Women’s Leadership Development
Elevate Talented Women to Lead Your Organization
Our leadership training for women focuses on the critical skills and competencies proven to make organizations thrive.
The women in your organization make up half of your talent pipeline, from your front lines to your C-suite. And while there’s no one formula for being an effective leader, it’s a little more complicated when it comes to women in leadership. Systemic inequities, intersecting identities, and biases (both conscious and unconscious) place disproportionate burdens on women.
Despite recent gains in the share of women in leadership, the pandemic has undone much of that progress — with women now leaving the workforce at much higher rates than men and women’s participation in the labor force dropping to its lowest level in 3 decades.
That’s why it’s critical that organizations make intentional efforts to invest in retention and support of talented women leaders.
While offering leadership development to individual women can help organizations keep and advance talented women in leadership roles, we believe it’s only one piece of a larger puzzle. To truly benefit women, organizations must first focus on equity, and work to establish a culture of equitable treatment for all genders.
At CCL, we’ve been trailblazing women’s leadership development since 1987 — with some of the earliest research on breaking the glass ceiling, to our pioneering leadership training for women, to our organizational solutions for building greater equity, diversity, and inclusion. Driven by client demand, we’ve helped thousands of women leaders navigate workplace challenges and have partnered with hundreds of organizations for innovative women’s leadership development solutions.
Women in Leadership Help Make Your Entire Organization Better
Having more women in leadership makes organizations better. It’s as simple as that. In addition to driving bottom-line financial performance, our research has also found that having more women in leadership roles predicts higher job satisfaction and commitment to the organization — for people of all genders.
But for all the benefits of women in leadership, barriers still remain. That’s where investments in building a culture of equity, diversity, and inclusion matter. Organizations that want to recruit, support, retain, and promote high-potential women need to start by looking at the larger systems in which they operate to find the root causes of women leaving or not being promoted.
A focus on organizational culture, combined with targeted leadership training programs for women, can make a dramatic difference. Development and support can help individual women better navigate challenges and prepare them for more senior roles. Our women’s leadership development programs offer a safe environment to explore building agency and self-clarity, aligning goals with intentions, balancing self-promotion with authenticity, building a strategic network, and creating greater work-life balance.
Create a World-Class Women's Leadership Development Initiative
As important as individual leadership training for women is, it’s just one piece of the puzzle. Gender equity is a systemic issue, and real change requires getting the whole organization involved. Now is the time for your organization to prioritize making gender equity in your workplace a reality.
Whether you’re looking for a customized, top-to-bottom solution tailored to support the talented women in your entire organization, or scalable programs designed to strengthen your overall culture to be more equitable and inclusive, we offer a variety of human-centered, research-backed women’s leadership development solutions for every budget, available both virtually and in-person.
Choose the Women's Leadership Development Solution That’s Right for Your Organization
Leadership Training Programs for Women
The Women’s Leadership Experience is a proven, research-based women’s leadership development program that can be customized for your organization’s unique context and culture. Partner with us to craft an experience that equips your women in leadership roles with the skills needed to advance even further.
Or, Advancing Technical Women is especially focused on retention and promotion of women with STEM expertise or at organizations in the tech industry. Designed by former women engineers, this program helps women hone leadership skills and rise to more senior roles.
- Develop needed competencies among your top talent
- Gender-specific format allows for building connections across your organization
Custom Solutions for Organizational Culture Change & EDI
Partner with our experts in organizational leadership for a systemic review to ensure your strategy and culture support your goals to retain and promote women in leadership roles.
Approaches include investments in equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) to provide more equitable opportunities for women, using our proprietary REAL™ framework. We can help ensure your people are equipped to recognize, respond, and move Beyond Bias™ and that everyone in the enterprise knows how to act as partners, allies, and advocates.
- Create a culture that supports and capitalizes on the benefits of the way women lead
- Build capacity to foster your organization’s peak performance
Our global, research-based leadership programs are available for leaders of all genders. Aimed at helping participants address the common challenges faced and skills needed at each level of the organization, these highly personalized leader development programs build self-awareness, influence, and communication skills. Custom versions, scale-up options, and group discounts may be available; please inquire.
Use our world-renowned programs to build scalable leadership development for your talented women leaders at all levels.
- Available live online, in-person, or through licensing in some cases
- Flexible, with many available dates and options; and some scholarships available
What Our Clients Are Saying
At CCL, we measure success by lives touched and impact made. That’s why the organizations we work with and the leaders we transform consistently tell us the same thing: their experience with us isn’t just a game-changer, it’s a life-changer. For nearly 4 decades, our solutions for building inclusive cultures and our award-winning leadership training programs for women have helped organizations support, advance, and retain talented women in leadership roles.
But don’t just take our word for it — take theirs.
Ingersoll Rand partnered with CCL to develop a custom Women’s Leadership Program, delivering positive impact on company culture as well as team diversity. The company is not only achieving talent development and business goals, they’re also making a powerful — and enduring — difference in the lives of women leaders.
Using Gender Diversity as a Lever for Operational Excellence, Global Growth, and Innovation
For 3 consecutive years, the Brandon Hall Group has honored Stellantis (formerly known as Fiat-Chrysler Automobiles) and CCL for the custom women’s leadership program we developed together. The program received a Silver award in 2022 and 2021, and a Bronze award in 2020, for excellence in the category of “Best Advance in Leadership Development for Women.”
CCL’s Work to Elevate EDI & Women’s Leadership Earns Multiple Brandon Hall Group Excellence Awards
“The program I was in had a lot of strong women… so seeing and understanding others who were at similar places in their career was really rewarding. There was a sense of community. To this day, I’m still in touch with one of the women, 8 years later… It really helped me, both professionally and personally, to understand who I was…and to be more confident in that.”
Emily Eakin
VP of Client Engagement
Traction on Demand
“In CCL, WICT found the ideal partner, well versed in providing best-in-class leadership development and bursting with faculty and staff committed to their clients’ success.”
Women in Cable Telecommunications Celebrates 1,000th Leadership Institute Graduate
Let's Talk About Getting More Women in Leadership at Your Organization
Have questions? Our experts are here to help. Let’s talk about how our decades of research and experience in organizational culture change and women’s leadership development can help to create a climate where all your talent can thrive.
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Elevating Women in Leadership Roles: Research & Resources
There are some persistent barriers to women’s advancement in the workplace. Learn how your organization can help grow your ranks of women leaders.
Formal policies are just one piece of what’s needed to attract, develop, retain, and promote talented women in your organization.
Organizations and individuals striving for gender equity in the workplace need to rethink systems and challenge assumptions in order to cultivate a culture capable of harnessing the power of all genders.
Together, we can help create a network of champions. Download our free resources on the importance of mentoring and sponsoring, particularly for women leaders – and learn how to get started today.
Statistics show that 2/3 of women in STEM roles quit within 15 years. Why, and what can individuals and companies do to advance and support women in tech?
There are many benefits of having more women in the workplace, including greater employee engagement and retention. Learn more about the value of women in leadership positions and what women want from work.
Frequently Asked Questions About Leadership Training for Women
At many organizations, while half or more of frontline workers are women, there are fewer women moving up the ranks, with very few women executives at the top. In fact, women outnumber men at almost every educational level, yet hold just 24% of senior management roles and make up only 3% of Fortune 500 CEOs. Many companies struggle to tap the power of women’s leadership and have fewer women in the leadership pipeline because women in the workplace often face a disproportionate share of barriers to advancement, including double standards, the second shift, and the infamous glass ceiling.
Leadership development initiatives can help women break the glass ceiling. By offering women leadership training opportunities, providing greater flexibility and work-life balance, ensuring women leaders receive constructive feedback, and continuing to evolve organizational policies and practices, companies can keep and advance talented women in leadership roles. In addition, organizations should keep in mind that mentoring and sponsoring at work are important — particularly for women.
Recently, the pandemic has undone much of the progress women have made in the workforce in the past several decades. In fact, women are now leaving their careers at much higher rates than their male counterparts. Plus, they face additional barriers to advancement. This is why leadership training is important for women — now more than ever. Organizations must make intentional efforts to invest in the retention and support of their talented women leaders. Additionally, leadership development training helps women navigate the unique challenges they face, and advance and promote other high-potential women.
According to our research on women in the workplace, having more women in leadership roles actually makes an organization a better place to work, for people of all genders. We found that having higher numbers of women leaders predicted several positive organizational outcomes, including less burnout, higher job satisfaction levels, and greater commitment to the organization — for both women and men. Plus, extensive cross-industry research has found that having women in leadership helps to drive bottom-line financial performance.
For the most part, the same things that men do. In our study of nearly 750 women and men leaders, we found that there were no statistical gender differences when it comes to how interested men and women are in raises, promotions, and leadership development opportunities, with 81% of women reporting that they were interested to extremely interested in leadership development training.
More questions? Our experts are here to help. Let’s have a conversation!
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