The Boardroom wants to bring women into the BoD - for more diversity at the management level
The topic of women's quotas is more present in the media than ever before. In theory, more attention is being paid to diversity, but in practice just 15 % of managers in Switzerland are female. Why are theory and practice so far apart?
Why are there still fewer women on boards than men? Several factors come together here, as the founder of the management consultancy The Boardroom had to realize. It's not just the boards that are to blame, but it's not just the women either. The question of blame is a vexed issue anyway, because only with synergetic cooperation do the two groups converge!
Boardroom women on the way up - when the board becomes the goal
On a rainy May day in Zurich, nearly 20 women gather for a meeting to listen to successful businesswoman Mirjam Staub-Bisang (Blackrock Switzerland). She gives a talk on investments, leadership challenges and diversity in business. All the listeners have one thing in common: they are professionally successful! Whether CEOs or HR managers, they have already found their way.
But that's not the end of the story, because the dedicated businesswomen want the space on the board of directors, for more diversity. Career women have one more thing in common: They belong to The Boardroom, the club that wants to revolutionize the quota of women on Swiss boards of directors.
Currently, only 30 percent of board seats are held by women, the rest by men. Diana Markaki, founder of The Boardroom, received her very first mandate at 36 and had only one female fellow member. She felt odd, alone, the great exception. Things didn't get any better after she moved to a Swiss company.
All of this led Markaki to feel a strong pressure to perform, which also brought insecurities. From the perspective of numerous other women, these feelings were a blessing. They eventually moved Markaki to create The Boardroom. The bootcamp where women (and men, too) can learn, to hold their own on the Board of Directors or get there at all.
With The Boardroom, an exclusive club, Markaki wants to change that and prepare women for leadership positions. The club's excellent network plays a major role in this and leads to advancing and living diversity within the framework of various event formats and trainings.
The right personalities are more important than gender
Although Diana Markaki thinks highly of women in leadership positions, gender is not the most important factor for her. It takes the right people for the position. Everywhere discussed about shortage of skilled workersMany of these positions are often filled incorrectly.
The more diverse people's experiences, the more the board benefits. Complex decisions often have to be made, which can be completely re-evaluated through different perspectives. The Boardroom is therefore not specifically aimed at female careerists, but also at those who have not yet thought outside the box. The goal is to tease out strengths and prepare women to assert themselves on boards. This works through networking, trial and error, and assertiveness, even with men!
