Number of women on UK boards up 50%, but parity challenges remain

The number of women on the boards of directors of the UK’s 350 top publicly traded firms has jumped by more than 50 percent since 2015, but women are still underrepresented in senior executive roles.

Women now hold more than a third of the seats on the boards of the United Kingdom’s biggest companies, meeting a government target set five years ago. The number of women on the boards of directors of the UK’s 350 top publicly traded firms has jumped by more than 50 percent since 2015, meaning that 34.3 percent of all board seats are now held by women, an independent panel said in a report published Wednesday. Women hold at least one-third of the board seats at 220 companies, up from 53 five years ago. While companies met the target for board membership, women still lag behind in the competition for senior executive roles, particularly at smaller firms. Women hold 26.5 percent of executive committee seats at the 100 largest companies and just 21.7 percent of these seats at smaller companies.