While women are very well represented among business masters graduates around the world, now accounting for a greater number of applicants than men for marketing, accounting and management programmes, they are still underrepresented among MBA students in the United States and around the world, according to the findings of a white paper published by the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) yesterday. Yet for many, it’s a question of money that is presenting the greatest barrier.
Motivated by the desire to improve their skills, advance more quickly and earn a good income, women now account for 52% of masters business students worldwide. Despite that, among MBA students, they still only account for 37% of the classroom population.
"Women have made phenomenal progress in attaining business master's degrees, yet they have not yet caught up with men in the share of MBAs earned," said Sangeet Chowfla, president and CEO of GMAC.
"Our extensive global segmentation research and market intelligence looked at several important underlying factors that contribute to this growing participation of women in business master's and lack of parity in MBAs, with financial concerns being the number one issue cited by female applicants."
Globally, 29% of women said that financial concerns were preventing them from taking up an admissions offer to start their graduate programme. That number rises to 38% when looking at the USA alone. Conversely, only 20% of US men said that financial issues were preventing them from taking up an offer.
The publishers of the paper — which can be found online — hope that the results will provide a blueprint for business schools to adapt their strategies to make their programmes more attractive to women.
Among the issues raised, the paper highlighted how women are more motivated by curiosity than men. According to their findings, the one defining characteristic separating men and women is their curiosity and appetite for learning new things, recommending that schools need to put greater emphasis on the ability of an MBA to develop the skills needed to make an impact and become a leader in one’s field.
