For 21 years, our Grant Thornton International Business Report (“IBR”) has tracked the proportion of women occupying senior management roles in mid-market companies around the world. This year, we continue to release the findings in our Women in Business 2025 report. With the theme “Accelerate Action”, the message is clear: progress can’t wait. Businesses must act now to increase the pace towards parity. We simply can’t afford another missed generation.

Current Status: Achieving gender parity in mid-market businesses is still decades away

Across the global mid-market, over the past two decades, the representation of women in senior management roles has grown from 19.4% to 34.0% in 2025. This is an increase of 0.5 percentage points (“pp”) compared to 2024. With this progress, gender parity is now projected for 2051, two years earlier than last year’s estimate. But this is far from ideal, as a young woman starting her career today will be working for more than a quarter of a century before she can expect to work at a mid-market firm with gender parity in top roles. There is a long way to go.

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In the Asian-Pacific (“APAC”) region, the proportion of firms with women in senior management roles reached 32.9%, up 1.6 pp compared to last year, nevertheless still trailing the global average. Meanwhile, Vietnam has seen a significant rise, with women in senior leadership increasing from 33.4% in 2024 to 37.4% in 2025, approaching the ASEAN average of 38%. These differences reflect varying policy landscapes and cultural influences that shape gender diversity outcomes in leadership roles.

"We have observed encouraging progress in facilitating women's advancement to senior management positions within mid-market firms in Vietnam, particularly in 2025. This is driven by evolving societal and workplace policies as well as Vietnam's long-standing culture that values women’s contributions. At Grant Thornton Vietnam, we are proud to contribute to this positive shift by ensuring career development support policies and fair promotion opportunities, with strong female representation across teams and leadership." — Nguyen Chi Trung, CEO and Managing Partner of Grant Thornton Vietnam.

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Moreover, the survey assessed how women occupy leadership roles in mid-market firms across Vietnam. Women are most represented in Chief Financial Officer (“CFO”), Chief Marketing Officer (“CMO”), and Human Resources Officers (“HRO”) roles, with 68.2%, 48.9%, and 46.6% of businesses reporting women in these positions, respectively. For more strategic roles, the percentage of businesses with female Chief Operating Officers (“COO”) saw a significant rise from 10.8% to 27.3%. However, the share of female Chief Executive Officers (“CEO”) fell from 22.5% to 12.5%. Globally, a similar upward trend is observed in CFO and CMO roles, though at a slower pace than in Vietnam. However, unlike Vietnam, the percentage of businesses with female CEOs worldwide has slightly increased by 2.6 pp since 2024 to 21.7%. These contrasting trends highlight Vietnam’s rapid progress in certain leadership roles such as CFO, CMO and HRO while underscoring the challenges women face in securing strategic positions.

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Impacts of having gender parity strategies

Globally, mid-market firms noted that their gender equality strategies positively impacted various aspects of their organizations, from commercial factors like higher innovation rates and better decision-making to corporate cultural benefits. In Vietnam, the most cited impacts include making employees feel equally treated and fostering an inclusive workplace. Additionally, firms highlighted business performance benefits such as driving innovation, attracting investors, and improving financial performance.

There are a diverse range of opinions on the benefits of gender diversity, but one thing is clear: gender-balanced teams positively influence business performance. Thus, action on diversity should be considered business-critical priority.

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External and internal pressures driving gender parity

External pressure is a major force driving mid-market companies to improve gender equality in leadership as investors, clients, and business partners increasingly expect stronger commitments. Globally, potential new investors exert the greatest influence, pushing over one in three (35.2%) mid-market firms to take action. This trend is also pronounced in Asia-Pacific, ASEAN, and particularly Vietnam, where nearly half (47.7%) of firms cite potential investors as the leading driver. 

Other key sources of pressure for firms globally include potential clients (31.1%) and partner organizations (26.8%). Similar patterns are observed across Asia-Pacific, ASEAN, and Vietnam. 

Another key finding from the IBR survey is that regulators and governments have less influence on pushing firms to improve women’s presence in senior management positions, suggesting that compliance pressure remains weak. As a result, businesses tend to approach gender equality voluntarily rather than as a mandated priority. 

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Apart from external pressures pushing firms to improve gender balance in their senior management team, many companies are also putting on internal pressures by setting up plans and targets. Having dedicated strategies with measurable targets for this matter and implementing them effectively are key to push for greater and more meaningful progress.

Globally, only 0.2% of firms report having no gender equality strategy in place. However, in Vietnam, 9.1% of firms lack any such strategy, significantly higher than the global average, as well as Asia-Pacific (0.4%) and ASEAN (3.4%). This indicates that external pressures in Vietnam remain weak, resulting in less leadership commitment to gender diversity. Encouragingly, firms in Vietnam with clear gender equality strategies prioritize income equality and senior management promotion. 

Another notable finding from the research is that mid-market firms, including those in Vietnam, place less emphasis on women career development, with few setting targets for networking or mentoring programs. Expanding these opportunities is essential to nurturing women's skills and ensuring they not only reach leadership roles but remain there.

Accelerating action

As the world’s engine room for growth, the mid-market section must take decisive action to drive meaningful changes. Increasing the representation of women in senior management must go beyond discussion and be established as a strategic priority. Accordingly, Grant Thornton International provides the following recommendations for businesses:

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Taking these steps will help mid-market businesses play a pivotal role in accelerating progress toward gender parity.

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