A clarion call has been issued to the travel industry to better support female progression.
Businesses should help create benchmarks by sharing data highlighting gender diversity, development, retention and those returning from career breaks, according to Google’s head of ads marketing, Nishma Robb.
Speaking at a Women in Business lunch, hosted by Travel Weekly Group’s luxury title, Aspire, and Celebrity Cruises, Robb said: “We need the light to be shone on developing women in business more.
“We need to take action and my rallying call consists of several factors. The first is data; we need to establish exactly where the travel industry is when it comes to gender diversity and pay divides.
“I created a policy within Google and I won’t allow anyone to speak at external events unless they are diverse events.”
Robb was joined by Celebrity Cruises’ Lisa Lutoff-Perlo, who became the first female chief executive at parent company Royal Caribbean Cruises in its then 45‑year history in 2014.
Lutoff-Perlo said: “My role gave me the opportunity to give a voice, an opportunity and a north star for other women. It took 45 years for our company to appoint a woman in this position and yet we’re in the travel business, where the decisions to buy travel reside with a woman in a household. We need to work together more.
“I looked at the faces of all the women when I got this job and they couldn’t have been happier for me and the same goes for the thousands of women working on our ships. It gives other women something to aspire to.”
Carol Hay, the Caribbean Tourism Organisation’s marketing director for the UK and Europe, and Mary McKenna, managing director at Tour America, also urged more women to become involved in mentoring schemes.