In celebration of the International Women’s Month, tech outsourcing giant Accenture recently shared key findings of a research it commissioned titled “Better to Belong” that examined the different workplace experiences of women in the local information technology and business process management (IT-BPM) industry.
The research is one of the many steps that the company is undertaking to achieve its vision in becoming the “most inclusive and diverse” employer in its line of business.
Accenture attributes the talent gap in the IT-BPM industry to the need of creating a more inclusive organization where women are not feeling respected by peers and not having a senior leader help advance their careers.
The company describes these individuals by the term “Net Better Off” (NBO), a framework that revolves around six facets that help leaders unlock their employees’ full potential. The six dimensions are emotional and mental, relational, physical, financial, purposeful, and employable.
Based on the data, a higher percentage of women in the workplace are comparatively receiving lower support across the talent lifecycle (29%) than men (26%). Consequently, 20% of women are reporting dissatisfaction with their jobs compared to 17% of men.
The research also revealed that their potential can also be maximized by 4.7x if women feel Net Better Off at work, especially when leaders support them in moments like onboarding, rewards, transferring, life events, and even leaving.
Some of the unique situations and external forces where leaders can leave employees Net Better Off is by expressing curiosity on economic inequality, racism, and environmental disasters that shape their work lives.
“Accenture is strongly committed to cultivating a culture of equality and creating an inclusive organization where women feel they belong, can advance and thrive. We support them at all stages of their careers in the company and make sure that we engage in open, honest and meaningful conversations. By doing so, we empower the women in the organization to take charge of their careers and inspire other women to do the same,” said Ambe Tierro, technology lead at Accenture in the Philippines, Africa and Asia Pacific.
Accenture also identified the ten everyday experience levers that leaders are recommended to get right in the process of unlocking their employees’ potential – this list includes empowerment, communication, diversity, customer-centric, skilling, dependence, governance, technology, self-efficacy and growth mindset.
In the Philippines, Accenture said it has also already surpassed its goal of achieving a gender-balanced workforce by 2025. As of fiscal year 2021, more than half of the organization are women.
