Men taking over half of top HR roles

Men taking over half of top HR roles despite making up only a third of profession

Males are taking more than half of all top HR jobs despite representing only a third of the HR profession new research has indicated.

The findings from Harvey Nash found 53% of Chief, Vice President and Director roles were filled by men despite women making up 63% of the profession, an over-representation of 43%.

The company, which surveyed 900 HR professionals across eight countries, also found that men were 50% more likely to aspire to the role of CHRO.

Lisa Wormald, Director - HR division, Harvey Nash, comments: “Given how well represented women are in HR, you could be forgiven for thinking that gender diversity is not an issue. What this research shows is that there is hidden challenge in promoting female senior HR talent.

“From my own experience of recruiting senior HR professionals it is very clear that women are equally capable as men in performing their role. However when it comes to their career, men tend to be more confident and driven about ‘throwing their hat into the ring’ for senior opportunities. If women want to take more of the top roles in HR they need more of that male ‘naked ambition’.”

The progression of women from entry level to senior positions in HR does not compare favourably with other departments. For example, in IT, whilst only one in ten employees is female, the ratio remains the same from entry level through to CIO / Head of IT according to Harvey Nash's CIO Survey 2013 and Harvey Nash's Technology Survey 2014. This suggests that although there are less women entering the IT profession, a good proportion of them manage to climb the career ladder successfully, something that their peers in the HR industry appear to be struggling with.

The survey also found that employee engagement was the highest priority for HR professionals in 2014 with most planning to involve high performing individuals in succession planning and provide mentoring from senior leaders.