The UK’s biggest listed companies have achieved gender-balanced boardrooms, but a lack of women in top jobs has seen the number of female FTSE 100 chief executives fall below 10, according to a Government-backed report.
Progress comes despite more firms looking to “weed out” costly or ineffective diversity goals amid a string of companies scaling back initiatives in the US, the boss of the FTSE Women Leaders Review said.
Vivienne Artz, chief executive of the FTSE Women Leaders Review, said a lack of resistance to diversity initiatives among the biggest UK corporates had propelled change in recent years.
“Whilst FTSE 350 company boards are now gender-balanced, sustained effort and determination is required to achieve the 40% target for women in leadership by the end of this year,” Ms Artz said.
Meanwhile, the analysis also found that the proportion of women in leadership positions increased to 35.3% across FTSE 350 firms, from 34.5% the previous year, as of the end of October 2024.
