Diversity breeds success, but it’s a message yet to resonate across the business world. According to a Grant Thornton report, women in senior positions only rose from 19 to 22% in the past decade. The large technology players are equally lagging: women account for 20 to 30% of Apple and Google’s workforces. Worse, Microsoft and Facebook only claim 17 and 15% respectively. Africa’s own diversity is middling by global standards and South Africa only shifted one percent in the previous ten years. But there is a growing number of senior female figureheads in technology, covering both the old and new guard, such as Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and IBM CEO Virginia Rometty.

It’s a mixed picture, which made the annual Brainstorm roundtable to discuss women in technology even more insightful than usual. Nearly 30 top technology and business leaders joined the discussion on where technologistas are today and what needs to happen for them to level the playing field.