Joys of a make do and mend holiday

How will public companies respond to the new insistence from the Financial Conduct Authority that at least two in every five board members should be female?

At least one of the key board positions of chairman, chief executive, finance director or senior independent director should be held by a woman, and those businesses that fail to comply will be required to provide an annual statement to investors on why they have fallen short.

I doubt there will be ticker tape flying and corks popping at this strong-armed tactic to boost diversity. But ask the pale, stale and male brigade in a few years how they are faring and they will probably be a lot more chipper. Why?

By then, they might have noticed that women bring a fresh skill set to senior roles. But they will definitely have taken cognisance of the fact that gender equality leads to greater efficiency, less excessive risk-taking and an improved bottom line, as repeatedly demonstrated by research.

The UK Government-backed Hampton-alexander review, which published its findings in February of this year, found that the number of female directors at FTSE-100 firms has increased by 50 per cent in the past five years, and women now hold more than a third of roles in the boardrooms of Britain’s top 350 companies.

Good news, but there are still 16 companies out of 350 which only have one woman on their board, employing a “one and done” policy of tokenism.

Sir Philip Hampton, chair of the review, hailed the “excellent progress for women leaders in business” over the past decade, but he has warned that businesses need to recruit and promote women to top executive roles “to sustain the changes made”.

The more women in senior positions, the clearer the career progression for their peers. Ambitious women frequently report frustration at the bottleneck they encounter once they are ready to move into the C-suite on the grounds that a de facto one-inone-out strategy is in place.

It’s shameful women are still in need of special pleading to get a foot in the door. But unless we push for change, our daughters will be treated no