“CNBC/SurveyMonkey Women at Work” survey reveals the high ambitions and high aspirations of working women in the U.S., Canada, U.K. and Australia ahead of International Women’s Day
ENGLEWOOD CLIFFS, N.J. and SAN MATEO, CA, March 5, 2020 – CNBC, First in Business Worldwide, and SurveyMonkey (Nasdaq: SVMK), a leading global survey software company, today announced the results of their inaugural joint “CNBC/SurveyMonkey Women at Work” survey, timed to International Women’s Day on Sunday, March 8th.
The survey finds that a majority of American women have high ambitions and high career aspirations, especially younger women, women of color and working mothers. It also shows employers have work to do when it comes to providing opportunities for women to achieve their career goals.
Key findings from the “CNBC/SurveyMonkey Women at Work” survey include:
Working women in America are very ambitious:
- 54% of U.S. women say they are “very ambitious” when it comes to their careers.
- 75% of black women and 65% of Hispanic women say they are “very ambitious,” versus 46% of white women.
- 64% of women with children under age 18 say they are “very ambitious,” versus 51% of women with no children under age 18.
- By comparison, 44% of Canadian women, 29% of British women, and 27% of Australian women say they are “very ambitious” about their careers.
- 15% of 18-29-year-old women and 15% of 30-44-year-old women expect to be in the C-Suite in ten years.
Mothers of young children in America, while highly ambitious, are also concerned about the impacts of paid leave and work from home on their ability to achieve career goals:
- 34% of women with children under the age of 18 are “very concerned” that taking advantage of paid leave, flex-time, or work from home arrangements might prevent them from achieving their career goals.
- 27% of women without children under the age of 18 are “not concerned at all” about this.
- 42% of black women and 30% of Hispanic women are “very concerned” that taking advantage of flexible work arrangements will harm their ability to achieve career goals, versus 15% of white women.
Equal representation appears to be getting (a little) better for women at the senior leadership level, but employers have work to do:
- 24% say their organization offers more opportunities for women than it did three years ago, while 12% say there are fewer opportunities.
- 35% say their organization’s workforce is more diverse than it was three years ago.
- Black and Hispanic women are more likely than white women to say their organizations have gotten more diverse.
- Just over half (55%) of women say men and women are equally represented in their company’s senior leadership.
- 13% say women are over-represented and 28% say men are over-represented.
CNBC Senior Media and Entertainment Reporter Julia Boorstin will reveal the results of the “Women at Work” survey today, Thursday, March 5th throughout CNBC’s Business Day programming and online at
“One in 10 working women in the U.S. aspires to be in the C-Suite in 10 years, a stat that reflects American women’s particularly high career ambitions even relative to their peers in Canada, Australia, and the U.K.,” says Jon Cohen, chief research officer at SurveyMonkey. “On International Women’s Day, these results are a reminder to the business world that all workers want jobs where they can contribute, grow, and be recognized for their work.”
Methodology:
The “CNBC/SurveyMonkey Women at Work” online poll was conducted February 10-14, 2020 among a national sample of 1,068 employed women in the U.S. Respondents for this survey were selected from the more than 2 million people who take surveys on the SurveyMonkey platform each day. The modeled error estimate for this survey is plus or minus 4.0 percentage points. Data have been weighted for age, race, sex, education, and geography using the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey to reflect the demographic composition of the United States age 18 and over.
SurveyMonkey also conducted the same survey among a national sample of 772 employed women in the United Kingdom, 1,072 employed women in Canada, and 912 employed women in Australia. The modeled error estimates for these surveys are plus or minus 4.5 percentage points for the UK and Canada, and plus or minus 5 percentage points for Australia.
Complete results of the survey can be found here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/curiosity/cnbc-international-womens-day-2020/.
For more information contact:
CNBC
Jennifer Dauble
201-735-4721
jennifer.dauble@nbcuni.com
SurveyMonkey
Sandra Gharib
SandraG@surveymonkey.com
About CNBC:
CNBC is the recognized world leader in business news and provides real-time financial market coverage and business content consumed by more than 320 million people per month across all platforms. The network’s 14 live hours a day of business programming in North America (weekdays from 5:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m. ET) is produced at CNBC’s global headquarters in Englewood Cliffs, N.J., and includes reports from CNBC News bureaus worldwide. CNBC at night features a mix of new reality programming, CNBC’s highly successful series produced exclusively for CNBC and a number of distinctive in-house documentaries.
CNBC also offers content through its vast portfolio of digital products such as: CNBC.com, which provides real-time financial market news and information to CNBC’s investor audience; CNBC Make It, a digital destination focused on making you smarter about how you earn, save and spend your money; CNBC PRO, a premium service that provides in-depth access to Wall Street; a suite of CNBC mobile apps for iOS and Android devices; Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant and Apple Siri voice interfaces; and streaming services including Apple TV, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Android TV and Samsung Smart TVs. To learn more, visit
Members of the media can receive more information about CNBC and its programming on the NBCUniversal Media Village Web site at http://www.nbcumv.com/programming/cnbc. For more information about NBCUniversal, please visit http://www.NBCUniversal.com.
About SurveyMonkey:
SurveyMonkey is a leading global survey software company on a mission to power the curious. The company’s platform empowers over 17 million active users to measure and understand feedback from employees, customers, website and app users, and the market. SurveyMonkey’s products, enterprise solutions and integrations enable more than 335,000 organizations to solve daily challenges, from delivering better customer experiences to increasing employee retention. With SurveyMonkey, organizations around the world can transform feedback into business intelligence that drives growth and innovation.
