BAC Bank of America Corporation

By Rachel Feintzeig And Christina Rexrode 

Top executives from companies including Facebook Inc. and PepsiCo Inc. on Wednesday evening said much work remains for women to be equal to men in American corporations.

Sheryl Sandberg, one of Silicon Valley's most prominent female executives, talked at an event hosted by The Wall Street Journal about the deep-seated biases held by men and women that can keep female executives from reaching the same levels as male counterparts.

"Companies say that diversity is important, that they want more women in leadership. Our employees don't believe that's true," said Ms. Sandberg--Facebook's chief operating officer--speaking to an audience that included her parents.

In a panel discussion, the chief executives of PepsiCo Inc., Bank of America Corp. and Salesforce.com Inc. talked about their own struggles to blend work and family responsibilities and to help their workers to do the same.

Indra Nooyi, the CEO of Pepsi, said she was surprised when her children seemed willing to sacrifice career ambitions for family. "We grew up with a mom who was never there," they told her, an experience that has made her re-examine the flexibility she offers to Pepsi workers.

Ms. Nooyi said that women still carry a disproportionate amount of responsibility for family life, no matter their position in a company. She spoke about rushing home from a long day of work to fix comfort food for her daughter. "You think my husband's going to do that?" she joked.

Brian Moynihan, the CEO of Bank of America and the sixth of eight children, concurred. "When my parents aged, guess who stepped in? The daughters," Mr. Moynihan said. "This is just the way it falls. It shouldn't fall that way."

Mr. Moynihan said it was important to him that his employees not have to choose between work and family. "You have to show you care," Mr. Moynihan said.

Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff cautioned against lumping all female workers into one group. For example, companies shouldn't assume all female employees have the same views on motherhood, he said.

"There are many different types of women, and you better be ready to include them all," Mr. Benioff said.

Some of the executives expressed frustration to once again be examining the issue of women and work, with little progress to show for all the conversations that have come before.

Ms. Nooyi, when asked if she had faced challenges as a woman in business, replied, "Oh, it was crappy." Earlier in her career, she was often the only woman in the room, she said, and men wouldn't make eye contact with her. She watched her male colleagues get the best projects, while she was left with the dregs, she said, adding that her ideas would often be dismissed, while men who said the same thing would be lauded as having shared a "brilliant idea."

Tech companies in particular have revealed workforces that are disproportionately male.

New data from LeanIn.Org, which was founded by Ms. Sandberg, and McKinsey Co. found only 15% of C-suite executives in the 26 tech companies the organizations examined are women. The sector also scored low on female entry-level employees.

Mr. Benioff said he wasn't optimistic about the current state of women in tech. "I think it's actually much worse than what the research showed, " he said.

Dominic Barton, global managing director at McKinsey Co., spoke earlier in the evening about unexpected challenges when his company to make women's advancement a priority. For one thing, he said, most of the women didn't at first believe him--a sign, he said, that he needed to talk about the topic more.

Women also made it clear to him that they didn't want to be promoted just because they were female. "'If you make it easier for us, we will kick your ass,'" was the message they sent, Mr. Barton said. "'That's not the way we're going to do it,'" they told him, "'that will not help us long term.'"

Write to Rachel Feintzeig at rachel.feintzeig@wsj.com and Christina Rexrode at christina.rexrode@wsj.com

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 30, 2015 22:54 ET (02:54 GMT)

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