New Delhi: Women hold fewer than a third of management jobs worldwide, while fewer than one in 10 firms in South Asia are led by a woman, according to a new report by the International Labour Organization (ILO).The findings, titled ‘Women in Business and Management: Scaling Success’, the ILO’s third global report on the subject, draws on a 2025 survey of 11,957 enterprises in 99 countries, carried out between June and September 2025, along with labour market data and company case studies. India supplied 768 respondents, more than any other country.India third from the bottom in Asia and the Pacific listIndia sits near the bottom of the list of Asia and the Pacific on women in management, above only Pakistan and Bangladesh, according to the report. The management figure for India is based on data from 2024, while the pay-gap figure is based on 2023 figures and covers management positions overall as well as senior and middle management. While the report does not publish India-specific survey results, India appears in its annex charts, which draw on national labour force surveys, UNESCO data and ILO estimates.Proportion of women in senior and middle management and all management positions in Asia and the Pacific, latest years (percentage) Source: ILOSTAT, 2025. National labour force and household surveys/ ILO’s ‘Women in Business and Management: Scaling Success’ 2026 reportThe report also looks at the pipeline. Among Indian graduates, 23.1% of women studied science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), compared with 31.4% of men. The gap is narrower than the world average, where about 15% of female graduates take STEM degrees against about 35% of male graduates.Source: ILO’s ‘Women in Business and Management: Scaling Success’ 2026 reportWomen in India earn about 28% less per hour than menIndia’s hourly gender pay gap among all employees stands at about roughly 28%, the fourth widest among the Asia-Pacific economies, behind Tonga, the Republic of Korea and Vanuatu. The pay gap among managers in India is close to zero.However, the contrast suggests that few women reach managerial roles, even as those who do are paid on par with men. The report does not explain the pattern for India.Where are the women leaders in South Asian firms?Citing World Bank data from 2023, the report says 9.2% of enterprises in South Asia have a woman as top manager, meaning fewer than one in 10 firms have women in top managerial positions.Source: ILO’s ‘Women in Business and Management: Scaling Success’ 2026 reportThis is the second-lowest share of any region after what the report states as “Arab World”, where it falls below 5%. This is despite women’s university enrolment in South Asia rising eightfold since 1995.The report also flags a demographic risk. Regions such as Southern Asia expect strong population growth and large youth cohorts, but without enough decent work this “demographic dividend” could bring more informality and working poverty. Young women in these regions are 14.4 percentage points more likely than men to be not in employment, education or training.Women’s numbers fall at every step up the management ladderGlobally, women now outpace men in higher education, with 46.4% of women attending university in 2023 against 40.3% of men. Yet, women hold 30.5% of managerial jobs and account for 22.8% of business owners. On average, they earn 78 cents for every dollar men earn.Source: ILO’s ‘Women in Business and Management: Scaling Success’ 2026 report“The constraint is not the supply of qualified women,” the report says, but the capacity of labour markets and enterprises to turn that supply into equal opportunity.Nevertheless, there has been progress at the top. The share of enterprises with a woman chief executive rose from 23.4% in 2013 to 28.2% in 2025, while the share with a woman board chair more than doubled, from 13.1% to 30.9%. Some 45.5% of enterprises had at least 30% women on their boards, up from 38.3%.But in 2025, 69% of enterprises employed women as junior managers, against only 35.5% at the top executive level. The report describes this as a “leaky pipeline”. Women also remain concentrated in human resources (62.5% of enterprises had women among senior managers) and finance and administration (55.4%), compared with profit-and-loss roles (19.8%) and research and development (26.3%). Women are under-represented in profit-and-loss and R&D, which the report calls critical stepping stones to CEO and board roles.Fewer firms are acting on gender equalityThe share of enterprises implementing gender equality and diversity initiatives fell from 37.4% in 2018 to 26.5% in 2025. This included a 19.6 percentage point drop in equal pay measures and an 11.3 point drop in maternity leave and support programmes.Source: ILO’s ‘Women in Business and Management: Scaling Success’ 2026 reportMost firms have policies on paper: 74.8% reported an equal opportunity or diversity policy in 2025, while 25.2% did not. Enterprises with such a policy were 29.4% more likely to report positive business outcomes and 17.9% more likely to report higher profits. The report cautions that the relationship “does not necessarily imply causality”.One Indian firm shows what targets can doThe report’s India case study is Havas India, a media and advertising group. Since 2020 it has grown from fewer than 300 to over 2,000 employees while raising women’s share of its workforce from 19% to 43%. Women made up half of its leaders in 2025.A committee of 12 leaders called ‘Women Who Inspire’ reviewed people’s policies for gender bias, shared representation data in team meetings and set targets for women at every level. Its Maternity Bounce Back programme lets mothers return to work gradually over six months. Of 41 employees who took maternity leave between 2022 and 2025, 71% stayed at least a year after returning.“Change doesn’t happen organically. You need to keep at it, and you need targets,” said Vandana Tilwani, the company’s chief human resources officer. Women still make up only about 25% of staff at its events agency, where evening and weekend work can clash with caregiving.The report calls for implementation, not new pledgesThe report urges governments to provide child care, family-friendly policies and effective gender equality legislation, and employers’ bodies to push firms towards metrics and targets. Maria Paz Anzorreguy, director of the ILO Bureau for Employers’ Activities, writes in the preface: “The task now is to scale success.”Aliya Akbar is an editorial intern at The Wire.