Where Women’s Advancement is and isn’t Working
Women are increasingly represented on the boards of major Swiss financial companies than in other industries. These role models provide more of an incentive than a measurement of success, which remains elusive.
Promoting women’s careers has been an ongoing effort in many Swiss companies in recent years. With a shortage of skilled workers and the increasing retirement of baby boomers, the economy is desperately looking for well-trained specialists, many of whom are women.
Advancing women is being embraced because, in the many companies that continue to be male-dominated, the conviction has taken hold that gender-diverse teams can lead to success.
But such vaunted diversity only becomes credible when the gender mix is evident in executive suites.
Political Pressure
It’s one of the reasons why Swiss legislators are giving women’s representation in large listed companies a bit of a nudge. Following transitional periods, companies in Switzerland must demonstrate 30 percent of the board of directors is comprised of women starting from 2026, and 20 percent on the executive board from 2031.
If the benchmarks aren’t met, reasons must be given in the compensation report and remedies must be specified.
SMI Companies Nearly There
Efforts to promote women are making slow but steady progress at major Swiss companies, according to the latest board of directors study published Tuesday by human resources consultant Russell Reynolds.
The 20 companies listed on the Swiss Market Index (SMI) have almost all met their target board-level representation targets. Currently, 18 are above the threshold, after 15 companies met the requirements in the previous year.
Credit Suisse Omission Impactful
Falling below the threshold are Givaudan at 29 percent and logistics company Kuehne + Nagel at 22 percent. The latter replaced Credit Suisse, whose board of directors was made up of a majority of women, in the SMI.
Critics accused the failed Credit Suisse board of directors of focusing too much on superficial diversity rather than on the skills of the individuals.
Exemplary Financial Sector
On average, the proportion of women on SMI boards is 34.4 percent, compared with 34.3 percent in the previous year, according to Russell Reynolds’ count.
Despite the omission of Credit Suisse, financial sector companies have a particularly high proportion of women on the top supervisory board with 37.6 percent.
In the new elections, four of the ten newly elected female board members were recruited from the financial sector. New additions include CSS CEO Philomena Colatrella (Swiss Life), Boston Consulting partner Pia Tischhauser (Swiss Re), Briton Vanessa Lau (Swiss Re), and former Societe Generale COO Gaelle Olivier (Partners Group).
International Laggards
An international comparison shows Switzerland can’t boast too much though. In terms of the proportion of women, SMI companies have fallen behind Sweden, Spain, Finland, and Germany.
The study’s authors measured a real quantum leap in 2022 when the SMI companies increased the proportion of women by 4.6 percentage points. Now, listed companies from France (45.3 percent), Norway (43.2 percent), and Italy (42.6 percent) lead the way.
Complicated Measurement
Academia has long argued whether diversity affects a company’s financial performance. Many studies show only weak correlations and proof of a causal relationship has hardly been established.
Researchers explain this, among other things, by the fact that the studies focus too narrowly on «diversity», leaving out measures of «equality» and «inclusion».
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