This article first appeared in Forum, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on November 13, 2017 - November 19, 2017

The Southeast Asia (SEA) markets are experiencing rapid transformation in every aspect of business — from digitisation and growth to regional and international expansion. Amid such change, organisations and their leaders are more conscious than ever of their purpose, policies and practices — with a focus on growth that is more inclusive and meaningful to multiple stakeholders to business. In doing so, gender balance and gender in development continue to be areas of discussion as well as for promoting greater diversity in skills and improving the overall dynamics of workplace productivity.

Today, the female workforce participation in the SEA region is 42% — higher than the global average of 39%. In Malaysia, female workforce participation is at 54%, which is higher than its neighbours in the region — Singapore, Indonesia and Vietnam. However, female representation at the senior management level in Malaysia remains lower at 25%, while female representation at the CEO/board level, at 14%, is among the highest in the region as a result of recently implemented quotas of 30% women directors on boards.

Our research shows that although there are notable exceptions and success stories, the majority of companies in SEA take a passive stance with regard to gender diversity. Companies tend to limit interventions to the most basic and rarely experiment with interventions beyond what is mandated by government, or seen to be established market practices. This is despite the fact that the vast majority of companies identified gender diversity as important and understand the business case behind it. In Malaysia, only 43% of women believe their respective organisations are doing a lot to improve gender diversity and only 40% believe their respective organisations have made progress in the last one to three years in improving gender diversity at all levels.

In our research, we found four beliefs among companies in Malaysia that prevent companies from being more proactive in pushing gender diversity:

Our research found little evidence to support these beliefs. We found that women do want to be promoted and are as concerned about their career trajectory and growth as their male counterparts. We also found that companies that do well in gender diversity tend to do well in promoting a meritocratic culture and broader inclusion, and show stronger organisational performance.

Even companies that actively pursue gender diversity often fail to achieve it. These companies are investing significant time and money but there is little evidence to determine which measures will be most valued by their women employees and most effective in achieving their gender diversity goals. Instead, they base their efforts on incorrect assumptions of what the obstacles are and, in turn, what the effective measures are. For example, companies expend significant efforts on leadership, recruiting and culture interventions when in fact, retention and advancement are the two biggest obstacles women are facing today in their companies, and most urgently require interventions designed to address them specifically.

What really works?

At Boston Consulting Group (BCG), we believe that with the looming skills and talent shortages, companies need to look beyond compliance to take bolder steps in promoting gender diversity. More importantly, they need to rethink their assumptions on what works in promoting gender diversity. Companies must transition from policies focused on cultural interventions to policies that make meaningful changes in how work gets done in their organisations. We have identified the three types of initiatives or interventions that would be worth your effort.

Throughout a woman’s career, there are likely to be several instances, such as childbirth and family care, when an employer’s commitment is tested. Companies need to think of out-of-the-box interventions that not only help women continue with their jobs, but also improve their work-life balance. What is important is to exercise flexibility as part of organisational culture, which allows not just the senior leaders, but also the line managers, to change the way they work in view of the special needs of women employees.

However, this can get complicated in some countries, where men are less willing to change their behaviours to achieve gender diversity goals. This is largely because they fear their welfare will be affected, for example, that they will have to bear a heavier workload. One way to overcome this is to ensure that work is redistributed transparently and fairly, and to establish a process for tracking satisfaction and capturing and investigating complaints.

In SEA, approximately 50% of women ranked increased visibility and exposure to female leaders and role models among the top five most effective initiatives. Choosing the right role models is critical and companies must think about selecting a larger number of role models with different priorities and stories to share. The role model must also be approachable, have some mentoring abilities and be willing to engage junior women.

In addition to building female role models, identifying male employees who support gender diversity, and rewarding them, can lead to greater chances of success. This point is specifically important, especially in countries where men do not view gender diversity as an issue.

Ensuring an inclusive work environment is important for driving gender diversity — or any kind of diversity. Uniformly making organisations across the region safe and comfortable places for women is one of the more effective ways to attract and retain talent.

At a minimum, companies need to resolve harassment and discrimination issues. This is still a major problem despite all the perceived actions to improve gender diversity, and despite the fact that most companies say they have anti-discrimination policies. Shockingly, 20% to 40% of women have experienced or seen incidents of gender discrimination at their company. To really make anti-discrimination policies work, companies need to increase the effectiveness and safety of escalation channels and adopt a “no tolerance” policy on discrimination that is publicly enforced by leadership.

Our research also shows that there are some interventions which simply do not resonate with women and are not effective enough to actually make a difference. Companies should reconsider how much effort they expend on interventions such as female advocacy, engaging in public debates, gender pay gap analysis, employee surveys, and the like. These interventions are great for generating momentum, but their value quickly diminishes if there’s no follow-through with hard policies and actions.

What works in Malaysia?

In Malaysia, many companies face challenges in retaining female talent. Women are under a lot of pressure to start families at a young age and find it challenging to balance those expectations with work commitments. Many chose to drop off the ladder despite their ambitions to become executives. So, what will work in Malaysia would be policies that promote childcare on-site, offer flexible work hours, remote talent management and creative female workforce programmes. For instance, Shell Malaysia’s Shell Women’s Network (SWN) helps increase the visibility of successful women so they can mentor younger colleagues and aspiring leaders. In other words, the diversity of role models in SWN is what makes the programme so successful.

Conclusion

Now is the time to act on gender diversity in SEA. Local economic growth, globalisation, and global economy shifts are changing the cultural and demographic status quo. Governments have been first to notice the importance of gender diversity and begin to adapt. Companies must now lead and follow.

There are no quick wins in the gender diversity game. Without serious commitment, progress will continue to be slow. Companies need to take a businesslike approach, think about what gives the largest return on investment, and follow through with their gender diversity policies.

Mariam Jaafar is a partner and managing director at BCG Singapore

Save by subscribing to us for your print and/or digital copy.

P/S: The Edge is also available on Apple's AppStore and Androids' Google Play.