The percentage of women in management positions, meaning Global Grade 14 and higher, is currently 22% calculated across the entire company (excluding employees who joined Merck as a result of the Millipore acquisition, since the global grading system has not yet been implemented for them). The percentage is higher at the subsidiaries than at corporate headquarters in Darmstadt; it is also higher in the Pharmaceuticals business sector than in Chemicals. The ratio of women in management positions is lower in certain Group functions, such as IT. Merck wants to further increase the percentage of women in management positions. Besides the local measures that are already in place – such as the cross-company mentoring program and opportunities to help employees reconcile the demands of career and family – we intend to develop further programs during 2011. We set ourselves a global objective of increasing the percentage of women in management positions to 25% to 30% by 2016. Effective April 1, 2011, we created the function of Chief Diversity Officer to support implementation.
At Merck 57% of all management positions (global grade 14+) are held by persons of non-German nationality – altogether 55 different nationalities are represented in such positions. The internationality of our management levels reflects the global nature of our business activities.
