Women in Business:
Visibility & Value

Despite making up nearly half of the workforce, women remain significantly underrepresented in executive roles and venture-backed entrepreneurship. This interactive report explores the data behind the gender gap.

10.4%

Fortune 500 CEOs

2.1%

VC Funding to Women

87:100

Manager Promotion Ratio

REPRESENTATION

The "Broken Rung" Phenomenon

The biggest obstacle women face isn't the "glass ceiling" at the very top—it's the "broken rung" at the first step up to manager. Because fewer women are promoted to entry-level management, there are fewer women to promote at every subsequent level.

Corporate Pipeline Representation

Percentage of positions held by women at each career stage.

The C-Suite Disparity

While women hold many entry-level roles, the C-Suite remains predominantly male. This donut chart visualizes the current gender split in top executive roles.

Insight: For every 100 men promoted from entry level to manager, only 87 women are promoted. This gap widens significantly for women of color, who drop from 18% at entry level to just 6% in the C-Suite.

ENTREPRENEURSHIP

The Great Funding Gap

Female entrepreneurs start companies at a higher rate than ever, yet they receive a disproportionately small slice of Venture Capital funding. This disparity limits the scale and visibility of women-owned enterprises.

Business Landscape

Women own a significant portion of US businesses, but due to funding gaps and industry segregation, they capture a smaller share of total revenue.

VC Dollars Allocated

Distribution of total Venture Capital funding by founding team gender (2023).

2.1%

Went to all-female teams

CHALLENGES

Barriers to Visibility

Why does the gap persist? Surveys of female executives and entrepreneurs highlight specific systemic and cultural barriers that impede visibility and career acceleration compared to their male counterparts.

Perceived Barriers to Advancement

Closing the Gap: Actionable Levers

Sponsorship over Mentorship

While women are mentored as often as men, they are less likely to have "sponsors"—senior leaders who advocate for them behind closed doors when promotion decisions are made.

Transparent Salary & Promotion Criteria

Companies with clear, objective criteria for advancement and salary bands significantly reduce the gender pay and promotion gap.

Diverse Investment Boards

VC firms with female partners are 2x more likely to invest in female-founded companies and 3x more likely to invest in companies with a female CEO.

<!-- Visualization & Content Choices: 1. Pipeline Funnel -> Goal: Compare -> Horizontal Stacked Bar -> To show the progressive drop-off at each level. 2. C-Suite Donut -> Goal: Inform -> Doughnut Chart -> To highlight the stark 89/11 split at the top. 3. Biz Ownership Toggle -> Goal: Compare -> Bar Chart (Dynamic) -> To contrast the high ownership rate vs low revenue share, emphasizing the scaling problem.