In this final installment of a three-part series, I promised you that I would provide statistics associated with companies that have a greater percentage of women on the board of directors. To do this I would like to share an article that I read in the Financial Times Limited that was published on July 23rd. I will print the article in its entirety:

Women crack glass ceiling from above

By Francesco Guerrera in New York

Published: July 23 2008 03:00 | Last updated: July 23 2008 03:00

Women have a much better chance of breaking through the US corporate glass ceiling if they work for companies that have several female board directors, according to research to be published on Wednesday.

A study of Fortune 500 companies between 2001 and 2006 showed that companies with a high percentage of female board directors ended up with more women in senior managerial positions than rivals with male-dominated boards.

The research was carried out by Catalyst, an organisation that is focused on women in the workplace.

It comes after similar studies showed that companies that had more female directors and managers performed better financially.

“This is a road map for companies,” Ilene Lang, Catalyst’s president, said in an interview.

“We are showing that if a company has a significant number of women on the board it is very likely that it will increase the number of women in senior leadership and do better financially.

“It doesn’t happen by dumb luck.”

The new road map, she said, “shows companies that once they start on this path, they will get very significant results”.

If Catalyst’s findings hold true, companies where a large number of directors are female – such as AT&T, the telecommunications group, office supply maker Xerox, and Sara Lee, the food group – should outperform their rivals in the next few years.

On average, women hold one in seven board positions in Fortune 500 companies and about the same proportion of senior managerial -positions.

But the study found that companies where the percentage of female directors was highest – where women made up about a quarter of the board – ended up with a third more women corporate officers than rivals that have fewer female directors.

“Women board directors are a predictor of women corporate officers,” the study’s authors said. “The more women board directors a company has [had] in the past, the more women corporate officers it will have in the future.”

Ms Lang said the reason for the stark difference was that female directors acted as powerful role models for more junior colleagues and helped them defuse stereotypes about women in the workplace.

“Women can crack the glass ceiling from both the top and the bottom,” she said. “It matters a lot who is at the top. People feel it. When diversity and inclusion are embraced by the senior-most level of the company, it really does filter down.”

The research found that female board directors had a greater impact on the growth in the number of women corporate officers in frontline businesses such as manufacturing, marketing and sales than in back-office functions such as human resources.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008