More executive women are optimistic about their future paths to the C-suite, according to KPMG. KPMG U.S. CEO Paul Knopp joins Wealth! to discuss the company's Women's Leadership Summit and the importance of elevating women in the workplace.

"The KPMG Women's Leadership Summit was part of the original vision 10 years ago when we started sponsoring the KPMG women's PGA Championship, and the idea was not only to elevate women in the game of golf, but also to elevate women in business, to elevate more women to the C-suite," Knopp explains.

He adds that supporting women in the workplace is "an imperative in today's world," especially when more women are attending college than men. He notes that the representation of women in the workplace — especially in the C-suite — is crucial, and that "highly-effective succession planning" is one way to get more women into higher leadership positions.

"While women aren't underrepresented in society overall in the US, they are certainly still underrepresented in business. And so what we have to do is continue to focus on some of the things I talked about earlier, which is sponsorship of women in business, making sure that we have accountability of leaders to make sure more women are in leadership positions and in the pipeline for the C-suite in the future. All those things are critically important," Knopp adds.

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This post was written by Melanie Riehl

Video Transcript

Women advancing in the C SUITE and in golf, the KPMG women's PGA golf tournament is this week and it actually coincides with KPMG S Women Leadership Summit, an initiative focused on advancing more women to the C Suite.

Joining me now to share what we can expect from both of these events.

We've got Paul Kop who is the KPMG US chair and CEO Paul, great to see you and grab some time with you.

As always here, I mean, two major events uh in more ways than one here.

So as we're thinking about this first, let's start on the business side because uh that is a massive move forward that we've seen the business community and especially publicly traded companies try to make in making sure that they have a, a more diverse, both board of directors as well as C Suite Brad.

It's great to be with you again.

Yes, I'm here on site at the Holly Country Club in Seattle where we are hosting the KPMG Women's Leadership Summit in conjunction with the KPMG Women's PGA Championship, which starts on Thursday.

So the KPMG Women's Leadership Summit was part of the original vision 10 years ago when we started sponsoring the KPMG women's PGA championship.

And the idea was not only to elevate women in the game of golf, but also to elevate women in business to elevate more women to the C SUITE.

You know, we're really proud to say since we started that sponsorship and hosting this summit 10 years ago, 20 other LP G events now have affiliated women's leadership conferences at the particular KPMG Women's Leadership Summit.

We're hosting tomorrow, we're going to have amazing speakers from politics, media, business.

We're gonna have Mikes with the CF CEO of T Mobile, uh Kara Lawson, the women's basketball coach, talk about high performance.

Um And we're also going to have Gina Davis, our key note speaker and the idea really is to ensure that we do more to elevate women both in sports and to the C suite into the future.

Certainly, what, what are you hearing from companies as they are trying to ensure that they're enacting the, the, the best strategy to attract and retain women talent, female talent.

Well, it's really an imperative in today's world, particularly where you have more women going to college than men to ensure that women look at your organization and see people like them in the organization.

Now, we have a study every year in connection with the KPMG Women's Leadership summit.

The study this year revealed that 73% of the women that previously attended the summit.

So if you will there's been 2500 women attend the summit over the last 10 years.

73 73% said that they have aspirations for the C Suite and they think it's within their sights.

And really importantly though too Brad, 78% of those women noted that in their own organizations, they're seeing more representation in the C Suite for women.

So that shows there's a lot of progress.

But at the same time, we have to understand and appreciate the obstacles that to continue sponsorship.

We have to have highly effective succession planning to make sure that we do get more women into the sea suited and into leadership positions overall.

You know, it's interesting, you know, coming into this general election this year, it seems like there, there's been more of a weaponization of diversity, equity and inclusion and making sure that you do have women who are elevating into more roles that that is part of diversity, equity and inclusion as well.

So where can companies who have started to remove that language or be less vocal about what they're doing, make sure that both their internal constituents and their external clients continue to know the work that they're doing on that front and, and actually continue to move it forward and, and more than just talk.

Well, certainly we have to recognize that while women aren't underrepresented in society overall, in the US, they are certainly still underrepresented in business.

And so what we have to do is continue to focus on some of the things I talked about earlier, which is sponsorship of women uh in business, making sure that we have uh accountability of leaders to make sure more women are in leadership positions.

And in the pipeline for the C Suite in the future, all those things are critically important along with great succession planning to ensure that women are represented in succession plans.

You know, what, what overall though with respect to diversity, equity inclusion, what we see is that generation Z and millennials are the most diverse they've ever been in terms of a population.

And we have to recognize in the business community that that's the talent of tomorrow.

And if that talent is more diverse, we need more diverse talent in our businesses to make us sustainable and successful for the long term.