At a glance …
The Businesswomen’s Association (BWA) South African Women In Leadership Census 2008, sponsored by Nedbank has as its key objective the improvement of the overall numbers and representivity of women as corporate leaders in the country. Another objective is to influence decision makers to change the face of gender representation in corporate South Africa. This is to be achieved by highlighting the successes as well as the shortcomings in our national efforts. Reporting on the overall trends is the BWA’s effort at raising awareness of the issue of gender inequality within the workplace.
The total number of women directors has increased from 221 in 2004 to 419 female directors in 2008, a percentage increase from 7,1% to 14,3%. The total number of CEO’s has increased from seven to 13, but this however only represents a change from 1,9% to 3,9%.
The number of Chairs of Boards has increased from 11 to 13, which has actually only moved the overall percentage from 3% to 3,9%. These last two areas represent the vestages of male dominance and not much has changed in these metrics. Deeper analysis of the results raises new questions and challenges. The top performing company’s list has increased once again this year from 31 companies in 2007 to 58 companies that appear on the list for the 2008 census. This is an improvement of almost 87% over the 2007 numbers and is truly encouraging. With more companies joining the fray, we hope to see even more changes in the coming years.
The State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) have moved well ahead of the JSE-listed entities. All 17 (100%) SOEs now have three or more female directors on their executive. This is extremely positive information and this momentum of transformation must now be encouraged within the JSE listed corporates, where 39,6% of JSE-listed companies still have ZERO (0%) female directors on their executive. It seems to indicate that where opportunities to appoint candidates have come about, the appointments have not been in favour of transformation. Much more needs to be done by the JSE listed companies to fully commit to gender transformation.
Going somewhere, slowly … very slowly
Since the inception census of 2004, the results have demonstrated a slow but steady improvement over the past five years. While women make up 51% of the adult population in South Africa, and only 42,4% of the working South African population, they constitute only 25,3% of all executive managers and only 14,3% of all directors in the country.
Some positive trends are visible
Women corporate leaders are a minority within a minority. While there will always be more people in an overall workforce than in corporate leadership positions, the relative representivity of women in executive management and board positions does not correspond meaningfully to the proportion that women form of the overall working population of the country. It is positive to note that the number of women in executive management and director positions has increased since last year by 6,1% and 1,2% respectively. It is also positive to see an increase in the number of women as CEOs and chairpersons from 2006 by 1,2%.
The number of women in corporate leadership has continually increased since the inaugural census in 2004. Unfortunately the total number of executive managers has decreased since 2006. An explanation for this could be that a large proportion of companies include executive managers into subsidiaries resulting in them not being counted in the current census. When looking at the percentages, women constituted 25,3% of all executive management and 14,3% of all directors in 2008. This number has increased significantly since 2004 when it was 14,7% and 7,1% respectively.
Getting women on board
Women are significantly underrepresented in top corporate leadership positions. The gap has closed slightly, between the number of female chairs and CEOs. Altogether 13 (3,9%) chairs of boards in South Africa are women, with the number remaining constant since the last reporting period. It is positive to see an increase in the number of female CEO’s since the last reporting period.
The current reporting period shows 13 female CEO’s, 3,9% of the total number and a 1,4% increase since 2007. The number of women, who are chairs of boards, has remained constant since 2007. This is actually a downward trend in real terms as the total number of company boards has grown from 318 in 2007 to 335 in 2008. It is a disappointing fact that this number has not changed.