GRIM PICTURE

However, we need to be wary that the amount of media attention given to these appointments does not give a distorted perception of how fast women are advancing in Korean society. Despite these new developments women are still very much underrepresented in leadership positions in the public sector. Women make up only 2.7 percent of civil servants in the top four tiers of the ranks, whereas women constitute 32.9 percent of the total public sector workforce.

In the private sector the picture is even grimmer. There are only twenty-nine women executives in the ten biggest companies in Korea, including Samsung, LG, and Lotte. This means women hold less than 2 percent of the executive positions in these companies. Although women in Korea constitute 40.7 percent of the total labor force, they fill only 7 percent of managerial and executive posts. This suggests that women still experience the glass ceiling at the middle level, and only a few women have broken through.

When asked why women are not being promoted to leadership positions, most HR directors and senior executives say that the pool of eligible female talent is not big enough. What these HR people do not, or will not, recognize is that the shortage of eligible women has much to do with HR practices discriminating against women (for instance, in allocating jobs and providing training opportunities) as well as with the fact that companies have not introduced family-friendly policies.

Koreans still hold a strong belief that women should continue working only as long as their work does not interfere with their primary duties of raising children and taking care of their families. This type of social expectation, the lack of family-friendly policies, and various forms of gender discriminatory employment practices are major reasons why women drop out of their jobs and don't pursue their careers after they marry or have children. Again, HR managers assert that job discontinuity and low productivity because of marriage and children are the main barriers to choosing female human resources. According to one manager, “Companies choose men because women have extra family concerns.”