Today, I had the honor of attending the largest military spouse career hiring fair ever, hosted by the Chamber’s Hiring Our Heroes veterans initiative. 

Like their civilian counterparts, military spouses—95% of whom are women—have made important gains in the economy since the 1960’s, but that progress has stalled in some critical areas. Today, women hold just 3% of Fortune 500 CEO positions and account for less than 16% of all corporate officers, despite representing nearly half of the nation’s overall workforce. As entrepreneurs, they are starting firms at a rate one and a half times the national average, yet fewer women-owned firms make it to the 100+ employee or million dollar and up range.

Unfortunately, we don’t have a well-diagnosed reason why. What has become clear is that women face special challenges in their career advancement. One reason, identified by the Harvard Business School, is that women have a tougher time developing the career networks and mentors to provide “the powerful backing necessary to inspire, propel, and protect them,” as their careers advance (The Sponsor Effect: Breaking through the Last Glass Ceiling (Hewlett, Peraino, Sherbin and Sumberg; December 2010).

This challenge is compounded for military spouses, who average nine relocations over a service member’s career. Sadly, this has resulted in a staggering 26% unemployment rate and 42% wage gap across professions between military spouses and their civilian counterparts. These gaps persist despite the fact that military spouses are on average more educated than their civilian peers. Eighty-five percent have some college and a quarter have a bachelor’s degree or higher.

The Chamber’s Center for Women in Business (CWB) was on hand at today’s event to provide mentoring and networking opportunities for military spouses. I was proud to see CWB’s team of esteemed mentors sharing their experience and advice with the more than 1,200 spouses at today’s fair.

One of the main reasons we created the CWB is that we believe women will play a leading role in the ongoing economic recovery as creators of both jobs and wealth.  Partnering with our own Hiring Our Heroes team today was a natural opportunity to support and advance women in the business community.