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The University of Calgary’s Haskayne School of Business (Haskayne) and the Alberta Securities Commission (ASC) today announced the results of the second annual Alberta Women on Boards Index.
This initiative is a research study intended to provide greater visibility into the gender makeup of the boards of directors of publicly traded TSX and TSX-Venture (TSXV) Alberta issuers(1). In 2016, the research scope was expanded to include named executive officers (NEOs) of TSX Alberta issuers(2).
Findings of the study, as of September 15, 2016, include:
- 32 per cent of new board directors of TSX-listed Alberta issuers appointed in 2016 are women, an increase from 22 per cent in 2015.
- Women account for eight per cent of NEOs for TSX-listed Alberta issuers.
- The province’s largest companies are leaders in diversifying their boards; women now hold 23 per cent of board positions at Alberta companies included in the TSX 60.
- Seven of the 10 new board members appointed to these companies in the last year are women.
- All of these companies have at least two female directors on their board. - Women hold 11 per cent of board positions of all TSX-listed Alberta issuers, an increase from nine per cent in 2015.
- The number of TSXV-listed board positions held by women has remained steady at four per cent over the last three years.
- Women hold the Chair position on the boards of seven Alberta issuers.
While the past year has held economic challenges for many Alberta-based issuers, that climate did not appear to hamper the move towards increased gender diversity on boards of larger issuers. “The percentage of women who were appointed as new board directors of TSX-listed Alberta issuers has increased year-over-year to 32 per cent, and this change was led by some of the largest companies reporting in Alberta,” notes Loren Falkenberg, Haskayne’s associate dean of research and co-chair of the study’s advisory committee. “While these results highlight that organizations are slowly beginning to recognize the importance of diverse representation on their boards, they also point to a troubling lack of female representation at the senior executive level.”
Alison Trollope, director of communications and investor education at the ASC, said that a benefit of collecting this data and making it available to the public is to increase transparency for investors and other stakeholders of non-venture issuers.
“We think it’s important to provide this information about gender diversity to our capital market, as we’ve heard from investors that they find it useful in making informed voting and investment decisions,” said Ms. Trollope.
The Alberta Women on Boards Index benefits from an Advisory Committee comprised of senior business leaders who oversee its development. In addition to Dr. Falkenberg and Ms. Trollope, the committee members include:
- Trudy Curran, Corporate Director
- Wendy Hanrahan, Executive Vice President, Corporate Services, TransCanada Corporation
- Linda Hohol, Corporate Director
- Byron Neiles, Executive Vice President, Corporate Services, Enbridge Inc.
