‘Women talk too much, make board meeting long’

When the AICD asked ASX 200 companies why more women weren’t on their boards, responses were startling.

AICD chair Elizabeth Proust says there are still 11 ASX 200 companies which have no women on their boards. Picture: David Geraghty

“Poor blokes. They can no longer get a board seat unless they wear a skirt.”

This was one response given by a chair of an ASX 200 company in a letter to the Australian Institute of Company Directors when asked why the company had no women on its board.

AICD chair Elizabeth Proust retold the story at a lunch hosted by the Australian Israel Chamber of Commerce in Sydney yesterday.

She said the AICD had written to the chairs of ASX 200 companies which had no women or only one woman on their boards — some as many as four times — asking them why they didn’t have more women directors.

Other responses were: “We would rather have someone known to the board already.”

“Women aren’t reliable enough to be long-term board members.”

“Women talk too much and make the board meeting too long.”

“We don’t have to and we don’t want to appoint women to our boards.”

“This is 2016 and these are real quotes from people about why they are happy with the status quo,” Ms Proust said.

She said the AICD now had a “reasonable chance” of reaching its goal of having 30 per cent of women on the boards of ASX 200 companies by 2018.

If not it would probably happen by 2019.

“From a level of only 8 per cent or 9 per cent of women on boards a few years ago we now think we are within striking range of that goal,” she said.

She said the top ASX 20 companies had almost reached the goal of having 30 per cent women on boards.

But she said the problem was with smaller ASX companies where the proportion of women on boards was much lower.

There were still 11 ASX 200 companies which had no women on their board.

“Thirty per cent is at point at which you get a critical mass and start to change the conversation.”

She said boards needed to break down the stereotype of a few years ago where “everyone around the board table was male, Anglo Saxon and white.”

“Some might say male, stale and pale,” she said. “That was the mindset.”

Gordon Cairns, the chairman of Origin Energy and Woolworths, told the lunch he was “male and pale but definitely not stale.”

He said his goal was to get to 50 per cent of women on the boards of both companies which had involved pushing executive search consultants to find more women for these boards.