Article at a glance  

• Women do not lack ambition. Dr Poornima Luthra explains that workplaces are still structured in ways that make career progression hard to sustain.  

• As a result, women are redefining ambition on their own terms, with many turning to entrepreneurship rather than climbing the corporate ladder. 

• The sheer volume of women leaving their jobs should serve as a wake-up call. 

• Businesses must rethink how “ambition” and “success” are defined by evaluating their workplace systems and cultures to make sure talent is not being lost due to poorly designed systems. 

"Ambition” and “success” need redefining  

Women do not lack ambition, as the 2025 Women in the Workplace McKinsey & Company report concludes. But there is a cost to success which has prompted many women to leave the workforce. Ambition is about growth and challenge; it's a personal driver which reflects our individuality. 

A recent CNN Business report found that almost half a million women had left their jobs in the US between January and October in 2025 for reasons ranging from poor work-life balance, the cost and challenges of accessing childcare and toxic workplace cultures.  

These pressures reflect a deeper structural issue: many workplaces were not designed with diverse career paths or life circumstances in mind. 

As a result, many women are turning to entrepreneurship. Women are now starting nearly half of the businesses in the US, according to a recent article in Forbes magazine. A 2024 Wells Fargo Impact of Women-Owned Business Report cites the number of women-owned businesses increasing at nearly double the rate of male-owned businesses between 2019 and 2023. Choosing entrepreneurship doesn’t signal lower ambition. It often signals the opposite — ambition on one’s own terms. 

When organisations fail to support diverse forms of ambition, they risk losing talented employees. 

Why is this a business problem 

The sheer volume of women leaving their jobs should serve as a wake-up call to business leaders. Many organisations are still largely run by men, and gender biases, both subtle and explicit, continue to shape workplace culture. When organisations fail to support diverse forms of ambition, they risk losing talented employees.  

How business leaders can redefine ambition and success 

We need to make both cultural and organisational changes, with a long, hard look at what ambition and success should look like. Business leaders must redefine these constructs for the workforce and next generation: 

• On the systems side, leaders must revisit hiring, promotion criteria, pay structures and performance evaluation. If we define ambition solely as vertical progression, we will continue to reproduce inequality and risk losing talented employees. 

• On the cultural side, leaders must model sustainable success. That means realistic expectations, visible boundary-setting, and rejecting the idea that heroic sacrifice equals commitment. 

• All leaders and team members should have the agency to challenge bias in their own teams. 

• Conversations about equity of opportunity must start early, in classrooms and around dining tables, as we speak to young people about success. 

Before we question women’s ambition, we need to question the systems we’ve built. If the goal isn’t desirable, the cost is too high and the support isn’t there, disengagement cannot be named as a lack of ambition. It’s simply a rational response to inappropriately designed systems.