Women filling only 28% of management roles in HK: study

HK's gender and cultural diversity statistics unimpressive.

Hong Kong’s reputation as an international centre is not matched by its diversity statistics with women filling 28 per cent of management roles, according to the findings in the 2016 Hays Asia Salary Guide.

According to a release from Hays, this is a fall from the 31 per cent reported in last year‘s Guide and the 33 per cent of the year before. When it comes to cultural diversity, foreign employees comprise 18 per cent of Hong Kong’s workforce.

The Guide highlights salary and recruiting trends across Asia drawing on data provided by more than 3,000 employers across Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, China and Japan representing over six million employees.

Here's more from Hays:

Across all countries, 51 per cent of organisations report having formal diversity policies and procedures in place while 30 per cent have nothing in place and 19 per cent were unsure of what their organisation was doing on diversity.

Of those with a formal diversity program, only 20 per cent claim their company adheres to policies and practices “well”. A further 34 per cent claim to adhere to policies and procedures “fairly well” while seven per cent admit not doing well at all and a hefty 39 per cent were unsure of their organisation’s performance.

According to Hays, diversity in all its forms is about providing organisations with a greater range of options when it comes to talent and workforce strategies.

“Both gender and cultural diversity strengthen the problem solving abilities of an organisation and promote a greater range of knowledge and experience to share across the entire workforce,” says Christine Wright, Managing Director of Hays in Asia.

“Localisation efforts rightly protect local employment markets where there is suitable local talent available, but in the current climate critical skills shortages exist. Companies able to tap into a global talent pool will perform better than those that must leave key roles vacant or make do with lesser qualified candidates.”

“The same can be said for those companies actively building their pipeline of female talent. When promoting from within, organisations that actively practice gender diversity have a much bigger talent pool to choose from,” said Christine.