Still a man's world at the top - for now

White males still hold center stage in corporate America, but asignificant number of women are waiting in the wings ready to takethe lead at Chicago companies.

More than 95 percent of senior-level managers at the nation'slargest corporations are white men, virtually the same percentagereported a decade ago, according to the study to be released soon byKorn/Ferry International, the New York-based executive search firm,and the University of California at Los Angeles.

"That number doesn't surprise me," said Lois Gallo, vicepresident of sales and service at Chicago-based Midway Airlines."I've never walked into a staff at which I wasn't the only female."

Although the study doesn't break out any numbers for theMidwest, a quick check of the larger publicly held companies inChicago turns up just two women at the top - Ellen Gordon, presidentof Tootsie Roll, and Christie Hefner, chairman and chief executiveofficer of Playboy Enterprises. Gordon is the daughter of a formerTootsie Roll president and Hefner is the daughter of the Playboyfounder.

There are, however, many Chicago women breaking through theso-called "glass ceiling" to the senior management ranks. Even moreare a few steps away.

At Hyatt Hotels, a privately held company based in Chicago, onlyseven of the 106 hotel general managers are women, but 50 percent ofthe corporate management staff is female, said President DarrylHartley-Leonard. Four of those seven women general managers areamong the top 10 performers at Hyatt, he said.

Joan Bernstein, the top-ranked woman at Oak Brook-based WasteManagement, said few women have made it to the top so far because theroad was closed until recently.

"Twenty years ago, there were the same number of women attendinglaw school as in the 1950s when I went. Now, you are seeing a numberof women in law school, accounting, finance, MBAs. For a long time,there weren't any contenders," said Bernstein, who takes over nextmonth as Waste Management's vice president of environmental affairsand ethical standards.

The federal government has launched an offensive to ensure morecontenders in the future. The Department of Labor's Office ofFederal Contract Compliance Programs is studying ways to forcefederal contractors - most of the nation's largest businesses - topromote more women and minorities to the highest corporate ranks.Those that do not could lose their federal contracts.

Already, women are more successful at smaller, moreentrepreneurial firms.

More than 80 percent of the members of the Committee of 200, agroup of top-level women in business, own their own firms.

Gordon, a member of the Committee of 200, said she believesthings are getting better.

"I think less about gender now. I remember the day when I sawso few women at business meetings or conferences. Now, I don'treally notice. They're just men and women."

Bernstein said the more progressive firms working to create adiverse culture have learned from the bad examples of the past.

"Those companies where white males in the same suits keptreproducing themselves went down the tubes. They never got a newidea in 30 years."

Gallo said she, too, believes the next generation of managerswill be more evenly divided between men and women.

"If I was to develop a succession plan tomorrow, there would bea balance of eligible men and women who can take my place."

And, she said, with so many women to choose from, "you don'thave that rare person you can eliminate. If you have 15 who arequalified and six of them are female, you're going to have to look atthem."