Three-quarters of boardroom appointments are still going to men, according to new research that suggests gender parity will “never be reached” at the top of the world’s biggest companies.
Egon Zehnder, the global search firm, examined board and senior executive roles at 1,610 public companies worth €7bn or more, in 44 countries. It found that just over a fifth of board seats were held by women, a 2 percentage point increase on 2016, but more than seven in every 10 appointments were still going to men.
“We need diversity, but it’s simply not happening fast enough,” said Jill Ader, who chairs Egon Zehnder. “With the rate of progress towards parity decelerating . . . fully balanced boards will never be achieved without a significant increase in the hiring of female directors.”