On March 8, the organizers of the Women’s March are hosting an all-day women’s strike to show what the United States workforce would look like without women. While the details of the strike are still being determined, the impact of all women walking out of the workplace would have some pretty large reverberations. Lyda Bigelow, associate professor of entrepreneurship and strategy at the University of Utah David Eccles School of Business, has researched women in the workplace throughout her career. Bigelow says there would be a disparate effect throughout organizations if every woman walked out of her place of employment. For front-line and middle-manager jobs, about 47 percent of the workforce would be lost. However, senior executives wouldn’t see much of a change. Over the past decade, there has been little change in the number of women entrepreneurs, how much access they have to funding and how many are leaders of Fortune 500 companies. “The c-suite will continue to operate, but it won’t have much to manage,” Bigelow said.

Lyda Bigelow | associate professor, entrepreneurship and strategy, David Eccles School of Business | Lyda.Bigelow@Eccles.Utah.edu | 801-585-3471