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The latest Gender Diversity Index report by 2020 Women On Boards shows a positive trend in women’s representation in the nation’s boardrooms . 2020 Women on Boards is a nonprofit organization founded by two women who were disconcerted by the lack of women in corporate boardrooms. They have been striving to get people involved to increase awareness of and improve the representation of women; their national campaign is “dedicated to increasing the percentage of women on corporate boards to 20 percent by 2020.”
Their index used Fortune 1000 companies from 2010 as a base and conducted research to verify the number of women employees and board members in these companies as of October 1 for 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015. The study does not include any company that no longer has a board of directors due to mergers, bankruptcies, etc.
The Key Results:
- Women now hold 18.8 percent of board seats on 842 companies, this is an increase from 17.7 percent in 2014 and from 14.6 percent in 2011
- Women have gained 75 board seats this year, compared to 52 in 2014
- Of the 960 active Fortune 1000 companies on the 2015 list, women hold 17.9 percent of board seats, in 2014, it was 16.9 percent in 971 active companies
- The number of companies with 20 percent or more women in the boardroom increased from 29 percent to 45 percent
- Companies with 11 to 19 percent of women went from 20 to 18 percent but has come back up to 19 percent in 2015
- Companies with one woman on the board have reduced from 33 to 27 percent
- Companies with no women on the board have gone from 18 percent to a low nine percent
- Consumer defensive, financial services, health care, real estate and utilities companies have over 20 percent women board members
Other Findings:
Smaller and newer companies have fewer women on their boards; out of 199 companies that joined the Fortune 1000 list since 2010, only 13.5 percent of boardroom seats are held by women. A trend shows that bigger companies add more women to the boards.
On the Fortune 100 list, 22.9 percent of the boardroom seats are held by women. Fortune 500 companies have 20.1 percent of boardroom seats held by women (this is the first time the number has crossed 20 percent) and in Fortune 501-1000 women have only 17 percent of boardroom representation.
Fortune 1000 by State:
The study includes 27 states that have at least 8 companies on the 2015 Fortune 1000 list. Of these, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey and Washington have exceeded 20 percent of women boardroom representation for two consecutive years. The most visible changes were in Texas, California and Ohio where 21, 11 and 10 women were added, respectively. Even though the report shows improvement, the pace is slow and we have a long road ahead.