Leveling up in healthcare

Women are strongly represented at the entry level in healthcare but are still underrepresented in more senior roles, according to analysis by senior partner Gretchen Berlin and colleagues. Women account for 75 percent of entry-level jobs in the sector but just 32 percent of C-suite positions. For women of color, representation at the C-suite level is just 4 percent.

The representation of women in healthcare decreases across employment levels but continues to outperform other industries.

Image description:

A bar chart displays six vertically stacked bars, showing employee roles in healthcare at each employment level, in order of a successful projected career path: entry level, manager, senior manager, vice president, senior vice president, and C-suite. Each bar contains color-coded stacked segments indicating the percentage share of employees in level who are White men, White women, women of color, and men of color. The representation of women is highest in the entry level (49% White women and 26% women of color), then decreases across each level, with only 32% of women (28% of White women and 4% of women of color) holding positions in the C-suite. Beneath this chart are 2 smaller vertical bar charts, the first showing the percentage share of women and men (without reference to race) across healthcare, and the second showing the percentage share of women and men across all other industries. The comparison shows that the healthcare industry has a higher representation of women in each employment level than across all other industries (48% of women in entry level, decreasing across each level, with only 26% of women holding positions in the C-suite).

Footnote 1: Percentage of White women and percentage of women of color may not sum to overall percentage of women because overall figure includes employees with race not reported. Footnote 2: Aggregate results from participating companies in healthcare (19 companies submitted pipeline data).

Source: Women in the Workplace 2022 pipeline data for Canada and the US

End of image description.

To read the article, see “Women in the healthcare industry: An update,” March 30, 2023.