March is National Women's History Month, but since women are pretty historic year-round, it begs the question: Why March? Is this month significant to women's history, or is it just an arbitrary month on the calendar? The answer involves a little bit of history and a little bit of coincidence.

Just before the 2020 recession, Black female professionals were advancing in the workplace. But according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, in January 2021, Black female professionals' unemployment rate continued to increase, reaching 9.0% from 7.7% in December 2020. Compare this percentage to white female professionals' unemployment rate, which held steady from December 2020 at 5.3%.

In the highest ranks of corporate America, there are seven times as many male executive officers as female executive officers; and, at the CEO level, men outnumber women by almost 17 to one, according to a new report from Morningstar authored by Jackie Cook.

Black and Latina women continue to disproportionately struggle with the effects of the pandemic on the job market, according to a Feb. 10 study by WerkLabs, the data and insights division of The Mom Project. One-third of Black mothers and one-fourth of Latina mothers said they were unable to work remotely during the pandemic, compared to only one-tenth of both White and Asian mothers.

Even women who make it to the top ranks of U.S. corporations face a persistent pay gap compared with men in leadership roles, a new study of corporate filings found.

Last September, I had the chance to talk with culinary workers at a virtual town hall. One of those workers was M. Rocha, who used to work at a hotel on the Las Vegas Strip. When the pandemic hit last March, like so many in the tourism and hospitality industry, she was furloughed. She’s still not back on the job today. She has a wife, son and elderly mother she takes care of, and they all depend on her paycheck.

Although businesses now employ more female managers than ever before, women’s advancement into senior leadership roles remains much slower than for men. While there are a variety of structural causes driving gender inequity in the workplace, one important factor is the disparity in how men and women are given developmental feedback.

When discussing the careers of women leaders, there’s a phenomenon referred to as the “glass cliff.” It’s an obvious relative to the term glass ceiling, which describes the invisible barrier to advancement that women often face when they are up for promotion to the highest levels of an organization.

From attempting to manage remote schooling to rearranging their workdays to fill child-care gaps, there’s no question it’s mothers who are, more often than not, shouldering the increased responsibilities of caring for kids throughout the pandemic.

SFA is excited to announce our 2020 Women in Securitization (“WiS”) Cabinet and WiS Sub-Committee Co-Chairs.