Research on Black women executives

As part of Black History Month, I’d like to highlight some important research on Black women executives that was released in 2008 and confirmed in a recent 2009 poll.

In early January, the Executive Leadership Council® and Harris Interactive®  polled senior corporate executives about the challenges facing and opportunities available to Black women in executive roles at major U.S. corporations.  According to the poll, senior executives identify the top 3 challenges facing Black professional women as:

• “Weaker or less strategic networks available (31%)
• Inaccurate perceptions of African-American women’s capabilities (24%), and
• Work/life balance demands (23%)”

These findings dovetail with ELC’s 2008 research, Black Women Executives Research Initiative, which focused on challenges and critical success factors for executive-level Black women.  This is really important research, especially considering the lack of available data on professional African-American women.

You can read the executive summary of the research here, and of the poll here.