Female parity | Land of the Vikings best place for women to work

Norway has been declared the best place in Europe for women to work. It tops the polls for the high numbers of female leaders together with favourable maternity leave and pay benefits.

Marking International Women’s Day (8th March), the findings by digital PR company, Reboot Online set out to expose the best destinations in Europe for women looking to pursue a career abroad. The findings are based upon a points-based index system which analysed the number of women in leadership positions, female employment, the Gender Gap Index, and maternity policies in each country.

Norway scoops the prize

Topping the charts is Norway with a total gender equality score of 7.11 out of a possible 10. The Scandinavian country is further highlighted for its 2023 high percentage of women in leadership positions (7.14/10). Norway also scores highly in the Gender Gap Index (8.80/10). This compares to the UK which only ranked sixth with a total gender equality score of 5.78/10. In some good news for women working in the UK, however, it did stand out as having the highest levels of female representation in leadership positions in Europe, including CEOs, executives, non-executives, presidents, and board members within its largest listed companies (7.20/10).

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As well as this, the UK has the highest five-year surge in this category (8.33/10), underscoring significant and continued progress in elevating the representation of women across leadership roles. This trend continues with a high level of women aged between 16-65 in employment (8.43/10). In similar news the Government-based FTSE Women Leaders Review recently mirrored these findings, reporting that the number of jobs held by women in the FTSE 350 increased by two percentage points last year to 42.1 per cent.