Data from Chief Executive Women (CEW) reveals a net gain of eight female CEOs in the ASX Top 300 during the last financial year.
Though noteworthy, the numbers cast a spotlight on an underlying issue: 91% of ASX 300 CEOs remain male.
CEW president Susan Lloyd-Hurwitz offered a stark assessment of the situation, calling progress “glacial” in an interview with the Herald Sun: "There is progress … but it is too slow. This is not relax time, this is accelerate time.
“To a very large extent the public service and indeed, surprisingly, even parliament is way ahead of corporate Australia on the focus on gender equity,” she said.
“The Australian public service has done a tremendous job over the last decade or so; they focused on it, and they set targets, and you see the result.
“It’s very clear that companies with gender-balanced executive teams do better for shareholders, that they do better around sustainability. They just perform better in all ways.”
The latest CEW census tagline is just as candid: 'Incremental change failing to solve the crisis'.
More work to be done
The 2023 census notes improvements among ASX 100 companies, all of which now have at least one female in their executive leadership teams.
However, CEO recruitment pipelines still heavily favour men, with 80% of roles earmarked for CEO training being held by them.
Lloyd-Hurwitz emphasises the need for timely interventions to improve the talent uptake for senior roles.
“(Companies) are going to have to improve the pipeline of talent for people coming into senior executive positions (and) the interventions need to happen when people are in their late 20s and early 30s, not when they’re just about to get to the ELT (executive leadership team) or the CEO job,” she said.
“The ASX 200 and the ASX 300 need to have a greater focus on this as an issue and it shouldn’t be seen as an equity issue; this is a productivity and a performance issue.”
An issue of performance
A study by an international team of researchers recently found that gender diversity among company management results in higher “psychological safety” within a business, leading to better performance, particularly in dealing with adverse conditions.
University of Sydney's Dr Stephen Zhang, who is a senior lecturer in Strategy, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, explained "psychological safety" as an environment in which staff feel relaxed or comfortable enough to speak openly and freely in discussions affecting the company.
"When a company has levels of high psychological safety, the employees feel that they have more freedom and are less concerned about the possible consequences of raising issues and problems in the company," said Dr Zhang.
According to the 2023 census, 71% of executive leadership roles are held by men. While 23% of ASX 300 companies have gender-balanced executive teams, 28 of them have no women at all in such roles.
The report suggests it will take more than a decade to achieve gender parity in executive leadership.
Investors are encouraged to prioritise gender diversity during due diligence, with 39% of ASX 300 and 55% of ASX 100 companies already setting 40:40 or better gender targets.
The report advises investors to prioritise gender diversity during the due diligence process and in making investment choices, stating this could "encourage a race to the top for disclosure".