Cranfield School of Management - with support from partners and sponsors - has released its annual publication, The Female FTSE Board Report. The report looks at trends in female representation on FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 boards and has provided a regular measure of the number of women Executive Directors on the corporate boards of the UK’s top companies since 1999.
Cranfield state that their reports have always distinguished themselves from the other reports concerning women on boards, by focusing on what they can do to advance women’s leadership at this level, rather than just focusing on the numbers of women on boards. Therefore, whilst this is the twenty third Cranfield University annual report, in 2006 they included FTSE 100 executive committees for the first time, as they identified them as an important pipeline to the board.
In the report’s Foreward, Professor Karen Holford, CBE Chief Executive and Vice-Chancellor Cranfield University stated:
“I have never viewed this important work that Professor Sue Vinnicombe started in 1999 as being purely about women on boards. It’s about the way women are valued, the appreciation of different styles of leadership, and the aspirations of all young people.”
This years’ report shows there has been a continued increase in the number of women on corporate boards. The percentage of women on FTSE 100 boards is 40% (or forty eight companies) and for FTSE 250 boards is 39%. This means that FTSE 100 boards have already met the target set by the Women Leaders Review for 2025 and FTSE 250 are almost at the target.
In total, women hold 413 directorships across FTSE 100 boards, however just nine were CEOs, 18 were Chairs and 377 were Non-Executive Directors (NEDs) - an increase of 15% over the past year - but as seen in previous years, there is a wide variance between the percentage figures in the top and bottom companies. For example, Diageo have 64% women on their board whilst Endeavour Mining Plc have only 22%. Eighteen companies have 50% or more women on their boards whilst there are ten companies with 30% or less women on their boards - this appears to indicate the downside of voluntary targets over mandatory quotas.
Sue Vinnicombe, Professor of women and leadership at Cranfield School of Management and lead author of the report, said:
“We have come a long way since I started this report in 1999, but just having women in NED roles is not sufficient to have an impact on the executive pipeline.”
The percentage of women in Executive Directorship roles in FTSE 100 companies has increased slightly to 16.8%, with 36 women holding these roles in 33 companies.
Regarding FTSE 250 boards the figures have also increased from 34.9% to 38.9%, with one hundred and ten companies already meeting the new target of 40% women on their boards. However, in total there are still only 47 women holding Executive Directorships across FTSE 250 companies for the third year running. Additionally, the variance across the FTSE 250 companies has grown - with the top company having 80% women on their board compared to the bottom with only 11%.
Sue Vinnicombe added:
“The lack of progress in terms of seeing women in these key executive roles is frankly appalling. For real change to happen, women simply must be in the significant decision-making roles of CEO and chair.”
Tony Danker, CBI Director-General stated:
“The Cranfield University Female FTSE Board Report 2022 shows that while some important progress has been made, most directorship roles occupied by women are at the non-executive level, rather than CEOs or Chairs. This isn’t good enough. The business case is watertight. Companies in the top quartile for gender diversity on executive teams are 25% more likely to have above-average profitability than companies in the fourth quartile. In the current economic context, if companies are to succeed, they must accelerate efforts to place more women at the top of UK plc – especially in decision-making roles.”
