September 2014
Research Institute
Thought leadership from Credit Suisse Research
and the world’s foremost experts
The CS Gender 3000:
Women in Senior Management
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
2
Contents
03 Editorial
04 The Credit Suisse
Gender 3000
06 The new boards
12 The Management Power Line
16 Measuring what they manage
22 Are “good” companies,
good investments?
26 What are the obstacles to women
advancing in their careers?
50 Appendix
52 References and further reading
For more information, please contact:
Richard Kersley, Head of Global Securities
Products and Themes, Credit Suisse
Investment Banking,
richard.kersley@credit-suisse.com
Michael O’Sullivan, Chief Investment
Officer, UK & EEMEA, Credit Suisse
Private Banking & Wealth Management,
michael.o’sullivan@credit-suisse.com
COVER PHOTO: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/NEUSTOCKIMAGES, PHOTO: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/PEOPLEIMAGES
55 Imprint / Disclaimer
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 3
Editorial
In the two years since the Credit Suisse Research Institute published its
Gender Diversity and Corporate Performance report, there has been a
notable increase in academic research and debate as to whether diversity at
the board level is reflected in improved corporate financial performance.
Given the ongoing focus on the topic, we have decided to revisit our analy
sis and seek to establish, not just whether greater diversity and enhanced
financial performance still holds in a post-crisis world, but also to consider
what happens below the boardroom—at a senior-management level. We
may have seen more diverse boardrooms emerging, but how diverse are top
management teams?
Our research team has undertaken the unique and significant exercise of
identifying and mapping more than 28,000 senior managers at over 3,000
companies actively covered by Credit Suisse analysts worldwide – The
Credit Suisse Gender 3000. This enables a deeper analysis of diversity
and its impact at a new day-to-day operational level rather than just the
supervisory benefits of the boardroom. As much as the proportion of women
in senior management, we can examine the nature of the roles women
fulfill by country and by sector.
Some of the findings of our initial report are confirmed – greater diversity
in boards and management are empirically associated with higher returns on
equity, higher price/book valuations and superior stock price performance.
However, new findings emerge from this added management analysis – we
find no evidence that female led companies reflect greater financial conser
vatism where leverage is concerned.
Also, dividend payout ratios have been
shown to be higher. Female CEOs have proven to be less acquisitive than
men when assuming the leadership position. The analysis makes no claims
to causality though the results are striking.
While the study shows that the proportion of women in senior manage
ment is similar to that on the boards of companies, their roles are arguably
skewed towards areas of less influence or offer less opportunity to move
into the most senior positions in a company.
The “Management Power
Line” reveals the lowest female representation at the CEO level rising grad
ually through Business Management and Operational roles, CFO and Strat
egy and, finally, to Shared Services where their positions are most concen
trated. We also find that female representation is higher in “New Economy”
companies and in “Non-Manual Labor” (mostly services) companies. While
we see female under-representation and management gaps across varying
sectors, country and cultural factors are far more influential.
Against this backdrop, what can drive further improvements? There has
admittedly been progressive legislation in Europe, but little has happened in
the US and diversity levels remain low in most of Asia.
The report considers
a number of the prevailing obstacles, specifically at mid-management and
senior levels and suggests some policy initiatives that could support further
progress. However, our research underlines that the trend towards greater
gender equality in the workforce and in top-management is consistent with
and supported by powerful logic. It is not a case of a greater ability of one
gender versus the other but that a more diverse group makes for better
decision making and corporate performance.
The speed with which change
is embraced will prove to be the most important and challenging variable.
Urs Rohner, Chairman, Credit Suisse
Brady Dougan, Chief Executive Officer, Credit Suisse
Iris Bohnet, Professor of Public Policy, Harvard University and Board
Member, Credit Suisse
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
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The Credit Suisse
Gender 3000
Is gender diversity to the benefit of all stakeholders? We extend our analysis
of board structure and corporate performance to consider senior
management representation, introducing the Credit Suisse Gender 3000.
Julia Dawson, Richard Kersley and Stefano Natella
Caveats and causality
Since our initial research report of August 2012, Gender
diversity and corporate performance, the focus on diversity
within corporate management teams and its perceived benefits has become an even more debated topic. A specific spotlight has been shone on the issue by the disclosure of low
diversity levels at leading Silicon Valley companies during summer 2014. While much of the focus continues to center on
the equality or fairness argument, we believe that the question
should be whether diversity is to the benefit of not just women
themselves, but also to the benefit of other stakeholders, corporates, investors and the wider economic environment.
Hence, in this second report, we have revisited the statistical analysis we previously conducted to objectively assess
whether there is a business and, importantly, investment
case that supports greater gender diversity. Do our prior
observations still hold true in the world post the financial crisis? To take the analysis a step further, we looked beyond
the issue of how differing female representation in board
structures may impact financial metrics to consider senior
management representation.
To do this, we have created a proprietary database from
Credit Suisse’s global company research coverage, amounting to more than 3,000 companies across 40 countries and
all major sectors—“The Credit Suisse Gender 3000 (CSG
3000).” It tracks, by company, industry and region, the gender mix across the key senior management roles of CEO,
CFO, Operations and Shared Services.
Our initial focus on
board structure was understandable not least because it was
the prime focus for regulators and policy makers. However,
the reality is boards supervise but do not necessarily manage
companies. The key is whether a diverse board structure is
mirrored in a diverse management team.
While our statistical findings suggest that diversity
does coincide with better corporate financial perfor
mance and higher stockmarket valuations, we
acknowledge that we are not able to answer the cau
sality question and this is an important caveat to the
observations below in the report.
Do better companies
hire more women, do women choose to work for
more successful companies, or do women them
selves help improve companies’ performance? The
most likely answer is a combination of the three. But,
we would argue from our analysis that women in man
agement are more of an influence on corporate per
formance than simply women in the boardroom, if still
lacking a sufficient timeline of management diversity
data to make broader claims of definitive causality. We
will continue to examine the issue in future research.
It is crucial to stress that the analysis that we con
duct in the report is not about judging the ability of one
gender versus another but the importance of diversity
in decision-making.
A fascinating study led by Pro
fessor Anita Woolley at Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper
School of Business shows that it is not the greatest
ability that leads to the best answer or outcome.
Within a group working together, the presence of a
woman within the group is one of the key factors
that influences the group’s collective “intelligence”
or in other words the ability of the group to make
successful decisions. Skill sets are different, one is
not necessarily better than another, but enabling
seems as important as being able. This was also a
key message of our initial report.
PHOTO: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/SHIRONOSOV
Letting the data speak
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WOMEN IN BUSINESS
What are the key findings from our analysis?
• Board diversity has increased in almost every
country and every sector, progressing from 9.6%
in 2010 to 12.7% at the end of 2013. Female
participation in top-management (CEO and direc
tors reporting to the CEO) stands at 12.9% at the
end of 2013, but varies considerably from sector
to sector and country to country. Countries where
board quotas were enforced show among the big
gest gaps between the level of representation of
women in the board and in top management.
• Regional differences in diversity, perhaps cul
tural in nature, are more striking than those at a
sector level. There is also a positive correlation
between market capitalization of a company
and the level of gender diversity at both the
board level and in top management.
Small com
pany management tends to be less diverse. The
increasing trend towards global business mod
els among corporates and the fact that large
market cap companies tend to be predomi
nantly global should help close the gender gap.
• The participation of women in top management
tends to be skewed towards areas of less influ
ence and with lower promotion opportunities. The
“Management Power Line” (Figure 1) shows the
lowest female representation at the CEO level and
growing gradually as we move from there toward
Business Management and Operational roles,
CFO and Strategy and finally Shared Services.
We also find that female representation is higher
in “New Economy” companies and in “Non-Man
ual Labor (mostly services) companies.
• Companies displaying greater board gender diver
sity display excess stockmarket returns adjusted
for sector bias.
Companies with more than one
woman on the board have returned a compound
3.7% a year over those that have none since
2005. The excess return has moderated since our
initial report. Over the last two and a half years, the
excess return is a compound 2.0% a year.
We
find also that companies with higher female repre
sentation at the board level or in top management
exhibit higher returns on equity, higher valuations
and also higher payout ratios.
• On a widely used risk metric—the debt to equity ratio—
we find almost no difference between companies with no
women on the board and those with at least one woman
on the board in terms of their appetite for debt; in fact, we
note that companies with more than 15% of women in
the top management show significantly higher debt to
equity ratios, compared to those with less than 10%.
This may confound some who have suggested women
operate an inherently risk averse approach. We find little
evidence to support this where debt is concerned.
• An analysis of acquisitions and disposals in Europe
and the US reflects less acquisitive behavior by the
company after the appointment of a female CEO
than before. Disposals have also been greater.
How
ever, we have found no evidence to suggest that the
return on acquisitions related to the price paid is
superior for female CEOs than male.
• We see three main obstacles to achieving greater gender
diversity: cultural biases; workplace-related biases; and
structural/policy issues. We analyze each one of these in
detail and dispel some of the most commonly accepted
justifications for a “natural” gender gap. We find cultural
and education issues the most challenging to overcome
in the short term and we believe that policy—but not quotas—can improve the current situation significantly.
The
Scandinavian model in areas like paternal leave of
absence, for example, has produced positive changes in
terms of increased representation of women in the work
force at all levels.
• We analyze the impact of quotas in driving higher gender
diversity. We find that these have not had significant
impact yet beyond the boards. Arguably quotas have led
to “tokenism” in some areas rather than an opportunity to
create a better management structure.
Yet, we think that
the introduction of quotas has generated a healthy
debate and led companies and policy makers to consider
other measures to improve the gender gap. We believe
that rather than setting quotas, regulators should con
sider improving transparency on this issue by requiring
publicly traded companies to disclose the gender diversity
numbers at the different levels of the organizational struc
ture or at the very least at the top management level.
Figure 1
The Management Power Line
Shared
services
18.9%
CFO,
strategy & IR
17.5%
Operations
8.5%
CEO
3.9%
5
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
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The new boards
There has been a trend of improved female
representation on the boards of companies.
Rightly or wrongly, quotas have played a
role. However, sizeable regional differences
exist—more so than at an industry level.
The globalization of larger companies—an
ongoing trend—may help close this gap.
PHOTO: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/NEUSTOCKIMAGES
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
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A new approach
In our last report, to assess the changing and contrast
ing make-up of the boards of companies, we took
aggregated data for approximately 2,400 companies
making up the MSCI ACWI index. However, for this
report we have broadened the data-set by switching to
the coverage reflected in the CSG 3000. This brings
together data for over 26,000 company directors
worldwide including 3,400 women directors at YE2013,
a global average of 12.7%.
We have switched our analysis away from absolute
numbers of women on boards to a relative or percent
age view by assembling data for each of the companies
of the number of men as well as women on the board
of the company. We believe this provides a more mean
ingful measure of how much influence women can
exert within the boardroom.
Moreover, by focusing on
relative rather than absolute values, we can see
whether the response to the call for board diversity has
simply been to add a woman while also adding an addi
tional man at the same time, in turn diluting genuine
progress to improved diversity. Comfortingly, we do find
progress driven by more than just statistical manipula
tion or “tokenism.”
As the debate about diversity has picked up pace,
so too has the increase in female board representation
as Table 1 confirms. Even between 2012 and 2013,
we have seen a significant drop from 39% to 34% in
the number of companies, globally, without any women
on their boards, most notably in EMEA, Latin America
and Asia (see Tables 5 and 7).
Europe, with quota and
target initiatives (we show more on this later), is the
furthest down the path of diversity with 19% of boards
having 30% or more female directors and only 10%,
having zero female representation. Over 50% of Euro
pean companies have more than 20% women on
boards, almost double the level in North America.
Again this probably stems from the European policy ini
tiatives.
Now that many countries have met diversity targets in
Europe, the challenge is what they will do next. Having met
their requirements, will they stop here, or will they further
extend the progress towards higher board diversity started
a few years ago? As of May 2014, with the appointment of
Patrice Merrin to the board of Glencore, the FTSE 100
index had met the Davies Report target of 25% and all the
companies covered in the CSG 3000 in Austria, Belgium,
Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, Portugal and
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS
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Table 1
Percentage of women on boards by country
Source: Credit Suisse Research – sample size 27,000 directors
2010
2011
2012
2013
9.6%
10.3%
11.3%
12.7%
Australia
10.8%
13.7%
15.5%
17.5%
Austria
11.4%
14.0%
14.4%
17.6%
Belgium
15.2%
15.8%
18.9%
23.2%
5.6%
6.1%
5.7%
6.5%
12.5%
13.5%
14.9%
15.9%
Global average
Brazil
Canada
Chile
2.3%
3.0%
3.7%
4.7%
China
8.8%
9.0%
9.6%
10.7%
Czech Republic
6.3%
9.7%
6.3%
6.3%
Denmark
16.9%
18.2%
20.6%
25.0%
Finland
26.4%
24.5%
27.0%
29.5%
France
16.1%
21.6%
25.1%
29.6%
Germany
11.8%
14.0%
18.5%
23.0%
Greece
11.5%
10.6%
10.4%
14.3%
Hong Kong SAR
8.9%
9.3%
9.7%
10.8%
India
5.5%
5.8%
6.2%
6.7%
Indonesia
5.9%
5.6%
6.1%
5.0%
Ireland
8.6%
7.4%
7.3%
12.3%
Israel
18.5%
11.5%
15.4%
18.2%
Italy
5.5%
4.6%
9.2%
17.5%
Japan
0.9%
1.1%
1.2%
1.6%
Kazakhstan
6.3%
6.3%
12.0%
16.0%
Malaysia
8.0%
8.6%
10.0%
10.9%
Mexico
7.6%
7.7%
6.5%
5.3%
17.2%
19.2%
22.3%
24.5%
Netherlands
New Zealand
15.6%
19.6%
21.3%
19.6%
Norway
36.6%
38.7%
37.2%
39.7%
Pakistan
2.4%
2.2%
2.5%
1.5%
10.5%
9.8%
10.1%
11.9%
Poland
Philippines
9.5%
9.5%
11.9%
16.3%
Portugal
3.1%
6.5%
7.3%
6.9%
Russia
6.8%
7.1%
7.7%
8.1%
Singapore
7.9%
8.0%
8.6%
7.9%
18.1%
17.8%
18.8%
20.0%
South Africa
0.7%
0.9%
0.7%
2.4%
Spain
South Korea
10.5%
11.1%
12.9%
13.7%
Sweden
28.9%
27.8%
27.3%
30.3%
Switzerland
8.6%
8.9%
9.3%
11.3%
Taiwan
2.8%
2.8%
2.8%
2.8%
11.2%
11.6%
11.7%
10.0%
Thailand
Turkey
8.2%
9.2%
8.5%
6.6%
Ukraine
6.7%
6.7%
6.7%
6.7%
UK
10.1%
11.9%
15.5%
17.9%
US
12.7%
12.8%
13.3%
13.7%
Sweden had at least one female director. Israel is
the only other country to have at least one female
director at all the companies covered, and again this
has been driven by diversity legislation passed as far
back as 1999. We would note that Portugal has the
lowest ratio of female directors at 6.9% at YE13,
followed by Switzerland at 11.3%.
In contrast to trends elsewhere, we would flag
companies in Developed Asia (i.e. Japan, Australia,
New Zealand, Singapore), which are still more likely
not to have a female director than to have one,
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 9
Table 2
Percentage of women on boards by industry
Source: Credit Suisse Research
2010
2011
2012
2013
Consumer Discretionary
10.6%
11.3%
12.4%
13.4%
Consumer Staples
13.3%
14.2%
14.9%
16.3%
6.7%
7.7%
8.3%
9.4%
Financials
Energy
11.3%
12.0%
13.0%
14.8%
Healthcare
11.7%
12.4%
12.9%
14.1%
Industrials
7.8%
8.7%
9.9%
11.0%
Materials
6.8%
7.7%
8.6%
10.0%
Technology
8.1%
8.4%
9.0%
10.9%
Telecoms
11.1%
11.0%
12.4%
14.2%
Utilities
10.6%
11.0%
12.0%
14.4%
9.6%
10.3%
11.3%
12.7%
Total
Table 3
Market capitalization and women on the board
Source: Credit Suisse Research
Number of women on the board
0
1
>=3
2
Average
M Cap
Telecommunication Services
19,729
26,013
21,301
44,254
25,943
Energy
16,968
20,773
44,277
31,257
25,616
Consumer Staples
11,266
10,845
21,888
45,650
22,156
Consumer Discretionary
11,259
14,743
21,202
23,824
16,491
Technology
9,111
25,718
38,767
65,494
23,384
Financials
8,500
12,259
18,563
35,296
17,737
7,802
11,190
20,019
11,692
8,112
14,417
39,907
52,921
26,587
Materials
7,759
8,971
18,784
16,742
11,422
Industrials
7,692
11,104
16,777
27,224
12,952
Total
although this is largely dictated by Japan which has
just 1.6% women directors. In Australia, for example,
women now comprise 17.5% of directors but still only
8% in Singapore. We see limited progress in EMEA,
perhaps an indication of cultural impediments and the
larger proportion of natural resource companies in the
market. While the 48% of companies, globally, that
had fewer than 10% women on boards in 2012 has
fallen to 40% in 2013, it is still a very material num
ber.
There is still considerable progress to be made
outside North America and Europe.
8,308
Health Care
PHOTO: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/IZUSEK
Utilities
9,891
14,569
23,295
34,268
18,161
If we look at the data from an industry rather than a
country or regional perspective (Tables 4 and 6), we also
see a marked drop in the proportion of companies having
zero female representation in all sectors. The decline in the
global average has been driven by the declines in technol
ogy, 10%; utilities, 8%; telecoms, 7.5%; and materials,
6.5%. Correspondingly, we are seeing large numbers of
companies increasing the percentage of female directors
into the 20-30% bracket and above, so that 24% of com
panies have had more than 20% female directors by 2013
compared to 20% the previous year.
Tables 1 and 2 show
the general shift towards both the introduction and increas
ing of women directors at the board level.
Looking at the representation of women in each sector
(Table 2) both in 2010 and 2013, we see little change in the
relative rankings and, as we found in our 2012 report and as
other research confirms, diversity is greatest in sectors at the
consumer end of the supply chain, typically more defensive
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
10
PHOTO: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/NEUSTOCKIMAGES
plays. We also note that financials have moved from
third place with 11.3% female directors to second
place at 14.8% and consider whether this reflects
greater conservatism post the financial crisis. But at
the low end of diversity rankings on our data, we are
not surprised to find the producer-end sectors, mate
rials and energy maintaining their bottom two posi
tions with 10% at best.
We discuss the reasons for this in a later sec
tion of this report, but while the tech sector has
improved the ratio of female directors by over
35.8% to 10.9%, the energy sector by 38% to
9.4% and materials by 47% to 10%, these sec
tors still have some way to go to reach overall
averages. Close to 40% of these companies still
have no female directors, and over 60% of energy
companies and 58% of materials companies have
less than 10% female representation.
Within the data for materials, there is a specific
degree of irony where the mining companies are
concerned.
The female participation in boards is
particularly low. It begs the question of whether
women are prepared enough or have the relevant
experience to be on the board of a mining company
or whether the pipeline is just too weak. However,
we would note these levels coincide with an indepth analysis by PWC and Women in Mining—
“Mining for Talent 2014.” This showed that only
32% of the men on the board of mining companies
have engineering or geology degrees and that
there was no correlation between engineers on
their boards and their financial performance.
Table 4
Percentage of women on boards by sector 2013
Source: Credit Suisse Research
0
<10%
10 –
20%
20 –
30%
>30%
Consumer Discretionary
32.4
9.0
32.9
16.7
9.0
Consumer Staples
29.8
7.5
26.1
22.4
14.3
Energy
43.5
15.1
28.0
8.8
4.6
Financials
24.2
13.1
34.0
19.7
9.0
Healthcare
27.9
5.6
35.3
23.3
7.9
Industrials
38.8
12.3
30.1
14.4
4.4
Materials
41.7
12.5
30.8
11.9
3.1
Technology
40.8
7.9
32.1
15.8
3.4
Telecoms
34.1
12.2
22.0
20.7
11.0
Utilities
21.4
16.5
32.0
23.3
6.8
Total
33.7
11.1
31.4
16.9
6.9
Table 5
Percentage of women on boards by region 2013
Source: Credit Suisse Research
0
<10%
10 –
20%
20 –
30%
>30%
North America
24.7
11.0
39.6
18.6
6.0
Europe
10.3
6.3
31.4
32.8
19.2
EMEA
39.6
10.4
29.2
15.1
5.7
Latam
56.0
13.1
19.0
10.7
1.2
Developed Asia
54.0
11.1
24.3
8.7
1.9
Emerging Asia
49.5
17.2
23.3
6.7
3.3
Total
33.7
11.1
31.4
16.9
6.9
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 11
Table 6
Percentage of women on boards by sector 2012
Source: Credit Suisse Research
0
<10%
10 –
20%
20 –
30%
>30%
Consumer Discretionary
36.8
7.2
30.2
17.9
7.9
Consumer Staples
31.0
6.9
29.3
21.8
10.9
Energy
46.9
13.9
31.4
3.7
4.1
Financials
31.0
13.1
33.3
16.0
6.7
Healthcare
29.5
8.5
39.5
18.0
4.5
Industrials
43.1
10.8
29.1
13.8
3.3
Materials
47.4
12.5
27.9
10.6
1.6
Technology
50.7
6.5
27.1
13.7
2.0
Telecoms
41.6
9.0
20.2
19.1
10.1
Utilities
29.7
14.4
33.1
19.5
3.4
Total
39.2
10.4
30.5
14.7
5.1
Table 7
Percentage of women on boards by region 2012
One important message arises when comparing
sectors and countries. It is at a country and regional
level that we see the greater differences in repre
sentation rather than between sectors. Country
factors, and arguably cultural ones, outweigh global
industry issues, notwithstanding the example of
mining. Consistent with our analysis, research by
Freeman, Kruse and Blasi1 shows similar findings.
However, there is a potential positive dynamic that
can change this.
We believe that as the global economy becomes
more and more integrated and companies become
more and more global in their client base and man
agement, the sector pull will gradually lead the way
and force cultural change.
This is further sup
ported by the correlation that exists between mar
ket capitalization and the number of women on
boards. Large capitalization companies are leading
the increase in female representation. The devel
opment of new sectors and industries will also help
this process as preconceived ideas and biases
tend to be less.
We will discuss this in more
detail later.
Source: Credit Suisse Research
0
North America
<10%
10 –
20%
20 –
30%
>30%
28.7
9.0
38.0
18.1
6.2
Europe
15.4
8.2
36.6
26.6
13.2
EMEA
41.4
9.1
27.3
17.2
5.1
Latam
58.3
8.3
25.8
7.6
0.0
Developed Asia
57.4
11.3
23.0
8.2
0.2
Emerging Asia
56.1
15.1
20.4
5.9
2.4
Total
39.2
10.4
30.5
14.7
5.1
1
Freeman, Kruse and Blasi 2008: The Same Yet Different;
Worker Reports on Labor Practices and Outcomes in a Single
Firm across Countries
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 12
The Management
Power Line
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM/BIKERIDERLONDON
Using our Credit Suisse Gender 3000 database, we can judge the level of
diversity at a top management level. Female representation overall is similar to
that at board levels but their sphere of influence and potential for progression
are inhibited by a severe skewing in roles away from the CEO and Operational
roles to that of Shared Services.
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
Supervision versus leadership
So, the news on the representation of women
on boards appears good: the trend is up in almost
every country and every sector. Yet, these numbers
need to be looked into with more detail. If we look
at the companies comprising the FTSE 100 and
S&P 500 indices, male CEOs outweigh females by
20 to 1 and UK male executive directors outnum
ber female executive directors by 10 to 1.
While we do not want to dismiss or belittle the
change that has happened at the board level coun
try by country, or its positive impact, we would feel
more reassured if the presence of women at the
board level was matched by their representation in
top management. Are there similar changes in the
areas which have day to day influence on business
strategy as well as those in the areas of supervi
sion, as we referred to earlier?
Within the CSG 3000, we have grouped senior
management by country and sector into four cate
gories to analyze their actual roles and influence:
CEO, CFO and strategy roles (including IR), Shared
Services (HR, Legal, IT, External Relations) and
Operations (Business Unit heads).
We are only able
to show a snapshot, though this will be a valuable
starting point to track over time.
As Figure 2 highlights, at an aggregate level, the
overall representation of women in senior manage
ment positions is in fact pretty comparable with that
of the board data—12.9% versus 12.7% or 15.3%
and 14.1% excluding Japan and South Korea.
However, there is a notable contrast in terms of the
nature of the responsibilities held. In all regions,
and in 18 out of 25 sectors (see Table 10), women
have significantly greater representation in Shared
Services rather than CEO or Operational roles.
These positions can carry less influence and typi
cally have less P&L responsibility. We would add
that Shared Services includes technology functions
which we know women to be poorly represented in,
suggesting these positions are heavily skewed to
legal and human resources functions.
This might reflect pipeline causes (as we will
see later) or vocational preferences.
Such roles
arguably also offer less potential to step up to
board level or the CEO role. CEO roles remain a
male preserve, with women representing only 4%.
The CFO/Strategy category is better represented
though this does include Investor Relations which
carries a greater female representation than the
more senior position of CFO itself. The Official
Board’s2 recent analysis of female executives at
large corporates with sales over USD 100 million
annually shows the highest concentration of
women to be in VP Communications 44%, VP
Investor Relations 35% and VP Human Resources
33%, corroborating these findings.
2
The Official Board – “The Growing Presence of Female Corpo
rate Executives”: A Study of The Official Board August 2014
Table 8
Women in senior management
positions by function and by region
Source: Credit Suisse Research – CSG 3000
SS
CFO/
strat
Ops
CEO
Total
North America
26.6%
15.6%
10.8%
3.3%
15.0%
Europe
23.1%
18.9%
11.4%
3.5%
14.7%
EMEA
23.7%
12.6%
7.8%
1.9%
11.4%
Latin America
17.3%
11.2%
7.4%
2.0%
9.1%
Developed Asia
22.9%
18.5%
6.7%
4.4%
12.6%
Emerging Asia*
22.7%
22.7%
13.1%
6.6%
10.4%
Global average
18.9%
17.5%
8.5%
3.9%
12.9%
* Excluding South Korea
Figure 2
Women in senior management
positions by function and by region
Source: Credit Suisse Research – CSG 3000
30.0% of women in senior management positions
25.0
20.0
15.0
10.0
5.0
0.0
SS
CFO/strat
Ops
North America
Europe
EMEA
Developed Asia
Emerging Asia
Global average
This leads us to an important conclusion.
While the
representation of women in management positions and
on the board of companies is similar, it is qualitatively dif
ferent in its make-up: We call this the “Management
Power Line” (see Figure 1). The importance of these
roles in terms of career progression, compensation and
ability to move laterally admittedly varies a lot from sector
to sector and from company to company, but we would
contend that these tend to reflect less influential positions
in the management’s structure. Based on Bloomberg data
about 94% of S&P 500 CEOs held top operations posi
tions immediately before ascending to the top job.
The
relative scarcity of women overseeing product lines or
entire business units risks slowing their advance to the
very top. Even when looking at management structures—
aside from boards—women appear to have more supervi
sion than direct influence.
CEO
Latin America
13
. PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM/RAWPIXEL
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 14
Table 9
Women in senior management
positions by function and by country
Source: Credit Suisse Research
Women as a % of
functions
Global total
CEO
Ops
CFO/
strat
SS
Total
3.9%
8.5%
17.5%
18.9%
12.9%
Argentina
0.0%
8.3%
23.5%
57.1%
21.7%
Brazil
2.2%
7.3%
9.9%
14.6%
8.9%
Canada
2.6%
10.1%
17.8%
39.7%
16.7%
Chile
5.9%
1.9%
9.1%
11.8%
6.8%
Mexico
0.0%
9.1%
13.3%
13.3%
10.4%
US
3.5%
10.9%
15.3%
25.9%
14.8%
Austria
0.0%
5.9%
21.4%
22.2%
12.8%
Belgium
16.7%
9.5%
23.1%
18.8%
15.8%
Denmark
0.0%
1.7%
23.1%
28.2%
12.9%
Finland
0.0%
7.8%
40.0%
41.2%
19.2%
France
0.0%
7.5%
25.3%
25.3%
13.4%
Germany
0.0%
5.1%
29.6%
15.9%
12.5%
Italy
5.0%
20.0%
15.5%
5.9%
13.9%
12.5%
9.2%
14.0%
20.8%
12.9%
Norway
0.0%
20.0%
14.3%
50.0%
21.6%
Portugal
33.3%
14.3%
16.7%
12.5%
16.1%
2.4%
9.0%
13.3%
26.0%
13.7%
Netherlands
Russia
South Africa
0.0%
8.6%
16.1%
34.8%
12.5%
Spain
0.0%
14.3%
8.7%
24.0%
12.2%
Sweden
5.3%
23.0%
29.8%
36.7%
25.6%
Switzerland
1.7%
6.7%
14.4%
13.6%
9.1%
Turkey
0.0%
6.7%
5.6%
19.6%
8.0%
UK
5.1%
14.1%
15.8%
24.5%
15.9%
Australia
4.5%
10.9%
18.0%
41.7%
18.6%
China
3.2%
5.4%
22.5%
7.4%
14.4%
12.5%
10.3%
19.1%
13.2%
13.7%
8.9%
8.1%
6.1%
12.9%
7.1%
11.8%
12.8%
18.0%
9.3%
12.9%
0.0%
5.1%
11.5%
13.4%
7.6%
Hong Kong SAR
India
Indonesia
Japan
Malaysia
6.7%
12.2%
43.8%
36.6%
26.2%
Pakistan
0.0%
11.1%
5.7%
5.1%
6.5%
Philippines
3.6%
23.1%
32.9%
28.6%
24.6%
Singapore
15.0%
4.2%
41.2%
46.8%
25.1%
South Korea
2.7%
0.8%
3.5%
1.2%
1.2%
Taiwan
5.7%
17.0%
37.4%
34.3%
24.3%
12.5%
20.5%
34.4%
30.6%
26.5%
Thailand
Against these global averages, there are some
noteworthy regional differences. Table 9 provides a
detailed drill down. The notable standouts are in
Europe (Sweden and Norway) and in Emerging Asia
(Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan and Thai
land which are all clustered around 25%, while South
Korea is the lowest country globally at a mere 1.2%).
Thailand has the highest level of female participation
at 26.5%, followed by Malaysia at 26.2% and Swe
den at 25.6%.
In terms of the mix of leadership roles highlighted,
the observation above regarding women in shared
services functions is apparent in all regions except
Latin America and Emerging Asia, the latter driven
by low levels of women in South Korean manage
ment teams and the relatively high share of women
in the CFO group across Emerging Asia. There are
marked differences in the Operations and CEO roles
held, with North America and Europe having consid
erably higher female participation in operations,
albeit only around 11%.
Asia is typically reflecting a
greater proportion of CEOs.
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 15
Table 10
Women in senior management
positions by function and by industry
Source: Credit Suisse Research
CEO
CFO/
strat
SS
Total
Autos and components
1.4%
0.8%
3.4%
3.7%
2.3%
Capital Goods
1.7%
2.6%
10.8%
7.7%
5.5%
Tech – hardware
3.4%
3.4%
17.3%
8.5%
7.1%
Building Materials & construction
1.8%
2.6%
20.5%
6.2%
8.3%
Metals & mining
1.0%
1.8%
18.9%
17.1%
10.0%
Oil & Gas
1.5%
7.0%
12.6%
18.8%
11.0%
Chemicals
1.0%
6.1%
14.8%
17.6%
11.0%
Paper & Packaging
0.0%
4.0%
18.3%
25.9%
11.2%
Insurance
1.0%
8.7%
14.1%
25.0%
12.0%
Diversified financials
1.9%
9.3%
18.2%
17.4%
12.6%
Consumer durables
5.4%
10.5%
15.0%
19.5%
12.9%
Food & beverages
6.8%
8.4%
18.3%
23.2%
14.4%
Telecoms
4.9%
9.8%
18.3%
24.2%
15.4%
Banks
7.5%
12.1%
14.6%
24.8%
15.4%
Retailing
5.4%
14.7%
17.3%
20.1%
15.6%
Business services
1.5%
12.4%
24.7%
18.6%
15.8%
Transport
9.0%
8.8%
19.9%
28.1%
16.3%
Tech – other
0.0%
8.2%
22.5%
42.1%
16.4%
Utilities
7.7%
13.8%
17.2%
27.5%
17.0%
Healthcare services
8.2%
14.4%
21.0%
26.8%
17.3%
Pharma & biotech
Table 10 cuts the data by industry rather than
region. We find five sectors showing a level of participa
tion of women in top management at 10% or below;
autos, capital goods, tech hardware, building materials
& construction and metals & mining. Only two show
levels above 20%: real estate and media. Supporting
the point above, 18 of the 25 sectors show higher con
centration of women in shared services.
At the CEO level, two sectors have no female
CEO; paper & packaging and other tech, mainly
environmental energy related.
In contrast, the
CEOs are better represented in a number of the
consumer sectors such as food & beverage,
media, and travel & leisure, though perhaps sur
prisingly lower in retailing. Interestingly, the bank
ing industry sits above the average of senior role
representation and very much at the higher end
for CEO positions.
Ops
4.4%
14.8%
15.5%
36.4%
18.0%
Travel & leisure
6.2%
9.9%
25.3%
30.2%
18.6%
Tech – software
3.3%
18.9%
17.0%
31.6%
19.5%
Real Estate
6.3%
13.5%
32.8%
26.4%
20.1%
10.9%
21.7%
24.4%
30.2%
23.2%
3.9%
8.6%
17.5%
18.9%
12.9%
Media
Global Average
Which industries lead the change?
We also analyzed our database, categorizing compa
nies under more detailed industry divisions compared to
the traditional sector groups: manual versus non-manual
labor industries; “old” economy versus “new” world; older
companies versus start-ups; and large caps versus small
market caps. Within this framework, we can get a good
read across of both the type of business and the different
countries to assess the relative influences and biases.
For
example, female representation has tended to be greater
in non-manual and new economy sectors. For more
detail, please go to the Appendix II.
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
16
Measuring
what they manage
While we are seeing progress in the representation of women in company
decision making, if not evenly spread in terms of seniority, how is this reflected
in the financial characteristics of these companies and how the market
perceives them?
Running the numbers
Figure 3
Return on equity
Source: CSG 3000
20% RoE, sector neutral
18
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
2005
2006
No WoB
2007
2008
At least 1
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
Avg
At least 2
Premium returns, premium valuation?
Figure 4
Sector neutral ratios: price/book value
Source: CSG 3000
3.5 P/BV, Sector neutral, M Cap weighted
3.0
2.5
2.0
1.5
1.0
0.5
0.0
2005
No WoB
To assess the impact of female managers on
performance, we briefly revisit our board data and
previous findings, but now bring our new
management data into the analysis to help assess
return and risk characteristics of company business
models and how the market values these attributes.
To provide an added new perspective on the topic,
we have also drawn off the valuations and corporate
performance framework provided by Credit Suisse
HOLT®. HOLT’s cash flow-based and standardized
methodology makes for superior cross border and
industry comparisons.
As we highlighted earlier, it is important to still
stress that we present this data just as it is—
empirical data. We do not seek to claim a causality
though note a notable consistency in some of the
relationships that emerge.
2006
2007
At least 1
2008
2009
2010
At least 2
2011
2012
2013
Avg
In our previous study, two key features were appar
ent amongst companies that displayed greater gender
diversity. First, they typically displayed higher returns
on equity (ROE).
Second, their price to book value
(P/BV) stood at a premium over time; you would of
course expect higher P/BV for higher ROEs. These
observations have continued to hold true as we bring
these charts up to date in Figures 3 and 4. Note that
these calculations adjust for sector bias for those with
out by constructing the comparisons on a sector neu
tral basis to account for the over- and under-represen
tation of women in management positions.
The 2013 sector adjusted ROE of companies with
at least one female board member was 12.2% com
pared to 10.1% for those with zero representation.
Over the last nine years the same ROEs have been
14.1% and 11.2%.
As for the price to book value, we
find a P/BV of 2.4x on 2013 book values for those
companies with female representation on their boards
versus 1.8x for those without, and a nine year average
for boards with women directors of 2.3x versus 1.8x
for companies with all male boards.
. PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM/TSYHUN
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 17
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
18
We would note that these results are consistent with
the recently published study on the influence of female
presence on boards and firms’ valuation, “Does it Matter
Where You Work? Etc…”, Schmid and Urban3 based
on 35,000 companies across 53 countries from 1998 to
2010 ex-financials, which found in developed countries a
statistically significant correlation between the presence
of women on the board and the firm’s valuation as mea
sured by Tobin’s Q.
How does this sit with our management data? Table 12
displays a range of financial metrics we have generated from
our management data including ROE and P/BV. The table
cuts the data both at an aggregate and sector level for those
with female senior management representation lower than
10% and those greater than 15%. (The average representa
tion is 12.9%)
While the absolute numbers differ somewhat, the
return premium highlighted above and the reward for it
reflected via a higher price to book multiple shown in the
board structure is apparent also where females play a
greater role in senior management.
Adjusting for any industry bias, companies with more
than 15% of women in top management carry a 2013
ROE of 14.7% compared to 9.7% for those where
women represent less than 10% of the top management.
Looking across the roles within management we found
that companies where female CEO and Operations man
agement account for more than 10% of these roles
exhibit an ROE of 15.2% versus 11.9% where their pres
ence is less than 5%.
Although the sample size for female CEOs compared
to that of male CEOs is not statistically significant, it is
interesting to note that ROEs and P/BVs are greater
where there is a female CEO. Either female CEOs make
companies better or better companies hire female CEOs;
or both.
In a separate analysis, we also divided our sample into
two groups, companies with no change or decline in female
board representation and companies that showed an
increase in board representation.
Over the last three
years, the latter group of companies has shown a
15% P/BV expansion versus 11% for the former
group. Given the sample size, this is statistically sig
nificant and the trend has been pretty consistent
year after year. However, we can do this only over
the last three years and so there might be some
effect tied to the choice of the time frame.
Credit Suisse HOLT CEO analysis
We have been able to look at CEO observations
further by drawing off our HOLT-based analysis of cash
flow returns.
We show here Cash Flow Returns on
Investment (CFROI®) for female CEO led U.S. and
European companies (though we flag a health warning
over survivorship bias here). Importantly, one could
argue that the data reflects more than an industry
effect.
In Figure 5, we have divided the CFROIs in four
quartiles and compared each company/CEO to its
industry peers. If industry were the only factor influenc
ing returns we would expect to find a flat profile to the
charts. However, the downward sloping profile reflects
more female CEOs in the first quartile suggesting a
positive gender effect.
We would, though, shy away
from asserting some causality.
Balance sheet structures
The differences in risk profiles of men and women
have been well researched. An extensive study by
Barber and Odean (“Boy Will Be Boys”, 2001)
and based on 35,000 households, showed that men
invest in riskier positions than women (portfolio vola
tility, individual stock volatility, beta and size) and
change their mind more often (45% higher turn
over). Can we find evidence of a more conservative
Figure 5
CFROI quartiles (relative to peers) for female-led companies
Source: Credit Suisse HOLT
14 CFROI quartiles (relative to peers) for female-led companies
U.S.
– sample size 35
12
Europe – sample size 18
10
8
6
4
2
0
1
2
actual
3
4
expected
3
Schmid and Urban, 2014: “Does it Matter Where You Work? The Role
of Women and Firm Valuation”
1
2
3
4
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 19
Table 12
Comparative returns for women in senior management
Source: Credit Suisse CSG 3000
ROE (%)
Net debt/equity (%)
Price/book (x)
Payout ratio (%)
– male
11.9
43.7
2.33
39.7
– female
15.2
46.5
3.22
44.0
28%
6%
38%
11%
– women < 5%
11.9
44.1
2.33
39.0
– women > 10%
15.1
55.5
2.73
55.5
27%
26%
17%
42%
– women <10%
9.7
35.2
1.97
35.5
– women > 15%
14.7
56.8
2.62
43.3
52%
61%
33%
22%
– women <10%
11.1
36.1
1.96
28.5
– women >15%
14.7
80.1
2.77
35.4
32%
122%
41%
24%
13.4
31.3
3.20
60.2
CEO
Premium
CEO and Operations
Premium
Senior management
Premium
Senior management by sector
Consumer discretionary
Premium
Consumer Staples
– women <10%
– women >15%
18.0
54.8
3.49
46.3
34%
75%
9%
-23%
– women <10%
11.4
41.4
1.86
47.8
– women >15%
11.3
29.0
2.05
43.0
-1%
-30%
10%
-10%
– women <10%
8.3
NA
1.07
33.7
– women >15%
11.8
NA
1.30
39.7
42%
NA
21%
18%
– women <10%
13.1
21.9
3.61
36.1
– women >15%
17.5
49.4
4.20
57.2
34%
126%
16%
58%
– women <10%
10.2
54.3
1.77
29.7
– women >15%
14.0
98.0
2.68
46.1
37%
80%
51%
55%
– women <10%
5.4
59.7
1.40
36.7
– women >15%
9.9
45.7
2.33
44.4
83%
-23%
66%
21%
– women <10%
15.3
-20.0
2.51
16.6
– women >15%
22.5
-12.8
3.85
34.0
47%
36%
53%
105%
– women <10%
10.1
23.6
1.59
55.3
– women >15%
33.7
89.0
2.14
63.2
234%
277%
35%
14%
70.3
Premium
Energy
Premium
Financials
Premium
Healthcare
Premium
Industrials
Premium
Materials
Premium
Technology
Premium
Telecoms
Premium
Utilities
– women <10%
5.3
94.0
1.34
– women >15%
9.2
106.3
1.54
62.8
74%
13%
15%
-11%
Premium
. 20
agement jobs select for risk takers, there may be a
concentration of female risk seekers compared to a
broader pool of men.
In our management data, we have also chosen
to look at a different metric to consider financial
risk – Net debt/EBITDA. This metric can be used
where banking covenants are concerned. This pro
vides a similar picture and does challenge the con
servative stereotype. While the levels are by no
means troubling in themselves – the corporate sec
tor is very cash rich at present – companies with
higher female management involvement have Net
debt/EBITDA of 1.0x compared to 0.8x for com
panies without women.
Where there is a female
CEO, Net debt/EBITDA is 1.3x compared to 1.0x
for male CEO-led companies.
Figure 6
Net debt/equity, sector-neutral
Source: CSG 3000
70% net debt/equity, sector-neutral
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
2005
2006
No WoB
2007
2008
At least 1
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
Avg
At least 2
Figure 7
Payout ratio, sector-neutral
Source: CSG 3000
50% payout ratio, sector-neutral
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
2005
No WoB
2006
2007
At least 1
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
Avg
At least 2
financial approach when looking at the influence of women
on boards and management rather than the behavior of
men in a household environment?
In our initial study, we examined the net/debt to equity of
companies over time that had female board representation.
There was some tentative evidence that balance sheet gear
ing was lower amongst companies with female board repre
sentation. However, as we update this now, the picture is
less convincing as Figure 6 shows. The averages over time
are barely distinguishable.
Companies with women on the
board showed at the end of June 2014 a net debt to equity
ratio of 47% versus 46% for companies with zero represen
tation and an average over time of 48% versus 47%.
Undue conservatism does not emerge from our man
agement data either. Companies with less than 10% of
women in top management showed a net debt to equity
ratio of 35% versus 57% for companies with more than
15% of women in top management. If we restrict this
analysis to just CEO plus business management we get
44% and 56%, respectively.
We would recognize that
there is a possible risk of selection bias here. If top man
Returning cash or conserving cash?
One final variable we have examined relates to the
dividend policy of corporates and the contrast between
where women are represented and where they are not.
Dividends have assumed significance for investors in
varied ways such as a perceived “signaling” by compa
nies. More generally, the reinvestment of dividends
represents the largest contributor to long-term equity
returns for an investor as shown by Dimson, Marsh and
Staunton in the Credit Suisse Global Investment
Returns Sourcebook.
Dividend policy can also say
something about a company’s attitude to capital man
agement. For the purpose of our analysis, the added
relevance is that the level of dividend is a specific man
agement decision or choice.
Our board data shown in Figure 7 gives us a his
torical perspective on payout ratios. Adjusting for
industry bias, we find an average over our 9 year
data of 39% payout ratio for companies including a
female board member and 32% without.
Essentially,
companies where women have had board represen
tation have paid more income out as dividends. In
our analysis, companies with more than 15% of
women in top management showed a payout ratio of
43% versus 36% for companies with less than 10%
of women in top management. If we just focus only
on CEO and Operations, we find similar numbers.
While there is a danger of over-interpreting such
data, we would note that a pattern such as this could
be the flip side of some of the other academic and
independent research that has referred to a more
considered approach to investment and acquisitions.
For example, we would note a study by Parrotta and
Smith (Female Lead Firms: Performance and Risk
Attitudes, 2013)4 which focused on almost 2,000
Danish companies with more than 50 employees,
showed that female CEOs lead to a 56% reduction
in the volatility of investments.
Other recent studies show, for example, that
female CEOs make lower levels of capital expen
4
Parrotta and Smith, 2013: “Female Lead Firms: Performance
and Risk Attitudes”
PHOTO: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/PIXDELUXE
WOMEN IN BUSINESS
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 21
diture as percentage of total assets 5 while
Levi et. al.6 analyzed acquisitions made by S&P
500 companies between 1997 and 2009 and
found that for each additional female board mem
ber, the cost of a successful acquisition was
15.4% less than if there were no women. In their
further unreported analyses, they show that “the
fraction of female directors is negatively and sig
nificantly associated with both capital expendi
tures and R&D expenditures.”
Our own analysis of the success of acquisitions
in return terms leveraging our HOLT cash flow
based framework was not conclusive. The transac
tion cash flow returns did not differ with gender
leadership.
However, an interesting observation
was apparent in terms of the number of M&A
transactions if not the returns generated. We have
collected the dates on which a prevailing female
CEO was appointed in both the US and Europe
from our dataset and examined how acquisitive the
respective companies have proved to be. We found
the number of acquisitions made in the three years
post a female CEO appointment were less than
those in the three years preceding.
Moreover, the
number of divestitures post a female CEO appoint
ment was in fact higher. Again, we wouldn’t assert
a causality though the charts are striking.
5
6
Alves, Couto and Francisco: “Board of Directors’ composition
and financing choices”
Levi, Li and Zhang (December 2013): “Director gender and
mergers and acquisitions”
Figure 8
Acquisitions and divestitures transaction counts
Source: Credit Suisse HOLT
50 transaction count (over 3 years)
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
Acquisitions
3 years prior to female CEO
Divestitures
3 years of female CEO tenure
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 22
Are “good” companies,
good investments?
Having examined the steady progress of greater gender diversity in companies and
the financial business models that emerge in companies which have greater
effective female supervision and management, the key question is does it really
matter for an investor in terms of equity market returns?
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 23
Figure 9
Re-running the numbers
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM\ASHDESIGN
Stock market performance was at the heart of the
statistical analysis we conducted in our 2012 report
and we update it here.
The message that then emerged from our analysis
two years ago was indeed a supportive one, particularly
in stock market performance terms. We showed at that
point that large companies greater than USD 10 billion
which had at least one woman on the board outper
formed those without any by 26% for large caps over
the six years ending December 2011 (on a sector neu
tral basis). The exercise derived an excess return of
3.9% a year. Importantly, this mix of companies would
also have outperformed global equities as measured by
MSCI’s ACWI.
However, given our analysis took place following a
period of considerable market and economic distress,
a key question for us was whether the excess return
has been sustained in a less risk averse market envi
ronment, while also coinciding with the marked
improvement in female representation in company
boards? Figures 9 –12 bring the 2012 analysis up to
date.
We have also updated our universe and rebal
anced it historically to remove any survivor bias.
The good news is the outperformance we charted
before has been sustained. From the start of 2012 to
June 2014, we have seen 5% outperformance on a
sector neutral basis by those companies with at least
one woman on the board. This then amounts to a
compound excess return since 2005 of 3.3%, hence
broadly maintaining the same momentum.
Figures
10–12 show the data regionally—US, Europe and
Asia-Pacific. The outperformance is most marked for
Asia-Pacific companies with a 55% excess cumula
tive return, followed by the US with 20% and Europe
with 18%.
We can add further backing to these findings by
using our new data that measures the percentage of
women on the board rather than the simple compari
son of zero versus one or more. We reviewed (Figures
13–16) the performance of the companies over
USD 10 billion, again on a sector neutral basis, but
where the percentage of women on the board is 0.5
standard deviations above the average versus those
where female representation is 0.5 standard devia
tions below the average.
The results are reassuringly
consistent. The basket of global companies above the
average outperformed those below by 36% or 3.7%
a year over our full history of 2005–2014 H1. The
results hold true when we conduct the same exercise
on a regional basis.
Global performance: companies market cap >USD 10 billion
Source: CSG 3000
130
120
110
100
90
80
70
60
50
2006
2007
No women on board
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
1 or more women on board
Figure 10
European performance: companies market cap >USD 10 billion
Source: CSG 3000
125
110
95
80
65
50
2006
2007
No women on board
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
1 or more women on board
Figure 11
US performance: companies market cap >USD 10 billion
Source: CSG 3000
160
145
130
115
100
85
70
55
2006
2007
No women on board
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
1 or more women on board
Figure 12
APAC performance: companies market cap >USD 10 billion
Source: CSG 3000
160
145
130
115
100
85
70
55
40
2006
2007
No women on board
2008
2009
2010
2011
1 or more women on board
2012
2013
2014
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS
24
Figure 13
Global performance: companies market cap >USD 10 billion
Source: CSG 3000
140
130
120
110
100
90
80
70
60
50
2006
2007
2008
% WoB 0.5 SD below average
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
% WoB 0.5 SD above average
Figure 14
European performance: companies market cap >USD 10 billion
Source: CSG 3000
125
110
95
80
65
50
2006
2007
2008
% WoB 0.5 SD below average
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
% WoB 0.5 SD above average
Figure 15
US performance: companies market cap >USD 10 billion
Source: CSG 3000
155
145
135
125
115
105
95
85
75
65
55
2006
2007
2008
% WoB 0.5 SD below average
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
% WoB 0.5 SD above average
Figure 16
APAC performance: companies market cap >USD 10 billion
Source: CSG 3000
145
135
125
115
105
95
85
75
65
55
45
2006
2007
2008
% WoB 0.5 SD below average
2009
2010
2011
2012
% WoB 0.5 SD above average
2013
2014
Management impact
Given our management data from the CSG
3000 represents a snapshot of the current struc
ture of leadership roles and hence lacks history, we
cannot conduct back-testing in the same manner
as we do in the board structure and stock price
analysis above. (We have rebalanced our time
series year by year in keeping with new board data
and constituent changes to construct the charts
above which in turn minimizes survivorship bias.)
However, and still stressing this survivorship caveat,
when we do roll back the current structure to ana
lyze past stock performance of companies with dif
fering degrees of management diversity, an inter
esting pattern does emerge.
Figure 17 shows the performance of portfolios of
companies reflecting three tiers of female manage
ment representation in “front office” positions, which
we define as our management positions ex shared
services. The tiers are set at minimum thresholds of
50%, 33% and 25% of representation. Note that
the portfolios were created using companies that are
currently trading rebalanced monthly.
It does not
consider companies that were trading historically,
but ceased trading in the meantime, therefore
underlining another element of bias into the results.
The universes as of today number 64, 204 and 367
and, in that respect, are not large.
. PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM\COLOURSINMYLIFE
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 25
Figure 17
Examining performance since 2009, the uni
verse with 25% female representation nonetheless
has delivered +22.8% annualized average return.
As the minimum threshold of female representation
was increased to 33%, the constituent concentra
tion increased and the average annualized returns
increased to +25.6%. Similarly, with a 50% mini
mum threshold, the constituent concentration
increased and the average annualized returns
increased to +28.7%. Essentially, as each thresh
old was raised, performance increased.
A key conclusion from this for us is that what
ever the more qualitative judgements as to the ben
efits of greater diversity may be, there appears to
be a material quantitative consideration for inves
tors. Our data provides a strong portrayal of consis
tent alpha generation from diversity enhanced gov
ernance and differentiated decision-making.
However, considering all the different factors that
may still be at work, we are not able to conclude
whether women are making companies “better“ or
do “better companies” have stronger female repre
sentation on the board?
Performance of companies tiered by female management
participation
Source: CSG 3000
4.00
3.50
3.00
2.50
2.00
1.50
1.00
0.50
0.00
2009
25%
2010
33%
2011
2012
50%
2013
All companies
2014
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS
26
What are the
obstacles
to women
advancing in
their careers?
It is clear that there are still many
challenges to overcome to increase
female representation on both boards
and in top management teams.
However, there is evidence emerging
from selected countries that specific
policies can make a difference.
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 27
Table 13
Main obstacles
Source: Credit Suisse Research
Cultural
Workplace
Structure/policy
Educational choices
Perception of female
commitment
Face time and flexibility
Lack of shared parental
leave
Sector choices
Double standards
Staff rather than line role
promotions
Lack of childcare
assistance
Pipeline availability
Spousal role and support
Mentoring for women rather
than sponsorship
Differentiated taxation
Risk aversion disparity
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM\ AUREMAR
Individual
Work-life balance priorities
Promotion rates
Organizations were
designed for men and
manufacturing
What should the right target for representation be? Is
there a right target? How fast can we attempt to get
there? And, more importantly what are the obstacles that
explain why the gender imbalance persists; are there
structural or qualitative reasons why women are not ris
ing up the management pipeline in equal measure and
are there specific industries and sectors where these
factors are more ingrained?
While we explore many of the impediments to
progress in detail below, we believe that many of the
challenges outlined in Table 13 can be addressed
readily. Indeed, the Scandinavian initiative has proven
successful using policies to drive greater equitability.
Many of the structural and workplace issues can be
overcome by government or corporate policies pro
moting diversity. In Scandinavia, the concept of
shared parental leave ensures that women can go
back to work after the birth of a child, if she so
wishes. It is an innovative social policy that clearly
addresses the family/childcare challenges while also
making economic sense.
If a father in Sweden does
not use his two month allowance, the family loses
the benefit. Governments should look to emulate
this initiative firstly for a six month period and then
extend it to a full year of shared parental leave.
One of the anomalies that we have found while
conducting our research is the fact that in the US,
single mothers and the wives or partners of the low
est earning workers are the least likely to be working
because they are unable to cover childcare costs.
So, the most needy are unable to participate in the
workforce, a long-term poverty trap and a substan
tial cost, both socially and to the government. In the
UK, all three and four year olds are entitled to 15
hours a week of free childcare and working parents
have tax incentives to help with childcare costs.
Extending this type of initiative more broadly would
be a very supportive policy to assist women staying
in the workforce and an easy step for governments
towards enabling greater diversity and equality.
Is it up to governments to drive diversity or are
companies now embracing diversity issues effectively and sufficiently? In Scandinavia, it has been gov
ernment-led initiatives and policies that have driven the
broad level of diversity we witness today.
Both the prevalent
cultural and social values, along with the relatively small
population pools, have been key in the success. This has
certainly been more effective in the self-regulating forms of
diversity initiatives introduced in other countries. We believe
governments are being short-sighted by not pushing
through more demanding diversity targets—the Harvard
University experiment discussed below, while reflective of a
small universe, demonstrates that change can be dynamic
and bear quick results.
Do quotas help with structural issues? As ever, the
answer is both yes and no.
Yes, they focus debate, but we
have concerns that they detract from the real issue of gen
der equality throughout the management pipeline by
encouraging tokenism. The Norwegian example has not
led to any improvements in female representation outside
of the boardroom or narrowing of the gender pay gap7. We
discuss this in more detail below but we believe that a bet
ter system would be for governments to require board level
training for potential female directors and for financial regu
lators to demand that all gender data and policies are dis
closed upfront in all quarterly updates and in all financial
reports.
Australian disclosure efforts have seen male CEOs
drag their feet, whereas female CEOs have met all disclo
sure requirements for the ASX200. Perhaps limiting board
and senior level remuneration and bonuses might make
disclosure more palatable.
The third area we believe should be tackled is educa
tion. Make education engaging! Start teaching girls STEM
(science, technology, engineering and maths) subjects in a
more enlightened, practical female-brain manner.
All Edu
cation Ministers should perhaps visit hands-on learning
spaces like the Exploratorium in San Francisco to see how
the subject can be taught in an exciting and engaging way.
7
Bertrand, Black, Jensen, Lleras-Muney 2014: Breaking the Glass Ceiling?
The Effect of Board Quotas of Female Labor Market Outcomes in Norway
. 28
And the workplace issues we identify in Table 13 should
be addressed too. Incentives for CEOs and senior manag
ers should include these issues in performance criteria, not
just the more typical financial and performance drivers.
CEOs who do not address pay-gap differences, differing
promotion rates and the opposing cultures of face time and
flexibility should be removed by their boards. Diversity deliv
ers better financial performance and market valuations as
we have seen in parts one and two of this report, so CEOs
who are not promoting diversity are not acting in the interests
of their companies or shareholders and should be
held accountable.
Educational choices and the management pipeline
The low female representation in Japanese companies
boards and overall top management is mirrored in the lowest
percentage of general growth and the lowest percent of
female graduates in engineering among the countries we con
sidered in this analysis.
In most countries though low female representation in senior
management can no longer be explained by a lack of education
or competences. Over 36% of all women in the US today have
college degrees compared to 14% in 1970 and OECD data
show that virtually every country globally has seen an increase in
female university graduation rates.
In 2009, women accounted
for 58% of OECD graduates up from 54% in 2000. Despite
this, the Grant Thornton International Business Report says the
global average of women in senior management positions, a
broad definition compared to our top management or CSG
3000, is flat at 24%.
So if women are graduating in greater numbers than men
but are still not breaking through the glass ceiling, particularly in
these more “systemized/producer-end” industries, are they
studying the wrong subjects? National Science Foundation data
show that women made up over 22% of US computer science
graduates as recently as 2005, but, surprisingly, this has fallen
substantially in recent years from 30% a decade earlier despite
the success of the sector. According to the latest data available,
women are just 18% of computer science and IT graduates in
the US and 16% in the UK.
We can understand why the debate today focuses on
STEM subjects and the lower rates for female graduates
in these areas.
While STEM degrees overall were awarded
almost equally to male and female students in both the
US and UK in 2010 (see Figure 19), if we drill down into
the actual areas studied, we see very significant differ
ences which help to explain the distinctions in the recruit
ment pool and subsequent lower levels of women in the
workforce. In the US, 41,000 male students graduated
with a maths or computer science degree compared to
14,000 women. In the UK, it was 15,400 males com
pared to 5,300 women.
For engineering, 57,000 males
graduated in the US versus 13,000 women and in the UK
it was 17,000 men compared to 3,300 women. It can be
no surprise therefore that many managers in these sec
tors argue that there are not enough women with the req
uisite skill sets to recruit or promote.
In the US, 38% of undergraduates enrolling for a
STEM degree do not complete their degree in a STEM
field, either dropping out or switching to a non-STEM
PHOTO: ISTOCK.COM\MEDIAPHOTOS
WOMEN IN BUSINESS
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 29
subject8. Gender-specific data is not available but this is a
considerable challenge to industries requiring STEM
skills. One explanation put forward is that all the theoreti
cal coursework is concentrated in years 1 and 2 with
more creative and explorative work left for later years by
which time students have opted for another field. Dissat
isfaction with the course program may also be part of the
reason why over 40% of female STEM graduates are no
longer working in STEM companies even two years after
graduation.
If female students decide or are persuaded to
stay reluctantly with their chosen field until graduation, it
may offer part of the reason why they are such early
“switchers” or choose other employment options.
Although the shortage of engineering graduates in the
US ensures that they enjoy the highest starting salary of
all undergraduates, female graduates switch to other
fields using similar skill sets—maths, science knowledge
—and opt for competing industries, consulting and
finance for example, or public sector roles, further dimin
ishing the female pool for the future management pipe
line. 75% of women STEM graduates have left the sector
within 10 years of graduation in the US, whereas over
40% of male graduates are still in STEM fields. In the UK,
less than 30% of all female STEM graduates of working
age are working in STEM-sector positions9.
According to a Stanford University and Anita Borg Insti
tute report10, 77% of mid-level male managers in the tech
nology sector have an engineering or computer science
degree versus 61% of women.
Higher up the management
ladder and at board level, data suggest that sector-specific
education is less of a factor in general hiring decisions, but
it is certainly a key determinant at entry-level appointments
and promotions, whichever sector. Even though a women
may bring broader skills to play lower down in an organiza
tion, if she does not have the technical skills to support
promotion opportunities, the numbers of internal female
candidates for management in these sectors are set to
remain low.
The generally negative perception by potential employ
ees of certain sectors will not help change the current
status quo. Based on PWC’s Millennials at Work survey,
14% of current graduates would not want to work in oil
and gas “solely because of (its) image.” Defence and
insurance are the second least popular, with 12% looking
to avoid employment in those companies.
Perceptions
such as these are hard to change—it might take
decades— but companies need to do more to help the
process if they are to maximize their own performance.
In Japan, there have historically been two educational
tracks at secondary and tertiary level separated along
gender lines. While statistics show that 40% of Japanese
graduates are female, this is a misleading picture as to
their potential to enter the broad workforce as female par
8
Up to 50% of US undergraduates change their choice of majors, accord
ing to Penn State University, but these are usually within-field, i.e. nonSTEM to non-STEM.
For comparison, at STEM-only institutes, MIT has a
completion rate of 97%, Stanford 95% and Imperial College 97%.
9 Smith Institute “Unlocking Potential – perspectives of women in science,
engineering and technology”
10 Simard, Henderson, Gilmartin, Schiebinger and Whitney: Climbing the
Technical Ladder: Obstacles and Solutions for mid-level Women in
Technology – Michelle R Clayman Institute for Gender Research, Stan
ford University and the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology
. S&E
Engineering
Portugal
Spain
Sweden
Italy
Canada
Saudi Arabia
United States
Greece
Estonia
Argentina (2007)
Bulgaria
Poland
United States
Male engineering
Israel
New Zealand
Cuba
United Kingdom
United Kingdom
Female maths & CS
Australia
Brazil
Belgium
Chile
Slovakia
Finland
Male natural sciences
Mexico
France
Germany
Germany
United Arab Emirates (2007)
Maths
Singapore
Female natural sciences
Austria
South Korea
Turkey
Norway
Czech Republic
Denmark
Netherlands
Hungary
Switzerland
Male maths & CS
India (2003)
South Korea
Japana
Taiwan
Japan
Singapore
United Arab Emirates (2007)
Taiwan
India (2003)
Mexico
Iceland
China
Netherlands
South Korea
Israel
Germany
Bulgaria
United States
Belgium
Poland
Albania (2003)
Greece
Canada
Denmark
Croatia
Latvia
Saudi Arabia
Australia
New Zealand
Italy
Norway
Romania
Argentina (2007)
Brazil
Georgia (2007)
Austria
Sweden
Czech Republic
Estonia
Cuba
Chile
Switzerland
Portugal
Slovakia
Hungary
France
United Kingdom
Spain
Slovenia
Ireland (2005)
Luxembourg
Finland
Macedonia
Turkey
Armenia
Lithuania
Figure 18
Females as a % of university graduates
80 females as a % of university graduates
Source: National Science Foundation 2011 report – 2008 data
70
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WOMEN IN BUSINESS
30
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Figure 19
Graduates in selected STEM disciplines – 2010
Source: National Science Foundation
70,000 graduates in selected STEM disciplines
60,000
50,000
40,000
30,000
20,000
10,000
0
Taiwan
Female engineering
Figure 20
Female % of S&E graduates by field – 2008
80 females as % of STEM graduates by ï¬eld
Source: National Science Foundation 2011 report
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
Table 14
Women as % of graduates by discipline
Source: Higher Education Statistics Agency Ltd 2011-2012; Digest of Education Statistics 2010-2011
UK
USA
Medicine & dentistry
57.8
48.3
Physical sciences
43.0
40.2
Maths
42.2
43.1
Computer sciences/ICT
16.2
18.2
Engineering
15.1
17.8
All STEM degrees
50.9
50.3
Law
64.0
70.3
Social sciences
60.3
49.3
Economics
30.9
30.6
Creative Arts
62.1
61.3
Business & Admin
51.2
48.8
All degrees
57.1
57.2
ticipation is skewed towards home economics, education
and service whereas male graduates come predominantly
from engineering, manufacturing, construction and sci
ence. This gender tracking of education is the key reason
for low levels of female participation in Japanese compa
nies (Figure 18) and while Shinzo Abe’s efforts to address
this with 30% representation in senior management and
political roles by 2020 are admirable, it looks a challenge
given the available talent pool. Access to Japanese ter
tiary education is also perhaps hampered for women by
the high costs of university courses, so this may also be
an area to be addressed to ensure more equitable access
as Abe has specifically cited improved female participa
tion rates as a way to counterbalance the declining birth
rate. In early September, he created a new Ministry for
the Promotion of Women.
In exploring the link between Japanese female education
and their participation in management, we have mapped the
corresponding data for other countries.
While there appears
to be a correlation between the two generally, we would
highlight that countries that see higher female graduation
levels are typically only seeing correspondingly high manage
ment levels because of legislative initiatives.
Culture and unconscious bias
In the 1970s and 1980s, Dutch psychologist professor
Geert Hofstede developed a framework to measure national
cultures and rank them on a masculinity index (MAS)11 reflect
ing the extent to which a given country or society applauds
achievement, competitiveness, heroism, assertiveness and
material rewards as opposed to “femininity” where values
focus on co-operation, modesty, quality of life and society is
more consensus oriented. Schmid and Urban12 have used the
framework to look at whether this interpretation of the cultural
or subconscious value system can help explain gender
11 Hofstede, Culture’s Consequences: Comparing Values, Behaviors, Insti
tutions and Organizations
12 Schmid & Urban 2014: Does is matter where you work? The role of
women in the boardroom and firm valuation
31
. 32
PHOTO: ISTOCK.COM\ANNEDDE
WOMEN IN BUSINESS
inequality—or at least explain it in part. They find that the frac
tion of female board members changes by +/–2.5% in abso
lute terms when “masculinity” drops by one standard deviation
and that approximately half of this change can be explained
statistically by culture and half by firm specifics. They also find
that the percentage of companies with at least one female
board member is 39% in more “masculine” countries, com
pared to 59% in more “feminine” countries. This clearly sug
gests that cultural bias is an impediment to the appointment of
women and maintains the glass ceiling.
Social conditioning over centuries depicting a father
being the breadwinner and a mother as the primary care
giver has led to the pervasiveness of the unconscious bias
against women today and the reluctance to promote
women in the expectation that they will eventually put any
family first—the old “too risky to promote” attitude.
This
can trigger a self-fulfilling prophecy and vicious cycle, and
lack of promotion is one of the top reasons cited by
women for leaving their jobs. We can see statistically that
women leaving are more likely to be replaced by a male
employee than a female, reinforcing the historical bias
and vicious circle. The more senior the female leaver is,
the more likely she is to be replaced by a male colleague.
Otherwise, the entry level split of close to 50:50 would be
maintained up the pipeline instead of female attrition rates
accelerating at mid-career levels.
These embedded negative perceptions about women’s
commitment to work typically center on their parenting role,
possible or actual.
Social conditioning has led to women
being equated with having greater family responsibility and,
in the working environment, this signals a family-work con
flict, actual or potential, regardless of whether the female
employee has a family or not13. Most male managers today
were brought up by a stay-at-home mother, so subcon
sciously or otherwise, this perhaps fosters expectations of
female preferences and likely choices.
13 Banerji and Greenwald 2013: Hidden Biases of Good People
Gender differences in willingness to take
risk and compete
Numerous studies have proven that men prefer tak
ing risks to women14. Risk aversion differences are most
obviously demonstrated in studies of male and female
propensity to gamble, in pension allocation and in insur
ance premium versus deductible decisions.
Male traders
have also been shown to trade more frequently, regard
less of whether or not this will lead them to underperform
their female peers. Testosterone pattern tests show that
levels can reach highs where male traders become over
confident and take bad risks knowingly, i.e. irrational exu
berance.
This appetite for risk taking has historically
been interpreted as men having a greater suitability and
natural aptitude for business leadership, but since 2007
there has been considerably greater debate.
One such study is Gneezy et. al. showing that in a
non-competitive environment, men and women per
form a given task fairly equitably, but when a competi
tive element is thrown into the game men immediately
step up their performance significantly whereas women
do not.
However, within a female-only competition,
women will perform better, but not to the same extent
as men. This is interpreted by the authors as “stereo
type threat”, i.e. that women are held back by different
expectations as to their abilities.
The explanation of
“stereotype threat” for women’s risk appetite levels is
underlined by a 2010 study15 that uses a gender neu
tral task (listing words starting with the same letter)
rather than the maze solving (i.e. male brain) task of the
Gneezy et. al.
experiment and here the findings show
that women tend not to compete with men if they
(rightly or wrongly) think they will lose anyway. With a
14 Niederle and Vesterlund 2007: Do Women Shy Away from
Competition? Do Men Compete too Much?; Croson and Gneezy
2009: Gender Differences in Preferences; Coates and Herbert
2008: Endogenous steroids and financial risk taking on a Lon
don trading floor
15 Guenther et al 2010: Women can’t jump? An experiment on
competitive attitudes and stereotype threat
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 33
gender neutral task, women outperform men in a non
competitive environment and when the competitive ele
ment is added, even though men again improve sig
nificantly, women also improve performance sufficiently
to match men’s results. So the presence of a “stereo
type threat” can explain the relative risk aversion of
women in certain settings.
Stereotyping
Figure 21
Percent of women in senior management versus
females as percent of graduates
Source: National Science Foundation 2011 report – 2008 data, OECD, Factfish
45.0% of women in senior management versus females as % of graduates
40.0
35.0
30.0
Stereotyping as to career paths can be driven as
early as parental steering or teachers’ advice towards
tertiary degree choices. In the UK, just 9% of the
science and engineering workforce is female and a
recent report says that parents and carers are rein
forcing gender stereotyping by advising female stu
dents interested in science and maths towards a
career in medicine or law rather than engineering.
Underpinning this is a difference in parental gender
attitudes: 2% of parents considered engineering as
an appropriate career for a daughter versus 12% for
a son16. Compare this to 16% of parents being in
favor of their daughters becoming teachers versus
5% for sons.
In the UK, just 5% of teachers at ele
mentary school level have science degrees and 75%
of secondary schools were not fulfilling their inde
pendent, impartial career advice obligations, accord
ing to one government report17. Being taught by a
non-subject graduate cannot be optimum18. Peer
pressure and broad cultural messages also add a
further negative layer.
So the bias, implicit or explicit,
steering children and girls in their choices reinforces
stereotyping and social conditioning.
What happens if you actively try to control uncon
scious bias? Harvard Business School found that
male and female students were arriving for their
MBA program with the same test scores, but that
there were few women making the top 5% cut at
graduation and so started a gender experiment with
the 2011–2013 class to identify reasons for this and
try to close the “grade gap.”19 To eliminate the
unconscious grading and memory bias for class par
ticipation (which makes up 50% of grades), they
introduced court stenographers to note exactly who
said what in class and to encourage female partici
pation by giving hand-raising coaching to counter
balance the dominant male behavior in classrooms.
What they also identified was that women stu
dents felt the need to choose between academic
and social success, while the two aspects were
closely intertwined for men. In a managerial context,
wanting to be liked can go against asserting author
16 Engineers Week Survey
17 Ofsted data
18 In the UK, an estimated 30-40% of GCSE maths lessons are
taught by teachers with qualifications in other subjects. The
Telegraph, 18 June 2012.
National Math & Science Initiative
estimates that 36% of public middle school maths teachers in
the US did not major in maths at college and/or are not quali
fied to teach it. The corresponding figure for science teachers
is 30%.
19 New York Times: Harvard Business School Case Study: Gen
der Equity – 7 September 2013
25.0
20.0
15.0
10.0
5.0
0.0
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
ity. But after the two year gender experiment, the grade
gap had narrowed so dramatically that women made up
40% of the top 5% at graduation and interestingly, no one
was able to pinpoint exactly the reasons for this huge
improvement.
Among the three possible drivers suggested
in an article in the New York Times were the efforts to
reduce the unconscious bias in grading, an improved envi
ronment both inside and outside the classroom that enabled
women to perform better and an easing of grading for
women. Or a mix of all three. But what the experiment so
clearly demonstrates is how quickly women narrow the
gender gap if the unconscious bias is controlled.
Double standards
As Guenther et.
al. write, “Being competitive in itself
is regarded as stereotypically rather male, and… being
competitive in ‘male settings’ for women still includes a
negative stigma of being bitchy.”20 In terms of general
behavioral patterns, what is seen as a positive in a male
colleague can be interpreted as a negative in a female
showing the same attributes. Double standards! An ambi
tious male is judged as wanting to succeed, driven, and
as someone with leadership potential; a similarly ambi
tious woman can be dismissed as not a team player and
someone difficult to manage.As a corollary to this, women
managers lean towards a more collaborative style of deci
sion-making, incorporating a greater number and broader
range of voices when seeking to make decisions and
choices.
This style of, or preference in, behavior can be
wholly misperceived by male colleagues as lacking the
ability to lead, lacking confidence or indecisiveness.
Politeness can be read as subordination!
In fact, this is a significant misinterpretation. In a fasci
nating study from 2010, Professor Anita Woolley and col
leagues identified a “collective intelligence” factor when
asking groups of between two and five to complete various
tasks. Their findings were that the performance—or suc
cess—in these tasks was not strongly driven by either the
20 Guenther et al “Women can’t jump? An experiment on competitive atti
tudes and stereotype threat
70
80
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS
34
average intelligence of the group, or by the most intelligent
member of the group, but was more correlated with the
interaction of the group, specifically the social sensitivity of
members to one another, each member of the group being
allowed to give their thoughts and opinions, and the propor
tion of females in the group, i.e. the presence of a facilita
tor more likely to draw out contributions and therefore the
best solutions of all. So it is about time that men started
teaching themselves that female deferring or listening to
others is not subordination, nor is it an inability to lead, but
a means to achieve the best solution.21
Other studies also evaluate how qualifications are rated
differently for male and female applicants. Interestingly,
recruiters tend to put more emphasis on the importance of
qualifications to jobs when men have achieved strong
results in these fields and downplayed their importance if
male candidates have not scored so highly.
This implicit
favoritism does not translate to women. Areas where
women have stronger skill sets or qualifications are deemed
to carry less weight in the recruiting process and instead
the hiring or promoting criteria are more likely to focus on
softer social skills, i.e. “likeability.”22
Spousal role and support
The work-life balance can be a continual change and
perhaps more so for women.
In her important work, A
Grand Gender Convergence: Its Last Chapter, Claudia
Goldin23 argues that the structure of jobs and the timebased structure of salaries must be altered for there to be
real equality. How women are able to structure their time
given outside commitments and what time demands orga
nizations place on them do not necessarily coincide. There
is still a strong correlation between women’s advance
ment and the time commitments of their jobs.
Literature always posits the female as the decision
maker when it comes to stepping out of the workforce.
This is not always obviously the case and the real reasons
for spouses and partners “supporting” such a decision can
be varied.
In the US, overall marriage rates have fallen
from 81% in 1970 to 51% in 2010 for 25–39 year olds.
In 2010 American Community Survey data, wives earned
more than their husbands in 26% of couples between 18
and 65 years old. Wives out-earning husbands can lead
to greater unhappiness in couples and to a higher divorce
rate. 50% of US couples report being “very happily mar
ried,” but this level of happiness starts to fall as wives
become the main breadwinner role and there is 50%
higher likelihood of eventual divorce when this is
the case.24
While it is commonly believed that motherhood is the
point at which gender promotion rates diverge, this is not
the case.
The promotion gaps start well before women
21 Woolley, Chabris, Pentland, Hashmi and Malone 2010: Evidence for a Collec
tive Intelligence Factor in the Performance of Human Groups
22 Phelan, Moss-Racusin and Rudman 2008: Competent yet out in the
Cold
23 Goldin C. A Grand Gender Convergence: Its Last Chapter. American
Economic Review.
2014;104(4):1091–1119.
24 Bertrand, Kamenica and Pan 2013: Gender identity and relative income
within households 2013
opt to have children and particularly today when
women are opting to have children later in order to
invest in their careers. There is a significant dis
crepancy between parenting rates at entry and
mid-level employees,25 with 9% fewer women hav
ing children at entry level and 8% at mid-level.
Women are postponing having children relative to
their male colleagues while they establish their
careers and seek promotion.
However, there is a generational shift in the
expectations of a work-life balance, and what today
is seen as a gender issue is set to become an issue
across the entire workforce. Bain & Co research
data show that men with non-working spouses are
significantly happier at work than when they have a
spouse/partner who is working.
It ranges from a
17% difference in their job satisfaction when they
have no children, rising to 34% when they have
children and their spouse is at home.26
Counterintuitively, it is mothers in the lowest
household income levels who are the most likely to
opt out of the workplace, according to US Census
Bureau data for 2005–07, because of the
unaffordability of childcare; but cultural and legacy
values can also consider a wife staying at home—
with or without children—as a status symbol, proving
that a husband has reached the level of earning
power where he alone can provide financially.
25 Simard, Henderson, Gilmartin, Schiebinger and Whitney: Climb
ing the Technical Ladder: Obstacles and Solutions for mid-level
Women in Technology – idem
26 Bain & Co 2013: Gender equality in the UK
. PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM\MONKEY BUSINESS IMAGES
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 35
The Bain & Co findings are echoed by data for
the tech sector showing that 79.3% of mid-level
women have a full-time working partner, more than
double their male peers, less than 38% of whom
have a full time working partner. This implies that
mid-level women are more likely to have to juggle
work and home and childcare responsibilities than
their male colleagues. Men in the tech sector are
four times more likely to have a partner with primary
responsibility for the household and childcare, and
50% have a partner who either works part-time or
not at all. This compares to less than 15% of
women with a partner working part-time or not at all
who can support them in their career.
Despite
working women still bearing the responsibility for
homecare and childcare, men will have to increase
their contribution, especially as paternal involvement in child-rearing continues to become the
norm. PWC’s research into young employees born
between 1980 and 1995, the so-called “Millenni
als,” shows that both men and women have very similar
expectations and demands of the work-life balance
today.27
Workplace bias and quantitative issues –
the gender pay gap
It is hard to comprehend that like-for-like jobs still pay
men and women differently. While pay gaps are obvious
where there are different skill levels, qualifications, hours
etc., there can pay be no excuse for the stubborn underpaying of women for doing the same job.
It is discrimination. It
serves as an obstacle to commitment and progression; it is
demoralizing and demeaning. But it is one of the easiest
workplace biases to remove.
Graduate level data is skewed by degree choice, the
higher proportion of women accepting jobs in the public
sector compared to men, particularly in education and
healthcare, or part-time posts.
However, MBA graduates
are emerging with similar skill sets and similar job profiles—
Figure 22
Estimated % of managers who were married – 2007
Source: US Government Accountability Office analysis of American Community survey data
90% of managers who were married
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Construction Educational
services
Female
Financial
activities
Male
Healthcare Info & comms
Leisure & Manufacturing
hospitality
Other
services
Prof &
business
services
Public
Retail trade
administration
27 PWC 2011: Millennials at work: Reshaping the workplace
Transport &
utilities
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
36
Figure 23
US marriage rates have fallen as the number of women
working has increased
Source: 2010 American Community Survey data,
Pew Research Center analyst of Decennial Census (1960-2000); US Department of Labor
80%
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
Marriage rates
% of women who outearn their husbands
Female labor participation
% of women who outearn their husbands by at least 10%
yet male MBA students still get paid USD 5,000
more than their female colleagues.28 This pay gap is
confirmed by a further study released in June 2014
of over 600 MBA graduates in Europe where the
annual salary gap was EURO 4,255 (USD 5,784 at
current exchange rates) at their first job out of busi
ness school, widening to EURO 36,304 a mere five
years after graduation, a 750% expansion. That is a
very material difference.
If we look at broader gender pay gaps reported
by governments but take comparisons for full-time
working men compared to full-time working
women, we see a 16.4% differential across
Europe, 17.1% in Australia and 19.1% in both the
UK and the US. The US gap is 10% for 25 to 34
years old and increases with age. This is in line with
women failing to reach senior management heights.
It also increases with tertiary levels of education!29
28 Catalyst Group 2010: Pipeline’s Broken Promise
29 This is not a surprise as manual labor is typically paid by the
hour and is more unionized, i.e.
collective agreements.
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 37
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM\MONKEY BUSINESS IMAGES
professionals in the UK. The narrowest gap in the UK was
in retail sales, at 5%.31
In a double-blind study at Yale,32 academic scientists were
given applications from students applying for a lab manager
position. They were given identical CVs, but some with a male
applicant’s name, some with a female name. Not only were
the male applicants rated higher on competence, hireability
and mentoring (whether the reviewer would mentor the candi
date) in line with other gender-blind study results, but also men
were offered a USD 30,000 starting salary while the women
were offered USD 26,500!
“Of Age, Sex and Money,”33 a study of the pay gap, finds
that CEOs pay employees of the opposite gender less than
those of their own gender (even when controlling for job char
acteristics), hence the perpetuation of this discrimination against
women.
The bias works both ways though, and the median US
difference in 2012 was an annual USD 11,084 in favor of the
male workforce and USD 64,200 at the senior management
level, according to the report. Male CEOs pay male middle man
agers USD 46,500 a year more than women, whereas women
CEOs pay women middle managers USD 21,960 more, i.e.
the male self-bias is more pronounced.
Interestingly, Norway and Sweden are 15%–16%.
The OECD reports an average of 16%, with a 21%
difference at the top of the pay scale. Japan has a
gender pay gap of 29% but it is 40% for workers
over 40, which is consistent with the very low levels
of women in senior management and on boards,
though this should improve with Abe’s 2020 initia
tives.
South Korea has the greatest difference at
39%, again tallying with the low representation of
senior women.
In terms of sectors, we see particularly wide
gaps in professions with billable hours, i.e. law; this
is one explanation for why office presence, or per
haps face-time continues to be rewarded.30 The
financial services sector comes next. In the US, it is
almost 30%, in Australia 32% and in the UK 38%.
The lowest gap was in construction in the US, 5%,
followed by agriculture and leisure & hospitality at
15-16%.
Education and health services were 23%
versus 17% within education and 19% for health
30 Goldin 2014: A Grand Gender Convergence: Its Last Chapter
Self-promotion and promotion
In academic research, male self-promotion can be cate
gorized as male overconfidence, which only diminishes later
in age.34 Men are generally better at playing by the invisible
rules that aid promotion. At the interviewing process, the
female tendency to “talk about” rather than “talk up” their
qualifications and experience can lead hirers to see them as
having accomplished less than their male counterparts who
are more willing to talk up the same experience. In the tech
sector, which frequently conducts first round interviews by
phone, women applicants often do not get past the first
hurdle, as their reticence to embroider their exact experience
and qualifications means they lose out to male candidates
who are more willing to do so.
Asking for promotion is also a
well-documented difference in male and female styles.
Accenture’s 2014 survey of 4,100 employees for their
Career Capital reports that men are over 10% more likely to
ask for a salary increase and almost 20% more likely to ask
for a promotion than their female colleagues and to com
pound that, they are 15% more likely to be granted these
than women.35 And when men ask for a salary increase, they
ask for a higher increase than their female counterparts!
“Women feel confident only when they are perfect. Or
practically perfect,” so argue journalists Katty Kay and Claire
Shipman in their recent book “The Confidence Code: The Sci
ence and Art of Self-Assurance—What Women Should
Know.” This is a concise way of explaining the seemingly
never-ending research projects that demonstrate that women
31 Australian Board of Statistics, Eurostat, ONS US Bureau of Labor Sta
tistics, OECD, UK Equality & Human Rights Commission
32 Moss-Racusin et al 2012: Science faculty’s subtle gender biases favour
male students
33 Newton and Simutin 2014: Of Age, Sex, and Money: Insight form Cor
porate Office Compensation on the Wage Inequality between Genders
34 Niederle and Vesterlund 2007: Jakobsson and others 2013: Gender
and Overconfidence: Effects of Context, Gendered Stereotypes and
Peer Group; Reuben and others 2011: The Emergence of male Leader
ship in Competitive Environments and many more
35 Accenture: Career Capital – 2014 Global Research Results
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
38
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 39
always underestimate their abilities compared to men
overestimating theirs—and actual results being equita
ble.36 It also explains women’s decisions not to go for
promotions and positions where they (subjectively) feel
unqualified, only to see a less qualified man step for
ward and take the prize. Less confidence means less
willingness to take risks and to compete.
Women’s relative reticence to ask for a promotion
and hence preference to rely on meritocracy and formal
channels is a brake on their climb up the career ladder.
Likewise, loyalty is considered by women as an impor
tant attribute, but loyalty does not result in them being
promoted. At possible opportunities for making the next
step up the ladder, women will want to be certain they
have all the requisite skills for the next level whereas
men will believe that they can fill in any missing gaps on
the job. This is cited as a confidence gap, a concept to
capture many differences in gender behavior, but it also
goes back to the difference between how boys and girls
answer questions in the classroom, where boys tend to
put their hand up to answer before the end of the ques
tion whereas a girl will only put her hand up when she
has secured the answer.
This narrow understanding of
the paths and prerequisites for promotion is a definite
obstacle; Harvey Coleman in “Empowering Yourself,
The Organizational Game” states that performance only
contributes 10% towards promotions decisions.
Asking for promotion further compounds the
greater frequency at which men get promoted. Vari
ous studies37 report that men are promoted twice as
rapidly in their early years in employment and that
these promotions are both vertical and horizontal, giv
ing men far broader experience (and network) within
an organization. And of course, this divergence
expands higher up the organization and serves as a
block on women having the same opportunities to
reach top management.
Data shows that men are
30% more likely than women to enjoy five or more
promotions in their careers, regardless of whether
women have children or not.38
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM\VIEWAPART
Flexibility: travel, face time and working
from home
The desire for flexibility is much discussed, but
flexibility is a catch-all term for anything ranging
from setting one’s own agenda, deciding where
and how much to work, and when and where to
travel. Travel is a key reason for women choosing
to step off the career ladder. While women can find
the requirement to travel a challenge, particularly if
they have other responsibilities outside of the work
environment, line managers can infer that women
have a wholesale unwillingness to travel.
36 Furnham and Chamorro-Premuzic 2007: Self-assessed intelli
gence and confidence for the acquisition of skills; Furnham
2001: Self-estimates of intelligence: culture and gender differ
ence in self and other estimates of both general and multiple
intelligences.
37 KPMG 2014: Cracking the Code
38 KPMG 2014: Cracking the Code - idem
This in turn can reinforce the “unconscious bias” and
lead to these managers not putting women candidates
forward for promotions or projects that would involve relo
cation or time spent abroad and typically, these are the
assignments that can be decisive and well-established
routes to networking and promotion.
The problem here is
about presumed female preferences and not the actual
preferences themselves. Men can presume that women
want to stop working at some stage, perhaps projecting
the role of their own mother. In a UK survey, 61% of
mothers said they would want to work even if they did not
have to financially versus just 24% who said they would
give up work if they could.39 Cotter et.
al. show that the
percentage of married mothers staying at home does not
increase consistently as husbands’ earnings rise. 60% of
mothers with husbands in the top 5% of earners are
working and over the past 15 years, it has been women
with higher earning husbands who have been increasing
their participation in the labor force.
This does not appear
to correspond to general perceptions that women will opt
out if they can afford to.40 Women may want to work dif
ferently, but that does not mean they do not want to work.
“Face-time” is widely regarded as a waste of time, but
it is a practice that persists. Why does sitting at one’s
desk in an office or remaining at one’s workplace equate
to better levels of productivity and higher levels of
loyalty?41 Technology developments mean that remote
working is a real possibility and a real benefit for many
employees. Certainly there are areas where remote work
ing is not viable, for example where confidential informa
tion is involved, where regulatory requirements mean that
employees need to be supervised in their functions, but in
most fields, it is increasingly a possibility that will not hin
der an employee’s output.
This type of flexibility does not
need to entail full-time or even considerable hours of
remote working, but this type of flexibility improves
employee satisfaction and loyalty amongst the entire
Figure 24
How do people get promoted?
Source: “Empowering Yourself, the Organizational Game”, Harvey Coleman
Performance 10%
Image 30%
Exposure 60%
39 NCT Survey: Experiences of women returning to work after maternity
leave in the UK
40 Cotter, England and Hermser 2007: Moms and Jobs: Trends in Moth
ers’ Employment and Which Mothers Stay Home
41 BTplc reports 63% fewer sick days in its home-based staff compared to
office-based staff and they have cut their average sick day count to 3.1
days per employee vs the UK national average of 8.5 days. Opportunity
Now website
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
40
Figure 25
PWC Millennials survey – employees that agree that
employers are too male biased when promoting from within
Source: PWC Millennials at Work research;
45% agreeing
women’s lives and, at this point, the sense of frustra
tion or sacrifice may not seem worthwhile; or it may
be that personal success for women is a more com
plex satisfaction than just work-derived, so they
choose to opt out or start to “make the compromise.”
40
Managing your own business
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
Brazil
China
France
Netherlands
India
Japan
Italy
Russia
Germany
Spain
Total
0
workforce even when these employees do not use the
facility. The possibility alone of flexibility is enough to cre
ate the difference and the time has come to challenge
traditional working practices with practical, workable solu
tions.
Flexibility in the form of the ability to set one’s own agenda
and schedule most of one’s working day often coincides with
rising seniority. It is of course incompatible with many areas of
work, but continually working with someone senior setting
working terms can be a compounding source of frustration for
employees, both men and women, passed over for or losing
Table 15
Who receives five or more promotions?
Source: KPMG 2014: Cracking the Code
% without children
Men
Women
Difference
% with children
65
74
51
57
27%
30%
out on promotions. This can be a specific trade-off for parents
trying to juggle school timetables and rigid working hours and
encourage a concern that it is the broad family, not just the
parent that is losing out on the work-life balance.
Men are more adept at making flexibility in their work
days.
Cranfield Business School research shows that as
many men work flexibly as women, but that women do so
contractually whereas men do so unofficially. Similarly,
Captivate Network data says that men are 25% more likely
to take breaks during the working day for personal activi
ties, 7% more likely to go for a walk, 5% more likely to go
out to lunch and 35% more likely just to take a break to
relax compared to their female colleagues.
Overall, there is less appetite for working long hours dic
tated by someone else these days, and this comes at the
pinch-point where women are losing out on promotions and
becoming less satisfied or even demoralized by the lack of
opportunities at work. It can coincide with the “rush-hour” in
If the ability to control or manage one’s time is a
key determinant of a woman’s decision to opt out of
the corporate world, it may also explain why so many
start-ups and new companies are being founded by
women today.
Between 1997 and 2014, the number
of women-owned businesses in the US rose by 68%,
twice the increase in male-led start-ups42. Biz2Credit.
com found that average earnings at one of the
10,000 female-owned businesses applying for credit
via their platform rose from USD 35,135 in 2012 to
USD 54,114 in 2013. The average loan application
was for USD 85,000 and women were looking for
these loans after 27 months in business rather than
the average of more than 40 months as in the 2012
applications, reflecting not just the general economic
rebound but a greater level of confidence amongst
female entrepreneurs.
At this scale of business, a
woman is likely working from home and maximizing
the benefits of technology, and 2012 data shows that
close to 90% of female-owned businesses have rev
enues of less than USD 100,000.
The rapid growth in female-led start-ups again
shows us that it is wrong to interpret a woman step
ping off the formalized corporate ladder as a decision
to stop working altogether, which is the common
perception. These women are choosing to work dif
ferently and to embrace different, possibly broader,
challenges than is currently being offered to them in
the corporate workplace. Perhaps they are choosing
to take the responsibility they are being denied in the
workplace.
In an academic report as far back as
1997, Moore and Buttner43 identified that many
women start their own business as an alternative
career option, largely at the point when they feel
they will not be promoted further.
Flexibility tends to push women into staff
rather than line roles
The downside for women looking for increased
working flexibility is that organizations tend to offer
this only in more support-side functions (i.e., shared
services) rather than in line positions. Line roles
remain the key conduit to senior and board positions
as these functions exist all the way up the organiza
tion, unlike staff and more internally focused roles.
25% of senior women are employed in Human
Resource functions, according to the Grant Thornton
International Business Report 2014 while Credit
42 US Census Bureau data
43 Moore and Buttner 1997: Women Entrepreneurs: Moving
Beyond the Glass Ceiling
. PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM\PRESSMASTER
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 41
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
42
Figure 26
Revenues for women owned companies in the US – 2012
Source: Data compiled by American Express OPEN/Womenable estimate from US Census Bureau
$100m–4.9m 1.5%
$500–999k 2.0%
$5–9.9m 0.14%
$10m+ 0.18%
$100–499k 10.0%
<$100k 87.0%
Suisse data, cited earlier, show 34% of senior female
management globally are in shared services (HR,
Legal, Communications etc). This is not the typical
route to an executive or board position which looks for
operational or financial responsibility and the sharp
discrepancies shown in our data in Figures 27 and 28
as to the relative representation of men and women in
line functions and shared services goes a long way to
explaining why men are so much more likely to be
promoted to the top and the limited pool available
even for board appointments.
Seeking out and prioritizing flexibility may come at
a time where dual incomes are less important or less
necessary as the cost of childcare erodes much of the
utility of the second income. This, however, is often
only a temporary issue and more flexible working
arrangements could keep female employees in the
workplace until this phase passes. The working cul
ture needs to judge women stepping out as a pause
in their careers driven by a multitude of different pos
sible reasons, not necessarily a permanent step off.
Women are mentored, men are sponsored
Mentors and sponsorship can be aids in helping
promotions, though fast track women’s programs
alone do not necessarily help promote greater
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 43
Figure 27
Senior management in line or operating functions
Source: Credit Suisse
60%
50
40
30
20
10
0
US
Male
Europe
Asia
Female
Figure 28
Senior management in shared services functions
Source: Credit Suisse
60%
50
40
30
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM\STOKKETE
20
diversity within an organization as is demonstrated
by the ongoing low levels of women in senior posi
tions. A 2008 survey by the Catalyst Group shows
that 72% of men with active mentoring received
one or more promotions within two years compared
to 65% of women. Why? One reason might be that
78% of the men were actively mentored by a CEO
or other senior executives, i.e. the decision-mak
ers, compared to 69% for women.
But behind
these numbers, it is actually a greater number of
women—83%—who have a mentor at one point in
their career compared to 76% of men, although
36% of women have female mentors versus 11%
for men. So it seems that women are not getting
equal benefits from mentoring even though many
companies see this type of program as a key tool in
efforts to help women up the promotional ladder.
They need to think again.
Sponsorship is a quicker route to the top.44 In the
UK, male employees are 25% more likely and senior
male employees 50% more likely to have a sponsor,45
possibly the old boy’s network, to smooth the way and
develop the exposure and profile needed to get through
the 60% exposure criterion identified in “Empowering
44 McKinsey & Company: Unlocking the full potential of women at work
45 Center for Talent Innovation: Hewlett and others – Sponsor
Effect: UK
10
0
US
Male
Europe
Female
Yourself, The Organizational Game Revealed” by Harvey Cole
man. Ibarra46 succinctly describes how women are “over-men
tored” and “under-sponsored” relative to male peers and how
the support network needed for promotion does not need
necessarily to be broader, but deeper, an impact which women
can misunderstand.
Ibarra argues that without sponsorship,
women are less likely to be appointed to senior roles and less
willing to step up for these positions.
Ibarra also suggests47 that mentoring, women’s leader
ship programs and networking initiatives can be counter
productive and recommends a 70-20-10 approach to
female talent development—70% on-the-job learning
through stretch assignments, 20% mentoring and 10%
through training. Most diversity programs try to address
the issue via the mentoring and training route, i.e. 30% of
the solution whereas the 70% assignment proportion is
essentially mirroring the male employee route—postings
abroad and postings in other departments, which give
male employees broader, line experience for promotion.
46 Ibarra 2010: Why Men Still Get More Promotions Than Women
47 Ibarra 2012: To Close the Gender Gap, Focus on Assignments
Asia
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS
44
Lack of role models
The absence of a role model is frequently posited as a
significant reason why women choose to opt out or aban
don efforts to secure further promotion. Why fight for fail
ure, or at least what looks unrealistic? Role models serve
as inspiration. Mentors aid as sounding blocks. It seems as
if “seeing really is believing.” Women are more likely to stay
in their positions if they have a female supervisor.48 Usually
internal colleagues who have direct knowledge of the situ
ation or parallel situations, they tend to aid personal devel
opment rather than career advancement.
As such, spon
sorship helps more as it can push obstacles out of a career
path before they appear. It is essentially pre-approval.
Structural obstacles – quotas themselves can be
an obstacle
Attitudes towards gender roles have evolved over the
past 50 years in close correlation with the increase in the
rate of female labor market participation and increased
tertiary education levels. In this context, another important
initiative to drive the ratio of women higher up the man
agement chain has been the setting of quotas for female
board participation (Norway, Spain, Belgium, Italy, France)
and targets (UK, Holland, Japan).
Malaysia has a 30%
quota for new board appointments, while Brazil has a
40% target for state-owned companies. Other countries
such as Finland, Sweden and Australia are supporting
diversity by disclosure requirements and/or active promo
tion of the diversity debate in the national media. But are
quotas a positive or a negative? Do they promote change
generally or do they just promote “tokenism?”
There is still little evidence as to the real impact of quotas
given their recent introduction.
But in a seminal study on the
impact of quotas in politics, Pande et al49 looked at the impact
on gender stereotypical beliefs caused by the 1998 imple
mentation of reserved seats for women in local village elec
tions in India. Under this quota, one third of village councils
were randomly selected at every election and made to appoint
a female chief councillor. The study looks at 7000 households
in 495 villages in West Bengal and perceptions following the
1998 and 2003 elections and shows that there was a dra
matic impact on the perceptions of the effectiveness of female
leadership, but only after the second round of having a female
chief councillor.
The introduction of these quotas also raised
parental aspirations for daughters and the aspirations of girls
for themselves. However, even with this positive change in
attitude towards female effectiveness, both female board and
management participation levels in India are around 7% today.
We believe that the effect of the quotas and targets for
board level participation have positively contributed to the
debate, but has so far failed to improve female participation
in senior management more broadly and have done nothing
to address the pipeline issues. Norway has a 40% quota
for female representation on boards with at least 10 direc
tors, but the number of women in senior management roles
is less than 22% according to CS data.
This corresponds
48 McGinn and Milkman 2012: Looking Up and Looking Out: Career
Mobility Effects of Demographic Similarity among Professionals
49 Pande et al 2009: Powerful Women: Does Exposure Reduce Bias?
to recent academic findings by Bertrand, Black,
Jensen and Lleras-Muney in their “Breaking the
Glass Ceiling? The Effect of Board quotas on
Female Labor Market Outcomes in Norway,” which
demonstrates that there has been no broader spill
over or trickle down impact from the quota and that
it has done nothing to impact (positively) the gender
pay gap outside the boardroom. So it seems that
boards have ticked the box. And that is all.
In the UK, the target for board representation is
25% by 2015 and currently stands at 20.7%50 but
women are just 16% of senior managers.
This
holds for many countries across Europe where tar
gets have been introduced. Our concern is that
governments, rather than taking board initiatives as
a first step and then driving further gender diver
sity—as Sweden has done, for example, in the
area of parental leave—will fail to push through
additional progress, resting on the progress made
at the board level. Also, male-led management
teams who hit their quota and target requirements
may then believe that all their gender issues are
solved and thus ignore the substantially larger
problems they have in the gaps in female represen
tation throughout their management structure.
As a recent alternative to outright quotas and
targets, we are encouraged by the initiative of
Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in Italy to highlight the
issue of female representation by appointing
women 50% of posts in his cabinet and as chair
men of four State-owned corporations.
This is a
clear signal of intent and it will be interesting to see
the extent to which it drives broader improvements
in female participation in management.
The “tokenism” argument has been tested in an
interesting study of Danish companies that found that
having a female in a very senior position in a company
does not lead to increased recruitment of women
board directors nor does a female board chairman
improve the representation of women on a board. In
fact, it leads to the opposite and companies with a
female chairman have, on average, a 9% lower share
of women board members. A second finding of the
study shows that if there is already one woman board
member in place, the probability of hiring another
female is lower.
If there are two female board mem
bers, the chance of hiring one more man is signifi
cantly higher than it is of hiring an additional female.
This is interpreted in the study as proof of “tokenism.”
Quotas at what price?
When the Norwegian 40% quota law was
passed in December 2003, just 9% of local board
seats were occupied by women. The law became
mandatory in January 2006 with a two year transi
tion period. The failure of companies to meet the
original voluntary requirement coupled with the
average 3.5% fall in share prices following the
announcement of the law plus the fact that no
50 Boardwatch – May 2014
.
WOMEN IN BUSINESS 45
Figure 29
2013 Female management gap by country (board versus top management)
Source: Credit Suisse Research
25%
20
15
10
5
0
-5
-10
-15
-20
Taiwan
Thailand
Singapore
Malaysia
Argentina
Phillippines
Qatar
Ukraine
Portugal
Kazakhstan
Japan
Indonesia
Russia
Mexico
China
Pakistan
Hong Kong SAR
Chile
Brazil
US
Turkey
Australia
India
Canada
Spain
South Korea
UK
Luxembourg
Italy
Switzerland
Ireland
Austria
Sweden
Belgium
Finland
South Africa
Germany
Denmark
France
Netherlands
Norway
-25
Figure 30
2013 Female management gap by sector (board versus top management)
Source: Credit Suisse Research
10.0%
8.0
6.0
4.0
2.0
0.0
-2.0
-4.0
-6.0
other management changes occurred suggest that
the law was broadly unpopular.
The new female directors were on average 8
years younger than existing male directors and the
male directors they replaced suggesting less experi
ence. Ahern and Dittmar in their research into the
impact of the Norwegian quota found that the addi
tion of women led to more acquisitions, increased
leverage and reduced cash holdings. Firm value as
measured by Tobin’s Q fell by more than 12% with
every 10% increase in female board members
showing that the market believed that companies
were constrained in their ability to appoint the most
qualified candidates to their boards. Compared to
valuations in 2003, the firms most impacted by the
quota continued to see substantially more negative
hits to their valuations from 2007 to 2009, i.e.
more
than a temporary reaction in the stock market.
Are quotas always what they seem?
The Norwegian mandatory quota is widely quoted as a
minimum 40% requirement and as the model to ensure
diversity. We were surprised therefore to find that the aver
age level of women on Norwegian boards was just below
40% for the companies covered by CS analysts and only
37% for the companies in the MSCI ACWI index. There
are a number of exceptions to the quota that explain this:
the law does not in fact state a 40% diversity requirement
as such and it only relates to companies with boards with
over 10 members (many of the shipping and oil services
companies have boards with 5-7 directors); it does not
apply to companies whose boards are appointed by a Cor
porate Assembly rather than the AGM (explaining why
Telenor and Norsk Hydro are below 40% but still compli
ant); it applies only to directors who are shareholder repre
sentatives and not employee representatives.
We also note
Real Estate
Tech – software
Tech – other
Media
Travel & leisure
Pharma & biotech
Healthcare services
Utilities
Transport
Oil & Gas
Telecoms
Metals & mining
Business services
Diversiï¬ed ï¬nancials
Retailing
Chemicals
Banks
Consumer durables
Paper & Packaging
Food & beverages
Conglomerates
Capital Goods
Building Materials & construction
Autos and components
Tech – hardeware
Insurance
-8.0
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
46
that close to 100 companies chose to delist rather than
comply when the law was passed and others decreased
the size of their board to fall below the 10 member thresh
old. So while the example has done much to focus the
diversity debate and foster diversity on its board, there are
many ways to get around the 40% target.
And do managers drag their feet with “comply or
explain” initiatives?
Australia has a “comply or explain” diversity initiative that
requires companies to disclose their (individually set) gen
der diversity targets in their Annual Reports and the compli
ance rates. Blackrock Australia in its 2013 report on diver
sity progress described progress “at a glacial pace” and
that “disclosures made by ASX 200 companies regarding
their gender policies point towards boards not appearing to
take the issue seriously.” Within the 140 Australian compa
nies within the CS3000, the ratio of women on Australian
boards has increased from 11% in 2010 to 17.5% in
2013 which would suggest that it is the smaller, less inves
tor-focus companies that are dragging their feet. At a man
agement level, women make up 18.6% of senior positions
but this is really only driven by the fact that 42% of
shared services positions are held by women.
For
the Australian companies under CS coverage, only
4.5% have female CEOs, only 18% of the finance
and strategy roles are held by women (and this is
overstated by the inclusion of the IR function here)
and 10.9% of business operations are headed by
women. Again, we would be concerned that this is
tokenism as a response to targets.
The impact of shareholders
In the US, shareholders, particularly public
employee retirement funds, have been pushing for
greater diversity at the board level. This has come
typically with pressure to adopt formal diversity
policies—even though these are not a legal require
ment as yet in the US—either via an AGM proposal
or a commitment from the company’s management
to improve corporate governance practices in return
for the withdrawal of such a proposal.
However, not
all management teams have lived up to their prom
ises. At the end of May 2014, this issue was high-
Figure 31
Impact of quotas and targets on female board representation
25%
Source: UK: ONS, Cranfield University Female FTSE reports; France: Institut national de la statistique et des etudes economiques; GMI ratings: ASX
20
15
10
5
0
1990
1995
1999
2000
UK – FTSE 100
Australia – ASX 200
Austria
2001
2002
France – CAC
2003
2004
2005
Netherlands
2006
2007
Italy
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
New Zealand
Belgium
�
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 47
lighted by the New York State comptroller, Thomas
P. DiNapoli, also the overseer of the New York
State Common Retirement Fund who publicly said
that he would vote against a specific management
team to protest against their corporate governance
failings and specifically the lack of diversity on the
board despite commitments made in 2009 in return
for the withdrawal of shareholder proposals.
CalSTRS, the California teachers’ pension fund,
has managed to secure the appointment of women
or minorities in 14 out of 35 instances where it has
put forward shareholder proposals for action . We
believe that requiring companies to disclose their
diversity policies and numbers in their annual report
might be a way to incentivize meaningful change across
the management structure.
We believe that closing the gap is not impossible, but
will take time. The speed of this process will vary from
country to country and will depend on several factors.
Below we list a few suggestions that come from the analysis performed in the report as well as from empirical evi
dence of the success stories we have seen over the past
few years.
There is no silver bullet; but the combination of
the appropriate policies and initiatives altogether can be
extremely impactful.
Table 16
Progressive measures
Source: Credit Suisse Research
Type
Description
Key points
•• Introduction and furthering of legislation
supportive to women and cultural change. We
do not include quotas which we consider
generally detracting from the broader issues.
•• Appointment of official diversity Watchdog
•• Introduction of Swedish style and longer term
shared parental level
•• State provision of childcare assistance to allow
women to work if they choose
•• State promotion of work place flexibility for all
Education
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM\NOSTAL6IE
Legislation
•• How are STEM subjects being taught?
•• Make learning more interactive
•• Teach STEM subjects in a more practical,
creative and engaging way
•• Make maths a requirement for school leaving
certification. It can be continued practice and
application or continued learning and skill
development
•• Provision of diversity information to accompany
all financial reporting.
•• Disclosure of diversity targets and progress
•• Disclosure of diversity initiatives and
education benefits
•• Disclosure of female talent retention initiatives
•• Disclosure of gender pay-gap
•• Ensure CEOs properly accountable
•• Penalties for failing to comply with diversity
reporting.
•• Control and monitor persistent
recruiting practices
Regulation
.
PHOTO: ISTOCK.COM\MATTJEACOCK
WOMEN IN BUSINESS
48
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 49
Appendix I
Table 17
Current gender quotas and disclosure requirements
Source: CS Research, European Women’s Lobby, Paul Hastings: Breaking the Glass Ceiling – Third Edition, PWC Malaysian Code on Corporate Governance 2012, Catalyst Group
Annual report diversity disclosure requirement
Board or senior managementlevel disclosure
Voluntary. Listed companies must
comply or explain
No
No
Listed companies must disclose
targets and progress
Comply or explain
Yes
Board, senior mgmt. and overall
workforce gender balance
Austria
Voluntary target of 35% for stateowned companies only by 2018
Listed companies required to consider diversity at board level
Yes, EU directive April 2014
Board
Belgium
At least 1/3 male directors and at
least 1/3 female directors by
2018
Mandatory
Yes, EU directive April 2014
Board
Brazil
40% target for State-controlled
companies
Voluntary. Waiting for Senate
approval
No
No
Canada
Ontario Securities Commission
proposal for TSX-listed company
disclosure of diversity targets and
progress.
Public consultation
ended April 2014
Comply or explain if approved.
Waiting Senate second reading
If approved
Proposal covers board and executive officers
Denmark
Targets and disclosure recommended
Comply or explain
Yes
Board
Finland
Both genders must be represented
on listed company boards
Comply or explain
Yes
Board
France
Listed companies and companies
with more than 500 employees
should have at least 40% by
2017*
Comply or explain
Yes, EU directive April 2014
Board
Germany
Companies obliged to “aim for
appropriate inclusion of women”
Comply or explain
Yes, EU directive April 2014
Board
Hong Kong SAR
Companies should aim for a balance of appropriate diversity, skills
and experience
Comply or explain
Yes
Board
Iceland
40% female representation on
boards
Mandatory for listed companies
Yes
Board, senior mgmt. and overall
workforce gender balance
Israel
50% female board directors at
state-owned companies. Since
April 1999, boards of listed companies have been required to have
at least 1 female director.
Mandatory
Yes
Board
Italy
33% quota for boards of listed
and state-owned companies by
2015
Comply or explain
Yes, EU directive April 2014
Board
Japan
PM Abe goal of 30% women
senior managers by 2020
NA
No
No
Malaysia
30% quota for new board appointments
Mandatory
Yes
Board
Netherlands
Supervisory boards to set and disclose diversity aims
Comply or explain
Yes, EU directive April 2014
Board
New Zealand
Listed companies must disclose
any targets and progress
Comply or explain
Yes
Board and senior mgmt
Norway
40% female representation on
boards
Mandatory for listed companies
Yes
Board, senior mgmt.
and overall
workforce gender balance
Singapore
No. Boards should consider
appropriate diversity
Comply or explain
No
No
South Africa
Boards should consider appropriate diversity. Financial Services
Charter targets 11%black women
directors
Comply or explain
No
No
Spain
At least 40% of both genders at
traded companies by March 2015
Comply or the lack of diversity will
be considered when State contracts and subsidies are awarded
Yes, EU directive April 2014
Board
Sweden
Target of equal gender representation on boards
Comply or explain
Yes
Board, senior mgmt.
and overall
workforce gender balance
UK
Recommendation for 25% female
representation on boards of listed
companies by 2015
Comply or explain
Yes from 2014
Board, senior mgmt. and overall
workforce gender balance
US
No
No
Must disclose if diversity is a consideration when directors are put
forward for nominated
Board
Board quota or target
Mandatory or voluntary
Argentina
No
Australia
* France has met its Phase 1 target of 20% female representation on boards by 2014.
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
50
Appendix II
Manual versus non-manual industries and
old economy versus new economy sectors
Manual versus non-manual labor industries
If we compare companies for which manual labor is a key component
of the final product (manufacturing, mining, etc) to those for which most
of the inputs are non-manual (banks, insurance, technology, etc.), we
find that women account for only 8% of the top management of “man
ual” industries versus 16% for non-manual ones. Intuitively, and given
historic reasons, that is not a surprise. Yet, in Europe, Emerging Europe,
Latin America and North America the difference is only a few percent
age points; in Scandinavia there is almost no difference, while in places
like Japan, South Korea or Indonesia the percentage of women in nonmanual industries is 3 to 5 times larger than that of women in manual
labor industries. In the more influential positions, such as CEOs and
Operations, the gap between “manual” and “non-manual” is far larger.
So while much is made of the low levels of participation in these manual
industries generally, the cultural overlay is still the key driver.
So we would expect the closing of the gender gap in top manage
ment in these more “paternalistic” countries to be driven by the services
sector gaining market share along with further globalization of consumer
products and technology.
Further ahead, the internationalization of edu
cation, admittedly at an elite level, along with cross-border work experi
ence, should gradually help to “import” more liberal and accepting atti
tudes towards women in the workplace in many of these countries.
Old economy versus new world industries
We would have expected to find a marked difference in the presence
of women in the top management of old world industries (oil, leisure,
machinery, mining, airlines, autos, etc.) versus new world industries (con
sulting, employment services, education, internet retail, etc.). Most coun
tries show similar percentages.
Japan is probably the most interesting case with an 18% participa
tion in “new” sectors versus a mere 3% in “old” sectors. This bodes
well for a gradual increase in the participation of women in the top
management of the Japanese corporate world—but it will take a long
time as the “old world” sectors will not disappear suddenly.
Also, when we look across the roles occupied by women in the top
management—CEO, CFO/Strategy, Operations and Shared Ser
vices—there is not a marked difference between new and old sectors
with the exception of developed Asia and Emerging Europe.
Age of existence
Another way to segment companies is based on the age of each
firm.
We look for discernible trends across the different top manage
ment roles on a pure global basis. We found no overall difference
between older and younger firms, with the exception of operations
roles: firms in existence for 15 years or less show that women in
operations account for 11% of the total; for firms older than 20 years,
the corresponding number is just 8%.
At the CEO level the only other point worth noting is that the 4%
female participation is pretty consistent across all ages, with a 6%
peak for firms founded 15 to 20 years ago.
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS 51
Table 18
Proportion of roles held by women in manual and non-manual labor-dominated industries
Source: Credit Suisse Research
Business Mgmt/
Operations
CEO
Region
Manual
NonManual
CFO/IR/Strategy
Shared Services
NonManual
NonManual
NonManual
Manual
Manual
Manual
Total
Manual
NonManual
Developed Asia
1%
5%
1%
14%
11%
20%
12%
30%
5%
18%
Emerging Asia
3%
8%
7%
13%
21%
22%
15%
19%
13%
17%
Europe
1%
6%
6%
14%
22%
18%
22%
23%
13%
16%
EEMEA
0%
3%
4%
9%
14%
11%
27%
22%
11%
11%
North America
3%
4%
8%
14%
14%
19%
27%
29%
14%
18%
Latam
4%
2%
4%
9%
12%
11%
14%
20%
8%
11%
Total
2%
5%
6%
13%
16%
19%
21%
25%
12%
17%
Table 19
Proportion of roles held by women in old and new industries
Source: Credit Suisse Research
Business Mgmt/
Operations
CEO
CFO/IR/Strategy
Shared Services
Total
Region
Old
New
Old
New
Old
New
Old
New
Old
New
Developed Asia
4%
2%
5%
18%
16%
22%
20%
33%
10%
21%
Emerging Asia
7%
3%
11%
10%
21%
23%
16%
24%
15%
16%
Europe
4%
5%
12%
10%
21%
16%
23%
23%
15%
15%
EEMEA
2%
0%
8%
6%
14%
6%
26%
20%
12%
9%
North America
3%
4%
12%
10%
16%
17%
27%
29%
16%
16%
Latam
2%
5%
7%
11%
12%
7%
20%
5%
11%
7%
Total
4%
4%
10%
11%
17%
19%
22%
27%
14%
16%
Table 20
Proportion of roles held by women based on the age of each firm
Source: Credit Suisse Research
CEO role
Bus Mgmt/
Product/Sales
roles
CFO/IR/
Strategy roles
Shared Svcs/
IT/Legal/HR
roles
Total women in
senior
management
0-5yrs
4%
12%
19%
24%
16%
5-10yrs
4%
11%
17%
20%
14%
10-15yrs
4%
11%
20%
24%
15%
15-20yrs
6%
12%
19%
26%
16%
20-25yrs
4%
8%
16%
22%
12%
25-30yrs
3%
9%
20%
24%
14%
30-35yrs
4%
7%
15%
23%
13%
PHOTO: ISTOCK.COM\VM
Firm Age
. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
52
References and further reading
• Abbott L, Parker S and Presley T: Female
Board Presence and the Likelihood of
Financial Restatement. Accounting Horizons,
Vol 26, Issue 4, December 2012
• Accenture 2014: Career Capital – 2014
Global Research Results
• Adams R, Gray S and Nowland J: Does
Gender Matter in the Boardroom? Evidence
from the Market Reaction to Mandatory new
Director Announcements. November 2011
• Ahern K and Dittmar A: The Changing of the
Boards: The Impact on Firm Valuation of
Mandated Female Board Representation.
Quarterly Journal of Economics vol 127 (1),
2012
• Aliaga C: Eurostat Statistics in Focus: How is
the time of women and men distributed in
Europe? 2006
• Alves P, Couto E and Francisco P: Board of
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. WOMEN IN BUSINESS
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