JB HiFi, Nick Scali, Baby Bunting and James Hardie have no women in executive leadership team

Some of Australia’s best known brands are part of a “disturbing” trend that is going to take decades to fix, unless more action is taken.

Gender equality for chief executive roles at Australia’s top public companies is still a staggering 100 years away for women based on current trends, a new report has found.

The “striking” findings came from a new report by Chief Executive Women, which showed that just 14 ASX 200 companies were led by women in 2022.

This was only four more than six years ago, demonstrating the glacial pace of change.

Australian companies had “stalled” in their promotion of women, the report found, with fewer females in gender-balanced leadership teams than in 2021 – down to 50 from 58.

It also revealed that key operational roles occupied by women at ASX 200 companies rose just 3 per cent between 2017 and 2022 to 15 per cent.

The analysis showed that across the broader ASX 300, the number of companies with no women in executive leadership teams jumped to 47 in 2022, up from 44 last year – a “disturbing” trend, according to President of Chief Executive Women, Sam Mostyn.

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President at Chief Executive Women; Sam Mostyn. Picture: Gaye Gerard / NCA Newswire

Companies in the ASX 300 with no women in their executive leadership teams include retailers JB HiFi, Baby Bunting and Nick Scali, materials company James Hardie and Mineral Resources.

Almost two-thirds of companies also have no women in so-called line roles, which are seen as the stepping stone to chief executive positions, and include roles such as chief financial officer, managing director, chief operating officer and group executives.

The data also found out of the 28 CEO appointments at ASX 300 companies in the past year, only four were women.

The report made for sobering reading, revealing that at the current rate, it would take 100 years – until 2122 – to achieve gender equality in chief executive roles, while it would be 2058 before there is gender balance in line roles.

A number of ASX 300 companies have no women in their executive leadership team. Picture: Brendon Thorne/Bloomberg

Ms Mostyn said there was “deep sense of urgency” for change needed from both government and businesses.

She called for “dramatic” changes to be made including legislating for financial sanctions against companies that do not comply with gender equality reporting, as well as requiring employers to introduce targets.

“Incremental is just not cutting it and something quite dramatic has to change,” she told The Australian.

“It’s not only that things have gone backwards or stalled – we’ve got some disturbing trends in areas where you’d expect to have better outcomes. Not only are things stalling, there are some areas where we’ve actually seen a reversal.

“There’s something about the impact of Covid and taking our attention off this … and those in charge are still not understanding the great uplift that’s available to them by having gender balanced leadership teams and promoting women into leadership roles.”

Sam Mostyn said urgent change is needed.

The report also called for gender balance targets be set to improve career pathways for women, after the analysis found that 70 per cent of companies reached gender balance after setting targets of at least 40 per cent of women.

The lack of available childcare as well as affordability constraints, along with inadequate paid parental leave schemes, were also hampering women’s career progression, the report found.

It has recommended universal early childhood education and care, higher pay for care industry roles and government procurement prioritising organisations with gender-balanced leadership.

First Nations women, and women of migrant, refugee and diverse cultural backgrounds were also under-represented when it came to leadership roles, the report found.