Women Shareholders Demand Gender Equality
The German Women Lawyers Association has been promoting gender diversity in leading positions for many years now.
The problem: The German government and private companies have signed a contract for more gender equality in 2001 - however: The situation in Germany has not improved substantially: In 2010, in the 30 most important DAX-listed companies, 2.16 percent of the managing boards and 7.42 percent of the supervisory boards were women – the latter mostly owed to the „Mitbestimmungsgesetz“ (German Co-determination act), which means women are mostly elected by employees, not by shareholders - according to German Corporate Law there are two boards: the managing board and the supervisory board.
As a start, in October 2007, the German Women Lawyers Association invited 200 women in leading positions together with Mr. Gerhard Cromme, former president of the German Corporate Governance Committee, to a „Corporate Governance Dinner“. At this event, a list of 400 potential female candidates for supervisory boards in German Companies was presented to Mr. Cromme, in order to prove these women actually do exist.
Two years ago one of the members of the German Women Lawyers Association had the idea to visit the annual shareholder meetings of three German companies and ask questions as to the means CEOs as well as the supervisory board will take to change this situation. In order to visit an annual shareholder meeting, one share of the company is sufficient, but also necessary. The idea was born.
In 2010 more than 100 members of the German Women Lawyers Association visited over 70 annual shareholder meetings and asked the respective questions. In general, the board is obliged to answer any question referring to the annual report – should they refuse to do so, shareholders may file a law suit.
Surprisingly, almost every company declared they wanted more diversity, but almost none had taken action to improve the number of women on their boards so far.
The project continued in 2011 – funded by the German Federal Ministry of Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth, organized by the German Women Lawyers Association. We looked for shareholders or convinced women to buy shares in order to send two women each to every annual shareholder meeting. These visitors were mostly members of our association, whom we supplied with a short speech on the topic, as well as information on and questions designed for each company.
For example: If a new member of the supervisory board was to be elected and a male member had been presented, we asked if there were female candidates as well, and if so, why these had not been chosen, respectively if women were not welcome on the board. Furthermore, we asked what measures the company had been taking for a better work-family-balance and how many men in leading positions had been taking „parental leave“, which means up to 12 months „paid“ time off after the birth of a child.
Our conclusion: Companies are not likely to choose more women on boards of companies if not bound by law. Instead it seems the men in those companies prefer to lock women out. This is why German women ask for the necessary action and a women’s quota, similar to Norway, where the quota has been introduced in 2007 – successfully. France followed in 2011 and many other European states are currently discussing the women’s quota.
For a fundamental comprehension of the project we refer to our surveys from 2010 and 2011.