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Why one woman changed her mind about female quotas for boards.

 

 

 

I started the day thinking all was as it should be. And then I read the following tweet:  RT @HarvardBiz: Women on Boards: America Is Falling Behind. If America is falling behind, Australia, our magnificent country, full of amazing women, is in the dark ages.

When I left university twenty years ago, to enter the male dominated world of investment banking, I was aware of the issue that women weren’t represented on the boards of Australian companies. However, like so many of my female peers, we simply thought the issue would disappear. We were told by our mothers and our fathers, our teachers and our professors that we could do anything. Be anyone. I now recognise this for what it was: naivete in the extreme.  Twenty years later Australia has one of the poorest rates of female representation in the boardroom in the world.

What happened to gender diversity?  What happened when a generation of highly educated Australian women entered the workforce? SILENCE. You are not hearing the sound of the glass ceiling shattering above the boardroom table. 84 boards in the ASX 200 still don’t have ANY female representation. That’s right ANY.

I know we have a female Governor General. And yes we have a female Prime Minister. And a female Premier. For this I am thrilled and delighted to be able to say to my daughters ‘that could be you’. But shamefully I can’t say this about reaching the highest levels of Australian business. Females simply don’t have the representation in the boardroom that we should and that is a problem for all Australians. And not just because the evidence shows that companies with a gender diverse board outperform. If we don’t have gender diversity on our companies boards then we don’t have gender diversity. Period.

It’s a disgrace of national proportions. Estonia, Latvia and Slovenia have greater female representation in the boardroom, to put it into global perspective. Call me impassioned on the issue but having watched the male status quo for the last twenty years I say “enough”! If your employer has an all male board, but the employee handbook says that they don’t tolerate discrimination based on gender, then it is a blatant case of do as I say, not as I do.

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You may not even especially care about this issue but if females are not well represented at the top of business then discrimination and gender bias, at all levels, is real. And that is bad news for all women. What does it say to our young women? What does it say to the world? Australian women just can’t cut it at the top? This is of course laughable, so what the heck is going on?

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There has been some progress, albeit of minuscule proportions. There are amazing women who have been fighting the good fight on this issue for a long time. Women on Boards are just one of the terrific organisations agitating for change. There are also fabulous women currently sitting on Australian boards who make us all proud. Catherine Brenner, Carolyn Kay & Jasmin Allen are just a few of women who should be, in my opinion, household names for their wonderful representation of women on our Top 100 company boards. Make no mistake these women are the best and the brightest and far from the “token” female on the boards on which they sit. But  we need more of them at the top. Many more.

There has been much discussion on the pros and cons of quotas. I for one support them and look to the stellar results Norway’s implementation has achieved as evidence that they do work. I don’t buy the argument that quotas lead to the wrong outcomes.  There are plenty of talented women to choose from. I agree it should be the right person for the job. But all too often it is simply the right man for the job. Australia claims to be a country that does not discriminate based on gender. OK then. We want equal representation on the boards of our Australian companies and we want it now. No more excuses.

Have we done enough? Do quotas work and should they be enforced to ensure the gender gap closes?

You can read the original article that was tweeted by The Harvard Business Review here http://s.hbr.org/k7azLD