Gender diversity in board rooms

Is gender diversity improving in the boardrooms? The latest Women on Board Pakistan survey 2020 released at PSX’s ceremony of ‘Ring the Bell for Gender Diversity’ shows some improvement over the last four years. The survey is conducted by Women on Board Pakistan (WOB), which is a self-funded initiative of voluntary professionals aiming to make diversity mainstreaming an important component of corporate performance. WOB’s objective is to have at least 25 percent gender parity on the corporate boards in Pakistan by 2025.

Besides an increase in absolute numbers of female directorship, the survey shows that women make up 11 percent of the total directorships in 2019 – a 2 percentage point increase from 2016 results. Similarly, listed companies and number of KSE100 index companies with no women directors has also fallen.

Despite the growth in women representation on the board, 50 percent of the listed companies in 2019 still don’t have women directors. The survey also shows that 30 percent KSE 100 companies don’t have a woman director.

Talking to BR Research, Aftab Ahmed, CEO and founder WOB made a few pertinent points. He asserted that despite the improvement, half of the listed companies still don’t have women directors, and those that are directors are usually either part of a family business or relatives. The survey shows that more than 65 percent of women directors are on related basis. Similarly, majority of the women on statutory positions like chairperson or CEO are also on related basis.

An older PICG survey titled ‘Gender Diversity at Board Level’ also highlighted that majority of Pakistani companies with female board members tend to be in family-owned enterprises, which shows that female board members are usually successful when they are able to bypass traditional social barriers through family connections.

Aftab Ahmed also pointed out another lacuna in the status of women directorship in the country: most of the female directors are on 3-4 boards, which further cuts down the number of unique women holding a board position. Furthermore, it’s usually women from major business families of the country that hold position on multiple boards of firms within the sponsor group.

The issue of diversity within corporate boards has gained traction in recent years. Most notable has been the new Companies Act, which requires every public interest company (whether listed or unlisted) to have at least one female director on the board. However, female representation at corporate board level needs more work; 11 percent representation on the board is not enough given the 1000 plus public interest companies.