The Utah Women and Leadership Project released a 2024 update on the Status of Women Leaders in Utah Business. There has been a slight increase since the last research publication, however, there’s still room for improvement.
This research and policy brief started in 2014, with an update in 2018, and this year.
In 2018, there was a decrease in women's leadership in business, and Shirlayne Quayle, CEO of PowerLane, spoke leader for the Bolder Way Forward program, and one of the authors of this research, said she is excited about the progress this year.
“I think part of that is visibility and a lot more understanding on the part of company leaders, communities, etc, about the importance of recognizing women's leadership potential," Quayle said. "Helping them move into programs that help them develop those kinds of skills and talents, and also celebrating it."
This research was acquired from the Utah Department of Workforce Service called “FirmFind.” This online resource is a directory of over 80,000 businesses in Utah. Any company that registers as a business is in this database.
For this study, the Utah Women and Leadership Project narrowed the sample size to businesses with at least 100 employees which resulted in around 1,700 companies.
“And we need this research because nationally, you know, we're ranked poorly still as a state for women, and so the more verified research we can gather in our state, the better we're going to be able to understand the correlations or the with those kinds of rankings,” Quayle said.
The number of women CEOs of Utah businesses has increased 4.9% since 2018. Around 700 companies reported having a CEO and 9.6% of them were women. Quayle shared how with “awareness and intentionality among organizations,” this increase was possible. To obtain this, Quayle encourages young women to believe in themselves and find a mentor with whom they can ask any questions.
“The mentor is able to share their wisdom and advice, but they're also learning through the engagement with a younger generation that is so critical for moving our kind of culture and community ahead,” Quayle said.
