Report: 2009 Catalyst Census: Financial Post 500 Women Board Directors

The 2009 Catalyst Census: Financial Post 500 Women Board Directors examines women’s representation on corporate boards at the most profitable companies in Canada, assessing women’s advancement and highlighting the gender diversity gap among corporate board directorships. To allow for comparisons over time, Catalyst tracks:

• Women’s share of all board seats and share of board leadership positions;
• Women’s board representation in public, private, crown, and cooperative companies and by Industry;
• The percentage of companies having zero to three or more women directors.

Findings:

In 2009, women held 14.0 percent of board seats at Financial Post 500 companies, an increase of one percentage point since 2007. In both 2007 and 2009, more than 40 percent of companies had no women directors. Similar to 2007, women held just 3.2 percent of board chair seats in 2009. Finally, while women’s representation on private company boards increased 4 percentage points from 2007, crown companies continue to have the highest representation of women on their boards compared to other types of companies.