answer.
(answer after the photo)
it’s raining over the city (cc) Ferran
The correct answer is 28.
There are a total of 28 women CEOs in the universe of 1000. A piddly 2.8%. (See full list of Women CEOs of the Fortune 1000)
There were 24 CEOs in 2008, so that is an increase of 4. At this rate, it will take:
- 18 years before we reach 10%, which will be in the year 2027.
- 68 years before we reach 30% or about 1/3rd. That would happen in the year 2077.
Year 2077! Wow!!
The cloudy Friday morning just turned into a weepy Friday afternoon. What about you?
I am no good at guessing games, but certainly would have been more optimistic than that! There is interesting (both disappointing in its whole, but also encouraging in its reconnection with reality) commentary circulating this week observing some backpedaling on the media’s “opt out” narrative (I might go so far as to label it a “myth”) of women in the workforce — particularly their opportunities for advancement — and redefines it as a “flexibility stigma.”
For more, read “The Times Opts Out of the ‘Opt Out’ Narrative” (Joan Williams in The Huffington Post”) referencing David Leonhardt’s “A Labor Market Punishing to Mothers” in The New York Times .
Interesting, isn’t?? There are way fewer women amongst the rich and powerful and way more women amongst the poor and the dispossessed…