Boards more effective with greater women’s participation – WROC

Sandra Glasgow

Indeed public and private sector boards play the important role of providing prudent entrepreneurial leadership, strategic guidance and support for companies and organizations. Of course the effectiveness of such boards is dependent on the experience and skills-set that each board member brings to the board room and the overall governance framework. However, increasingly research is showing that gender diversity is also a major determinant of a board’s success.

Corporate governance expert and chief executive officer of the Private Sector Organization of Jamaica PSOJ Sandra Glasgow believes that the most effective boards are “those comprised of a diverse group of people, with varying experiences, knowledge and skills.” This diversity embraces the need for equal distribution along gender lines. Glasgow explains that “diversity in the broadest sense of the term denotes board members of different gender and ages with different industrial and geographic backgrounds and functional experience who can reach excellent decisions and add significant value to a company.” She however laments that “unfortunately… many boards score poorly when it comes to diversity, especially as far as women directors are concerned.”

Moreover the benefit of including more women on boards is the subject of many academic studies and surveys. The PSOJ 2009 Handbook & Tool Kit on Good Governance handbook cites a study conducted by the Conference Board of Canada in 2002 on women and corporate boards which suggested a strong link between female numbers on boards and good governance credentials. Among other things, the research found that 94% of boards with three or more women (compared to 58% of all-male boards) insist on conflict of interest guidelines; that more female than male directors pay attention to audit and risk oversight and control and that women more than men tend to examine a wider range of management and organizational performance. Overall then, having more women leaders on boards seems to prevent or reduce corruption and impropriety within organizations.

It is against this background that the Women’s Resource and Outreach Centre WROC has been advocating for more women to take up board positions as part of a strategy to improve corporate governance, protect women’s rights and engender national change. Recent data compiled by WROC show that while women have made significant strides in educational and professional development, their participation on boards has only moved by 4 % on public boards and by 2 % on private sector boards over 10 years (1998-2007). Their representation remains inequitable at 16 % on private sector boards and 33% on public boards.

Interestingly WROC’s study titled Gender and Governance: Implications for the Participation of Women on Boards on Commissions in Jamaica found that while the vast majority of men believed that women were prepared for decision making at the level of boards, one third of the women surveyed did not share this view. Although women have the educational qualifications and intelligence to lead many of them feel unprepared for leadership. This formed part of the rationale for the WROC/ United Nations Democracy Fund Strengthening Women’s Leadership in Jamaica Training programme which has also received support from the Canadian International Development Agency. Through this programme some 83 women have already been trained are being empowered to take up positions on boards. Similar to what has been effectively done in other countries such as New Zealand; a database of these qualified and equipped Jamaican women is currently being compiled and will become available by year end. For more information send your emails to communications@wrocjamaica.org