Quest Staffing, a leader in gender empowerment

The company is led by CEO, Kay Vittee: "This is a huge achievement, given the continued under-representation of women in senior-level positions and slow pace of their inclusion in these, both locally and internationally. The results of a recent survey have revealed that only 20% of women currently hold senior management positions globally. What's more, this number has declined significantly since 2009," says Vittee.

"Fortunately South Africa is faring better than some of its international counterparts beating the global average by 7%. However, there remains a vast pool of highly capable women who are denied these positions." According to the 2011 BWA South African Women in Leadership Census, women hold only 4.4% of CEO/MD positions, 5.3% of chairperson positions and 15.8% of all directorships. Men, in contrast, hold 95.6% of CEO/MD positions, 94.7% of chairperson positions and 84.2% of directorships.

More women in top positions, better results

Research has proven that there is a correlation between the proportion of women serving on a firm's executive board and how well that firm performed both financially and organisationally. By using a diagnostic tool designed to measure organisational excellence against nine key dimensions such as direction, motivation and innovation, researchers found that companies with three or more women in top management scored higher on each dimension than those with no female executives. As a result, these companies also performed better financially.

"We understand that the quest for gender empowerment and transformation is never-ending and will continue to commit and contribute to this. Our business strategies go hand in hand with transformation because together they drive organisational performance up and costs down, thereby enabling the growth of our staff, our candidates, our clients and our country," concludes Vittee.