As we celebrate International Women's Day, what's not to get about the value of women in the workplace?

As International Women's Day rolls around again on 8th March, it's always a good time to check in on how we, the fairer sex, are doing.

Reading some of the latest reports and surveys, my instinctive reaction is to sigh and wonder 'so what's new?' Same issues, same barriers, same outcomes.

But rather than getting jaundiced, it's worth keeping the issues at the forefront of our minds and insisting on the debate. Eventually, with enough insistence and persistence, maybe what is common sense can become common practice.

So then, where do we stand on this vexed question of taking our rightful place in the boardrooms of the world?

For those of us in the UK, the report issued last year by Lord Davies about women on boards carried some welcome conclusions. Lord Davies recommended that 25% of FTSE 100 board members should be female (the average then was 12.5 per cent) by 2015, and that both FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 companies should increase the percentage of women appointed to the board from then on. Not wishing to be churlish about the fact that women are actually slightly over 50% of the population, you have to give Lord Davies props for trying.

What has been the response a year later? Underwhelming might not be out of place as a description. As at October 2011, only 14.2% of FTSE 100 board members were female, representing a small rise from 12.5 per cent in 2010, while the average percentage of women on the board at a FTSE 250 company is 8.9%, up from 7.8% a year earlier. This fractional increase would suggest that business isn't listening to Lord Davies.

But before women can get to the boardroom, there's the small matter of getting them to executive levels in the first place.

Martin Webster, head of corporate governance at law firm Pinsent Masons, puts the case clearly when he says: "The real difficulty comes with promoting women into senior executive jobs, and that is a much longer play, which requires more fundamental reforms in the way we work and handle career progression."

According to evidence from the UK department for Business, Innovation and Skills, the number of women achieving executive director positions, i.e. actually running companies, is getting fewer, not more. Dropping from a low base of 18 at the end of 2010, there were only 16 female executive directors in the FTSE 100 at the end of 2011. Although there has been an increase in women at executive director level in the FTSE 100 from 3% in 2002 to 6.1% in 2011, it's safe to say that we're not exactly ready to cheer just yet. What is crystal clear is that we are failing to get women into executive positions in companies.

While recent female CEO appointments such as Virginia Rometty at IBM and Maria das Gracas Silva Foster at Brazilian Petrobas are welcome, for things to change at the top, the pipeline has to be opened for more females – and indeed other minorities – to reach senior levels.

But how will things change, you may ask? This brings me, sadly, to yet another disappointing study.

The Sex and Power Report 2011 from the Equality and Human Rights Commission shows there is a continuing trend of women being passed over for top jobs in Britain. The report measures the number of women in positions of power and influence across 27 occupational categories in the public and private sectors, and calculated that at the present rate of change, it will take 70 years to reach an equal number of men and women directors of FTSE 100 companies. It also found that it could be up to 70 years before there are an equal number of women MP's in parliament.

So things could be worse – at least now we know that those of us with the potential for surviving and working for a further 70 years now have something to look forward to.

But it is interesting to note that the report's findings included the fact that, in politics, women represent 22% of MPs, 17.4% of Cabinet members and 21.9% of the members of the House of Lords.

In media and culture, women represent 9.5% of national newspaper editors (down from 13.6 per cent in 2008), 6.7% of CEOs of media companies in the FTSE 350 and 26% of directors of major museums and art galleries.

Even in the public and voluntary sector, women represent only 12.9% of senior members of the judiciary (up from 9.6% in 2008), 22.8 % of local authority chief executives (up from 19.5% in 2008), 35.5% of head teachers of secondary schools (down from 36.3 per cent in 2008) and 14.3% of university vice chancellors (down from 14.4 per cent in 2008)

One of the biggest problems facing women (why not men, I often wonder?) is the crippling cost of childcare in this country, was the conclusion of a recent report by the think-tank, the Resolution Foundation, and the parenting website, Netmums.

The report warns that mothers are paying "a shockingly high price for motherhood" by being forced to accept badly paid, low-skilled jobs after having children, because there are so few decent part-time jobs in Britain. Bosses, it seems, are willing to offer either well-paid full-time jobs – or poor quality part-time work. More than 90% of the 1,600 mothers, who work part-time, and took part in the survey, had worked full-time before having children and wanted to continue working.

Nearly 45% of those questioned agreed that by working part-time, they had had to take a lower skilled job than if they worked full-time. Sally Russell, co-founder of Netmums, said: "It is unbelievable that women are encouraged to climb the career ladder only to be forced back to the lowest rung when they have children."

According to the report, many women 'move down the occupational ladder' when they switch to part-time work, in a move that is frequently irreversible. Not only do these women lose 'significant income', many are forced into the so-called 'five Cs' of clerical, cleaning, caring, cashiering and catering.

So, really, what is new?

Not a lot, it would seem. According to the UK Equality and Human Rights Commissioner Kay Carberry, "The gender balance at the top has not changed much in three years, despite there being more women graduating from university and occupying middle management roles. We had hoped to see an increase in the number of women in positions of power, however this isn't happening.

"Many women disappear from the paid workforce after they have children, so employers lose their skills. Others become stuck in positions below senior management, leaving many feeling frustrated and unfulfilled. Consequently, the higher ranks of power in many organisations are still dominated by men."

"If Britain is to stage a strong recovery from its current economic situation," says Carberry, "then we have to make sure we're not wasting women's skills and talents."

Indeed, according to the British Prime Minister, by not giving women access to the highest levels of involvement and decision making, business is also losing business. Impressed by the lead taken with female representation on boards by Norway, which imposes boardroom gender quotas, and countries like Iceland and Spain, David Cameron recently pointed out that promoting more women to senior roles boosts business performance.

"The evidence is that there is a positive link between women in leadership and business performance, so if we fail to unlock the potential of women in the labour market, we're not only failing those individuals, we're failing our whole economy."

Whether the pressure is from politicians or from the bottom line, the businesses that fail to 'get' it will eventually also be the ones that fail.

And that, my friends, is the bigger picture. Because when having more women on board means more business, we are not just talking about the profits of individual companies, but about the success of our national economies and, in turn, the global economic health of our planet.

While some women give up in despair and drop out of the race, others mean business. These women have turned to other forms of income generation, swelling the numbers of new business owners with enterprises that suit their talents and lifestyles. But the loss of these talented people - and what they can do if given the opportunity - is one that countries struggling with economic difficulties can ill afford.

So, to all the sisters who are not waiting to be wanted, needed or accepted, but are instead doing it their way and doing it anyway, Happy International Women's Day!

Author of 'Everyday Heroes – Learning from the Careers of Successful Black Professionals'. Available online from www.everyday-heroes.co.uk and on order through booksellers. ISBN 978-0-9569175-0-8