Where Are All The Women In The FTSE 100?
The Standard asked this question last night in an article. All of the usual reasons are given and never being at boardroom level in a large company, I wouldn’t know why there are so few.
i do remember though at a dinner of the Ipswich law Society many years ago, the Education Officer or something like that of the Law Society getting up and saying that looking at the statistics of legal education, that by the turn of the millennium, there wouldn’t be any good male lawyers coming through.
i don’t have the statistics, but I know quite a few exceptional female lawyers who could have done well in business. so why do exceptional women choose certain professions like law, medicine, dentistry and veterinary science, but shun others like business and engineering?
Everybody has the right to a good career and exceptional people will succeed, wherever they go. So perhaps the problem is not the selection process, but the reasons why the various groups choose their particular career path.
I was interested to see that one of the women featured is Alison Cooper, the head of Imperial Tobacco. It’s not a job I would do on ethical grounds and I’m rather surprised that a woman has decided to do it. But she does like an odd cigar. As she has two daughters, I bet she gets a bit of stick about it.
The Anonymous Widower 
Many of the people in these very high positions have been privately educated. Many private schools are single sex. Although they will have the same education in all girls schools as in all boys schools, I cant help wondering if there is somehow a subtle link
Comment by Liz P | October 10, 2012 |