The 2025 Women in the Workplace report from Lean In and McKinsey has sparked plenty of conversation across professional circles. It’s positioned as one of the most comprehensive studies of women’s experiences at work.
The report tracks progression, ambition and barriers across senior levels. Yet a closer look reveals a significant gap that changes how its findings should be understood. Caregiving responsibilities and childcare are almost entirely absent from the core narrative.
Throughout the main body of the report, there is no meaningful discussion of care, caregiving or childcare. This absence matters. Care responsibilities sit at the centre of many women’s working lives. Leaving them out reshapes the story that the data appears to tell and shifts attention away from structural barriers and towards individual choice.
One of the most repeated headlines from the report suggests that women are less interested in promotion than men. This framing has travelled fast. It has been shared on social platforms and echoed in commentary. However, the data itself shows something more nuanced. Women and men report similar levels of motivation and commitment to their work. Younger women, in particular, often show a strong desire to progress. When women have access to the same support and sponsorship as men, the reported gap largely disappears.
The problem is not a lack of ambition, it’s context. When care is not named, the reasons women give for stepping back from promotion are reduced to personal preference. The report briefly notes that women who say they do not want a promotion are more likely to mention personal obligations. That observation is not explored or developed. It is noted and then left behind.
Personal obligations is a broad phrase that hides a great deal of unpaid labour. It covers childcare arrangements, school schedules, elder care, household management, medical appointments and emotional labour. These responsibilities take time and energy. They also influence how people engage with work opportunities that demand long hours, travel or constant visibility.
By failing to centre care, the report presents a partial picture of women’s careers. It allows ambition to be measured without acknowledging the conditions that shape how ambition can be expressed. This approach risks reinforcing the idea that women opt out by choice rather than navigating systems that have not adapted to their realities.
Workplaces still tend to reward patterns of behaviour associated with people who have fewer caring responsibilities. Availability at short notice, constant presence and informal networking continue to matter. When flexibility is reduced and remote working is discouraged, the impact isn’t evenly felt. Those carrying the bulk of care work are the first to feel the consequences.
This matters for employers and leaders. If the story is framed as a confidence or ambition issue, then the solutions stay surface level. Encouragement programmes and messaging aimed at women will not address the underlying design of work. Real progress depends on recognising caregiving as a normal part of working life rather than an exception.
Supportive promotion pathways, fair sponsorship, flexible working arrangements and realistic expectations around availability all play a role. When these are in place, women’s career aspirations look much closer to those of men. The data already points in that direction.
Something to remember
When care is left out of the conversation, we end up with conclusions that do not reflect women’s lived experiences. Any serious discussion about women’s careers needs to include the realities that shape how work fits into life. Only then can progress be measured honestly and workplaces designed to support everyone.
