The People Bulletin

The 30% Club is campaigning for 30% of director posts to be held by women by 2015 and held its first meeting on Monday, 4 July.[1] Only 13% of the FTSE 100 executive board members are female – it was previously higher at 17%. The lack of women on the board of the UK’s top corporates has long been a bugbear of organisational behaviour and diversity gurus. The leader of the pack in the UK on this issue, Professor Susan Vinnicombe at Cranfield School of Management, has evidence that boards with higher numbers of women on them are more effective and have better corporate governance .[2]

The background to Lord Davies’ report, calling for the 100 biggest companies to ensure at least 25 of their board members are female by 2015 was helpfully set out by Michelle Gray in her article for The People Bulletin: ‘All aboard?’ on 23 March.[3] Helena Morrissey, chief executive of Newton Investment Management is the founder of the 30% Club and told The Sunday Times that it was “a bit unrealistic” for a woman to be able to have “a family and friends and hold down a difficult, high-octane job when both partners work full time.” She went on to tell the newspaper how her and her journalist husband Richard had the conversation about which of them would stay at home to look after the children (they have nine). She was passed over for promotion because of her pregnancy with her first child almost 20 years ago and changed investment companies as a result.[4]

‘Real transformation’ will, according to the 30% Club be brought about by:

• motivating and supporting chairmen to appoint more women to their boards;
• providing information and support for businesses trying to improve their diversity and for women seeking board appointments;
• working with related groups such as the FTSE Cross-Company Mentoring Programme, the Professional Boards Forum and executive search firms;
• raising the profile of the issue by stimulating debate and influencing the political agenda. This involves generating media coverage, running events and collating research; and
• tracking progress towards the 30% target. 

[1] www.30percentclub.org.uk

[2] www.som.cranfield.ac.uk/som/som_applications/somapps/contentpreview.aspx?pageid=13273&apptype=think&article=131 

[3] www.apbusinesscontacts.com/the_people_bulletin-pb_7/ontheboard.aspx

[4] www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-23/morrissey-topples-old-boys-as-money-manager-with-nine-children.html