CIPR research by Socially Mobile graduates identifies Missing Women in public relations
A new research study examines the gap of nearly 4,000 female public relations practitioners in England and Wales who have failed to advance to senior positions or have left practice mid-career.
Two-thirds of practitioners working in public relations in England and Wales below director level are female and a third are male. The situation is reversed in senior roles. 54% are male and 46% are female.
It's an industry scandal hidden in plain sight. Women are failing to realise their potential mid-career.
We see the issue in every Socially Mobile cohort. The programme receives many applications from women returning to work after having a family.
The issue is intersectional and is compounded for under-represented and under-served practitioners, including Black and ethnic minority practitioners, the LGBTQ+ community and those with disabilities.
We pitched a proposal to the CIPR Research Fund in the Spring last year to work with Socially Mobile graduates with lived experience of this issue to understand why progress is so limited.
The research project identified a culture within the practice that exhausts women through constant pressure to prove their worth, manage impossible expectations and navigate gendered double standards. It impacts not just individual careers but also shapes the entire industry's approach to leadership, value and measures of success.
There isn't a single answer - if there had been, the countless interventions over the past 50 years might have been more successful.
Meaningful change requires cultural and organisational transformation in all areas: leadership, flexibility, life stage support, behaviour change, and structural and organisational reform.
It requires accountability, metrics and reporting to change cultural and societal norms.
Acknowledgements
The Missing Women study would not have been possible without the research team of Rana Audah, Isobel Wilson-Cleary, Josie Shepherd, Sarah Waddington CBE and supervisor, Ben Verinder. Thank you all.
Thank you to the women who participated in the study and spent time meeting with the researcher team. We dedicate the report to you and hope that it gives a much-needed voice to the issues that you raised.
Reference
Waddington, S., Audah, R., Wilson-Cleary, I., Shepherd, J., Waddington, S. and Verinder, B. (2025) The Missing Women Report. CIPR.
