UK's lack of female bosses is weird, says Royal Mail's Moya

[TrueBlueTerrier]

UK's lack of female bosses is weird, says Royal Mail's Moya Greene

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Moya Greene, the boss of Royal Mail and the most recent addition to the tiny group of female chief executives in the FTSE 100, has said the lack of female bosses in the UK is "weird".

Greene, who steered the successful stock market flotation of Royal Mail this year, said company directors must demand to know:

"Where are the women?"

"There is no shortage of great female talent in Britain," said Greene, a Canadian who joined Royal Mail from Canada Post in 2010, told the Sunday Times. "I have met some outstanding executives."

She said bosses needed to ask themselves "what it is about Britain" that has led to so few women making it to the top job: "If people like me, when they get the list from executive recruiters, do not ask, 'Where are the women?' who is going to say it?

"It seems so weird to me that in all of the UK you can't find a list more representative of the whole population."

Greene is one of just four female FTSE 100 chief executives. The others are Carolyn McCall of easyJet, Alison Cooper of Imperial Tobacco and Angela Ahrendts of Burberry.

Liv Garfield will join as chief executive of water company Severn Trent in early 2014, pushing the total up to five until Ahrendts leaves for Apple in California next year.

Inga Beale has been appointed the first female chief executive of insurance market Lloyd's of London, where women were banned from the underwriting room until 1972.

However, three FTSE 100 companies – Glencore Xstrata, the London Stock Exchange and Antofagasta – do not have a single female director. It would have been five if Vedanta and Croda had not been demoted from the FTSE 100 this month.

It is almost three years since Lord Davies published his report calling on FTSE 100 companies to achieve 25% female representation by 2015.

In the first 18 months since the report was published, the female share of FTSE 100 boards increased from 12.5% to 17.4%. The rate of increase has slowed considerably since and currently stands at 19.8%.

Alison Carnwath at Land Securities is the only female chair of a FTSE 100 company.

Norway, Italy, France, Spain, Belgium, Iceland and Dubai have all introduced quotas forcing companies to appoint a certain number of women to their boards. Germany has voted in favour of introducing a 30% quota.

[Lounge Lizard]

Maybe the remuneration isn't good enough.

[the deliverer]

Maybe its because they are half the man Moya is.

[houseoflords]

More women in business? Power dressing and shoulder pads aswell yea?