Status of women in business in Slovakia. While more than 37 percent of managerial positions in top companies are filled by women, they occupy only 15 percent of board positions, and just 10 percent of company boards are chaired by women

Authors Avatar

What is a status of women in business?

The EU has been working on a plan to pave the way for more women to take managerial positions in top companies Europe-wide, since only 13.7 percent of top managers sitting on the boards of firms in 2011 were women. Compared to 2010 the number rose only slightly, by just 1.9 percent, despite an appeal by Viviane Reding, the European Union's Commissioner for Justice, Fundamental Rights and Citizenship. Last year Reding called on companies to sign a pledge to increase the number of women in top positions, but the initiative has so far been joined only by 24 companies.

The situation in Slovakia is very similar. While more than 37 percent of managerial positions in top companies are filled by women, they occupy only 15 percent of board positions, and just 10 percent of company boards are chaired by women, according to a preliminary report on gender equality prepared by the Labour Ministry.

The European Union is now expected to adopt quotas which will lead to higher representation by women on boards of directors and in parliament, Ivana Janíková Stavrovská, the press attaché of the Information Agency of the European Union in Slovakia, told the SITA newswire.

Join now!

“Personally, I am not a great fan of quotas,” Reding said. “However, I like the results they bring.”
Not all countries are open to using such quotas. Oľga Pietruchová from the Department of Gender Equality and Equal Opportunities of the Labour Ministry says that in some jobs having quotas would be very problematic.

“The official attitude of the Labour Ministry prefers self-regulation and positive motivation for employers to increase [the number] of women in top positions,” she told The Slovak Spectator.

Silvia Porubänová, a sociologist with the Institute for Labour and Family Research, a state-funded research body supervised by the Labour ...

This is a preview of the whole essay