Women on Corporate Boards: The Role of Business Schools

According to GMAC, the organisation which governs the GMAT, a test every applicant for business school has to take, the testing year 2012 had the lowest male-to-female ratio (1.33) in the history of the test. The annual growth rate among women at 4.3 per cent for the past ten years was nearly double the growth rate for men. Consequently, the programmes, curricula and activities now being put in place by business schools aim to prepare and grow the pipeline of women managers and executives.

Elissa Sangster, executive director for the Forté Foundation, an organization dedicated to inspiring women business leaders, comments: “Offering curricula and programs to prepare women to exercise corporate and corporate governance responsibility at all levels, has taken on new urgency and relevance”.

A 2012 report by the Credit Suisse Research Institute, Gender Diversity and Corporate Performance, showed that businesses are more successful with women in the boardroom. Following a 2012 study of 2,400 companies globally, the Institute found that net income growth over the past six years averaged 14 percent in companies with women directors, eclipsing their counterparts without female board members, which posted only ten percent growth.

Nevertheless, half the population constitute only 17 per cent of the representation on Fortune 500 corporate boards. To make a difference, the Forté Foundation contributed to a list that now includes 8,000 women, with the goal to put them on the radar of leading companies. Forté sent invitations to major executive search firms and the chairs of publicly quoted companies giving them access to a searchable database of women with the qualifications to immediately step forward and serve on corporate boards.

This Global Board Ready Women searchable database is administered by the Financial Times Non-Executive Directors Club and has already become an international initiative with more than 100 business schools and professional organizations from around the world as members.

Business schools play a crucial role in the pipeline, both in developing future leaders and promoting current leaders, writes Elissa Sangster. They can help by identifying alumnae who may be a fit for the list of global board-ready women; communicating early to female students about how to become board ready; adding board readiness to the curriculum; continuing the conversation after graduation in alumni magazines and conferences.

(04|2013) Source: Gmac 1, Gmac 2