International Women’s Day 2026

Give to Gain

Every year on International Women’s Day, I reflect on how far women have come in the workforce compared to my mother’s generation, and the advances I hope we will make by the time my children enter the workforce.

This is my seventh year writing this reflection, and each year I find myself asking the same question: are we moving fast enough?

The progress is real. The path, however, has not been linear.

Each year, the theme evolves. The data shifts incrementally. Representation improves – but unevenly. Momentum builds – but requires reinforcement.

This year’s theme, Give to Gain, is simple but consequential. When we give, we gain.

In leadership terms, giving is not generosity in the abstract. It is the disciplined allocation of opportunity. And research consistently shows that opportunity, when allocated intentionally, compounds.

Progress Requires Intentional Design, Not Optimism

According to McKinsey’s most recent Women in the Workplace report, women now hold approximately 29 percent of C-suite roles in North America. Yet for every 100 men promoted into management, only 87 women advance. This gap is often referred to as the “broken rung” that compounds over time.

Research across sectors consistently shows that gender-diverse leadership teams are associated with stronger returns, better governance and more disciplined risk management. And yet women remain underrepresented in CEO roles and core decision-making seats.

The evidence is clear: representation is not accidental. It reflects structural choices made over time – and ultimately, what leaders choose to give. Succession outcomes are cumulative, shaped by the opportunities leaders allocate over time.

What Giving Actually Means

This year’s campaign encourages giving visibility, funding, sponsorship, access and equal pay. For leaders, these are not symbolic gestures – they are operating decisions. Research on leadership development makes clear that advancement is shaped by access to stretch mandates, enterprise exposure and sustained sponsorship.

Giving means assigning meaningful operating responsibility, including revenue ownership and complex transformation mandates where leaders are accountable for results, and sponsoring emerging leaders into stretch roles before confidence is complete. It also means ensuring compensation equity without waiting for escalation, and visibly crediting contributions in rooms where advancement decisions are made.

Research highlighted this year in Forbes reinforces that generous leadership behaviours – advocacy, credit-sharing, sponsorship – strengthen trust and long-term performance.

At the same time, organizational psychology research makes it clear that encouraging women to “lean in” without addressing biased evaluation systems or psychological safety simply transfers disproportionate risk onto the individual. Giving must shape the environment in which leadership develops, not simply inspire effort.

Succession is the Outcome of What We Give

Leadership pipelines are formed long before a mandate reaches the search market. By the time a Board requests a diverse CEO slate, readiness is already visible – or absent. That readiness reflects years of accumulated developmental opportunity.

Who was given P&L ownership?
Who was given international and investor exposure?
Who was sponsored at critical inflection points and trusted in moments of crisis?

Representation at the top is the outcome of repeated allocation decisions. Leadership pipelines are not built in the final year before transition. They are built in the steady, disciplined allocation of stretch, exposure and sponsorship over time. If we want to gain diversity in leadership, we must give earlier, and with intention.

How Leaders Can Give to Gain

If this theme is to matter, leaders must be deliberate about how they allocate opportunity.

Leaders can give to gain by:

• Sponsoring, not only mentoring.
• Assigning stretch mandates and giving enterprise exposure before perfection is demonstrated.
• Protecting pay equity and ensuring performance evaluations are calibrated for bias.
• Giving visibility in high-stakes forums and maintaining development investment through economic cycles.

Organizations that do this gain stronger talent benches and succession depth, more resilient governance and better long-term performance. Giving is not a concession. It is strategy.

My Commitment This Year

Seven years into writing these reflections, one observation has become increasingly clear: influence is most powerful when it is exercised intentionally. This year, I am committing to being deliberate about how I allocate opportunity – both professionally and personally.

Professionally, I will:

• Encourage my clients to sponsor high-potential women into operating mandates earlier in their trajectory.
• Ensure diverse candidate slates translate into real appointments, not optics.
• Invest time in mentoring women navigating critical leadership inflection points and give credit more visibly in leadership discussions.

The roles we shape today determine who will be ready to lead tomorrow. The responsibility to allocate opportunity thoughtfully is real.

Personally, I will:

• Model sponsorship and advocacy in everyday conversations.
• Be explicit in encouraging confidence and ambition in the next generation.
• Use my platform – however modest – to amplify capable women whose contributions deserve greater visibility.

Leadership development is not passive. It reflects the choices we make about who receives access, advocacy, encouragement and belief.

The Broader Gain

When women gain economically, organizations strengthen. When organizations strengthen, markets expand. Giving is not subtraction – it is multiplication.

As I reflect on my mother’s generation – and my children’s – I remain hopeful that we are building a world where gender equity in leadership is no longer a topic of annual reflection, but the norm. That outcome will not arrive by optimism alone. It will reflect what we choose to give.

This International Women’s Day, the question for leaders is not whether we support women, but where we are allocating opportunity.

What we give – access, advocacy, sponsorship, visibility, capital and trust – determines who will be ready to lead when succession moments arrive.

Ultimately, the future of leadership will be determined by the opportunities we choose to give today.