While the headlines may look good – the reality of the situation when it comes to women directors in boardrooms across the UK is that a glass ceiling remains ‘stubbornly in place’.
Sue Vinnicombe CBE is Professor of Women and Leadership at Cranfield School of Management and has overseen the Female FTSE Board Report since 1999. This year’s report found that while women make up 43% of directors on FTSE 100 boards, and 42% on FTSE 250 boards, an ‘executive gender paradox’ has emerged as the gap between the number of women in non-executive director (NED) roles and executive roles has, in fact, widened.
All Things Business spoke to Professor Vinnicombe about her work at Cranfield University and the wider sector; about why targets remain important and why historically, and in the modern workplace, women struggle to make their presence felt.
With an early academic career informed by how many times Professor Sue Vinnicombe found herself the only woman on courses and in meetings, her professional focus soon turned to Women in Management and why the number of women in senior leadership positions barely changed year by year, despite progress in equality legislation and growing awareness of the benefits of diversity.
It is true that there has been significant improvement on the figure of 6% of directors on FTSE 100 boards being women when the FTSE Board Report was first published 25 years ago, but Professor Vinnicombe remains concerned that the fact that figures that have reached the 40-45% range is not necessarily a reason to celebrate, nor a clear indication of how far businesses have come.
“With the percentage of women in director roles meeting the Women Leaders Review targets, the headlines look great – but the persistent reality remains, that the glass ceiling for women in executive level positions is still stubbornly in place,” she said.
“One of the issues we have is that the Higgs Review (2003) recommended that boards with equal numbers of executive directors and NEDs should be restructured to include more NEDs. Because of an increasing focus on this, and later findings from the Lord Davies Report, there was pressure on companies to get more women on their boards, and women who were climbing the executive ladder were suddenly being courted to fill these NED roles.
“Is that a good thing? You couldn’t blame the women who chose that route, for women who could see how tough it was going to be to reach executive roles it was an opportunity, but the more they jumped into those roles, the more they left the status quo at the top.”
In 2010, Professor Vinnicombe had been invited to Downing Street by Gordon Brown for a breakfast with key stakeholders to discuss women in leadership. The election later that year saw David Cameron become Prime Minister which led to the setting up of the Women on Boards review, led by Lord Davies of Abersoch, and Professor Vinnicombe was invited to sit on the review’s steering committee as the research lead.
“Watching how Lord Davies underwent something of a transformation was interesting – he was certainly prepared to stop and listen, and he became our biggest champion and advocate.
“Some of the facts we could use to illustrate the barriers that have existed for women relate directly back to education. For instance, I was astonished to learn, later in life, that the old 11+ exam had a lower pass mark for boys than for girls. They wanted equal numbers of boys and girls in grammar schools and girls performed better, so they boys’ pass mark was lower.
“Most people will remember a few years ago, the headlines each August were that girls had once again out-performed boys in exam results. Questions were asked about why that was happening. I wonder if it would have been the same if the results had shown boys outperforming girls, I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t!
“In the end, Lord Davies’ report set quite tough targets – that 25% of board members would be women – but it proved effective and representation doubled, reaching 26% over the next five years.
“All this suggests that the willingness is there. That there is support for women to climb that ladder, which is why it’s all the more important to ask questions about why it isn’t happening.”
The figures from the recent Female FTSE Board research found that 42% of overall directorships on FTSE 250 boards are currently held by women – an increase of 3% from 2022. 174 FTSE 250 companies have at least 40% females on their board, meaning 70% have now met the benchmark Women Leaders Review targets.
Of the 793 women holding directorships on FTSE 250 boards in 2024, however, just ten are Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) – a 17% decline from 2022; 23 are Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) – a 12% decline from 2022; 35 are Chairs (the same as 2022); and 125 are Senior Independent Directors (SIDs) – a 50% increase from 2022. This means the increase in female representation in directorships FTSE 250 boards was solely driven by women in NED roles.
Professor Vinnicombe said: “Through their own tenacity, drive and experiences some women do make it to the top positions, but once they get to the C-Suite they often find themselves unsupported and in a hostile, macho environment. To say that’s disappointing, 25 years on from when I started this report, is a huge understatement. It’s clear that many issues still must be addressed before we can really expect to see significant and meaningful changes in the numbers of women executive directors.”
“Two or three years ago, it was determined that there are four key roles on a board – CEO and CFO are normally the two executive directorships; then there is the Chair, which is, of course, very important, and then you have Senior Independent Director. In an effort to try to encourage the focus on getting women into those ‘top’ jobs, the FTSE Women Leaders Review set a target that every FTSE 350 company should have at least one of those roles filled by a woman by 2025.
“So, for a company looking to achieve targets, the easy route is to be a SID; suddenly we were seeing women being catapulted into SID roles, and now 50% of women on boards are in SID roles.”
The report identifies maternity bias, childcare policies and the male-dominated executive environment as factors that prevent women from securing the top executive roles.
“Research shows how it gets harder and harder as you get more senior, and it’s particularly hard if you are the only woman on the board. The norm is the male culture and topics of conversation often reflect that, added to the fact Cranfield University that investors are more often than not male, and dealing with what can be an aggressive approach in the boardroom makes it daunting to be the only woman.
“How do we resolve the issues? Diversity is important, but it has to go alongside inclusion. We need diversity but we also need to hear different points of view and experiences. I think there is something to be said for mixed gender and diversity and what it’s going to mean in terms of getting women into those positions.
“But one thing that doesn’t help is the whole picture on maternity leave. We’ve always focused on making sure mothers have decent maternity leave. A lot of women now get six months paid leave and then the option to take another six months. Firstly, that is a lot of time out of the workplace, and secondly, the same provision does not apply to men. So really, we discriminate against dads, and through doing that we have normalised the fact that women do the baby care. When you look at Scandinavian countries where it is mandatory for dads to take three months’ paternity leave, you end up with a very different view on childcare.
“Here, dads get a month if they’re lucky, so you are normalising the fact that the woman is the carer. The fact that flexible working is so readily available now doesn’t help because it means women can continue to be the carer, tempted by shorter and more flexible hours. Without really meaning to, we have created a different career path for women.”
So, will what we hear about the workforce of tomorrow – the Generation Z workforce – where money is not always the driving factor, and work-life balance, additional benefits and business ethos are more important drivers, bring about change?
Professor Vinnicombe said: “One likes to think it will be different, but there can be a change of attitudes before then. Being a senior executive is a tough job, and we should maybe be more open to job sharing, not just for women but between men and women. Executive positions don’t mean you have to be full time, spreading that burden is a great idea and something we should be more open to.
“We hear about unconscious bias in recruitment, but I’m not sure it really works. It’s no good just looking at attitudes changing because there’s nothing to force that to happen.
“This is why I’m a massive proponent of targets; and I mean targets, not quotas. A target gives you a basis for what you should be aiming for. You may miss your targets one year, and there might be good reasons why you haven’t met them, that’s fine, but at least they’re there, offering a view on the longer term, as something to aim for.
“Targets drive meritocracy, meritocracy doesn’t exist on its own, I believe we need targets to focus the mind and change behaviour.”
Find out more about Cranfield University and the Cranfield School of Management at the website.
