The Commonwealth Bank Retail Insights Report has revealed that retail businesses with a higher percentage of female executives are performing better across a range of metrics including business confidence, personalisation and customer experience.
According to the findings, retailers providing exceptional levels of customer service have an average of 47% female executives compared to 35% among those delivering poor customer experiences.
In addition retailers with a 75% female executive team, 30% expect business conditions to improve compared with just 16% with no female executives.
The report highlights that retail is among the top performing industries when it comes to gender balance in leadership positions, with 41% females in executive roles.
The average is 23.3% for Australia's top 2000 companies.
Commonwealth Bank national manager retail Jerry Macey said that women are an asset to the industry.
“Retailers with more female executives prioritise customer experience within their business strategy and within that, see personalisation as very important. And they’re right: in previous research, we found that three quarters of Australians will stay loyal to a business that personalises their experience.”
“It’s encouraging that many retail businesses have more female executives than average, however clearly some lag this trend.
“They may want to pursue gender balance considering the customer experience benefits that accrue.”