Women Slow to Gain Seats on Boards and in the C-Suite, Says New Research

Two separate studies released recently found that women are not cracking the glass ceiling and closing the gap with men in the boardroom and C-suite.

While the number of women on boards in the Philadelphia region has slightly increased in recent years, it may take the better part of a century before parity is seen in boardrooms in the area, a new survey has found.

The results of the survey, called "Women on Boards 2007: The Time Has Come," were released today by the Forum of Executive Women, a premier organization of influential women leaders in the Philadelphia region, and showed that Philadelphia companies are continuing to fall behind the national average for the number of women in the boardroom.

The number of women on boards in the region has increased less than one percent between 2005 (9.73 percent) to 2006 (10.41 percent), and the numbers are better for 15 local companies in the Fortune 500, with 13.77 percent of women on boards. Still, the overall national 2006 Catalyst average was closer to 14.6 percent.

"At the current improvement rate, it will take nearly 50 years for executive women to reach gender parity, and nearly 75 years to reach parity in board seats," said Elva L. Bankins, President of The Forum of Executive Women, and Senior Vice President at CEO Resources, Inc. in a statement today. "While there is some encouraging data, the numbers are essentially flat. So we must continue to engage in discussions with our corporate leaders to identify the obstacles and take advantage of all opportunities to make strategic and meaningful improvements. It is essential that we remove the barriers that are keeping our region from reaching its fullest potential."

"In the race for talent, women are barely on the playing field in the most senior levels of the largest companies in the world," --Irene Natividad, co-chair of CWDI

Research for the reportwas conducted by the Forum of Executive Women's Executive Suites committee and professional services firm Deloitte & Touche USA, and was based on 2006 data reported by the region's 100 largest public companies.

A second study, by Corporate Women Directors International (CWDI) found that women are not landing C-level jobs at faster rates.

CWDI, a nonprofit advocacy group, said yesterday that while women held 11.8 percent of board seats on Fortune Global 100 companies last year, only 6.6 percent of senior executive officers were women. Translation: only 73 positions of 1,113 executive positions were held by women. Put another way: 57 percent of the Fortune Global 100 companies evaluated by CWDI did not have a single woman officer and 18 percent had no women directors.

“In the race for talent, women are barely on the playing field in the most senior levels of the largest companies in the world,” said Irene Natividad, co-chair of CWDI, in a statement upon release of the findings. “Given this low representation, it’s hard to see dramatic increases in the number of female CEOs and board directors over the next decade.”

Natividad called the findings “ironic” because the percentage of women as workers, consumers, small-business owners, and investors continues to grow.

The CWDI did, however, single out certain companies for having women representation on their boards. Six of AT&T’s directors are women while the company with the highest percentage of women directors is Royal Ahold with four out of seven directors. The study also singled out the U.S. Postal Service, Hewlett-Packard, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, and McKesson for having at least 25 percent of their senior executive positions filled by women.