Gender inequality…even in the metaverse

Women remain locked out of leadership roles indicating gender inequality…even in the metaverse, states a McKinsey & Company report.

A McKinsey report on found a “discernible gender gap” in the metaverse akin to gaps existing in Fortune 500 companies and start-ups. For perspective, less than 10% of Fortune 500 CEOs are women, only 17% of venture capital (VC) dollars go to women-led and women co-led companies and just 15% of VC general partners in the US are women.

The reality is that women are spending more time in the protometaverse than men are and, according to McKinsey data, are more likely to spearhead and implement metaverse initiatives. Yet, women represent a minority in the metaverse economy. Both the entrepreneurial capital and the CEO roles in the metaverse space remain disproportionately reserved for men.

McKinsey research indicates that 41% of women had used a primary metaverse platform or participated in a digital world for more than a year, compared with 34% of men. In addition, more women spent significant time in the metaverse: 35% of the women surveyed are power users, spending more than 3 hours a week in the metaverse, compared with 29% of men.

Women are more likely than men to engage in hybrid use cases in the metaverse, traversing both physical and digital worlds to take part in activities such as gaming, fitness, education, live events and shopping via AR/VR technologies. By contrast, men are using the metaverse to participate in purely digital experiences such as gaming, trading nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and attending social events.

Moreover, 60% of women report that they have implemented more than two metaverse-related initiatives in their organisations. The numbers show that these female executives are 20% more likely than their male counterparts to implement multiple metaverse initiatives, especially around marketing, employee learning and development and product design.

Yet, women are still “locked out of leadership roles” in the metaverse economy with 90% of leadership roles being held by men. In the past five years, male-led metaverse companies received a higher share of total entrepreneurial funding than female-led metaverse companies.

The metaverse has the potential to bring profound change to the global economy, as well as to create new and more equitable opportunities for all who use it, which is why it is imperative for all key stakeholders to understand the dynamics at play. According to early indicators, women may already be a powerful metaverse user base. Addressing the existing gender gap in leadership roles while the metaverse is still in its formative stage is therefore of paramount importance. To do so, industry stakeholders will need to engage a range of different voices and infuse diverse leadership into the companies and coalitions shaping the metaverse today.