14-04-2025
Why Don't We Talk About Motherhood In Business?
Patricia Nagy is the Chief Strategy Officer of The Proxy Agency, a revenue-enabling, full-funnel marketing agency in New York City.
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It's 2025, and only 10% of S&P 500 CEOs are women. While many factors contribute to this persistent disparity, one of the most significant remains motherhood. Even in an era that champions workplace equality, the path to the C-suite still stigmatizes motherhood, framing it as a career detour rather than a leadership accelerator.
And yet, as of July 2024, out of the 52 female CEOs in the Fortune 500, all but two are mothers.
We celebrate leadership traits like resilience, time management, crisis response, emotional intelligence and adaptability—all skills honed through motherhood. Yet, the corporate world remains hesitant to acknowledge motherhood as part of the leadership journey. Instead, the unspoken rule persists: If you're a woman in business, leave your personal life at the door.
For decades, corporate culture has clung to the idea that personal matters should remain invisible in the workplace. But the pandemic shattered that illusion. Suddenly, Zoom calls exposed our kids, pets and messy living rooms. Work and home life became inextricably linked, forcing companies to acknowledge what had always been true: The personal and professional are inseparable.
Yet, this "leave your personal life at the door" rule was never applied equally. The pandemic also laid bare a long-standing reality: Even in two-income households, women often still bore the brunt of domestic labor, childcare and remote schooling. While companies adapted to new ways of working, this invisible workload didn't disappear—it simply became more visible.
This is the Lumon mindset—a reference to the fictional corporation in "Severance" that demands employees separate their personal and professional identities. But here's the question: Does the Lumon world apply only to women? The answer, overwhelmingly, is yes.
While men are often encouraged to integrate work and family, women are expected to compartmentalize, downplay or even hide their roles as mothers as a weakness or obstacle to their careers. The consequences are real: Women who become mothers tend to face slower career progression, fewer leadership opportunities and lower earnings, while men who become fathers often see no such penalty.
The outdated perception that mothers are somehow "less committed" lingers, even when research shows the opposite. It's not just about how we work, it's about who is allowed to bring their full selves to work without consequence.
Some industry leaders have recently called for infusing more "masculine energy" into the workplace. This perspective is not only regressive but fundamentally misunderstands what makes leadership effective.
Leadership is not about adhering to a singular, gendered ideal—it's about a balance of skills that drive business success. Empathy, collaboration and effective communication—qualities often associated with women and working mothers—are just as critical as decisiveness and risk-taking. Research consistently shows that diverse leadership improves profitability, strengthens workplace culture and fosters innovation.
The notion that businesses should embrace a more "masculine" ethos not only dismisses the strengths that many of today's top leaders bring to the table but also reinforces the very biases that keep women—especially mothers—from advancing. Instead of regressing to outdated ideals, organizations should focus on building leadership teams that reflect the diverse strengths needed for long-term success.
The irony of corporate culture's dismissal of motherhood is that many of the most sought-after leadership skills are developed through parenting.
• Crisis management and decision-making under pressure: Mothers don't have the luxury of hesitation. Whether responding to a medical emergency or handling a last-minute childcare issue, they make fast, high-stakes decisions daily—a skill that translates directly to the business world.
• Time management and prioritization: There is no workforce more efficient than working mothers. Juggling school drop-offs, client meetings and deadlines forces them to maximize efficiency in a way that many executives strive to achieve.
• Emotional intelligence and communication: Parenting teaches patience, negotiation and the ability to read between the lines—just like managing teams, resolving conflicts and driving business relationships.
• Adaptability and resilience: No plan is ever set in stone. Mothers learn to pivot quickly, adjust to unforeseen circumstances and keep moving forward—just as business leaders must do in times of uncertainty.
By treating motherhood as something that must be hidden or minimized, businesses create a pipeline problem that directly impacts leadership diversity:
• Many women don't feel supported at work and may be more likely to leave the workforce, leading to a loss of top talent.
• Fewer women in leadership means fewer role models for future female leaders, reinforcing the cycle of underrepresentation.
• Companies miss out on leadership skills that working mothers bring to the table, such as crisis management, adaptability and emotional intelligence.
It's not enough to advocate for gender diversity in leadership without addressing the structural barriers that disproportionately hinder mothers from advancing. Until businesses recognize and dismantle these barriers, the leadership pipeline will remain broken.
If nearly all female Fortune 500 CEOs are mothers, why isn't motherhood recognized as part of the leadership conversation? The reality is that the traits most valued in business—resilience, adaptability, crisis management and emotional intelligence—are sharpened through the experience of parenting. Yet, corporate culture continues to sideline motherhood, treating it as an obstacle rather than a source of strength.
The companies that will thrive in the future are those that recognize leadership isn't about reinforcing outdated notions of who belongs at the top, but about leveraging the full range of skills and perspectives that drive success. That means fostering an environment where the realities of work and life are not at odds but understood as interconnected. It means measuring leadership by ability, vision and results, not by outdated assumptions about commitment or capability.
Let's expand, not restrict, the definition of leadership to reflect the complexity and diversity of today's workforce. Motherhood and leadership are not in opposition. It's time to start recognizing what has always been true.
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