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All the essential informations about the Club and our activity in Poland on one page

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Diversity on Supervisory Boards, November 2021

“Diversity on Supervisory Boards 2021” examines the reasons for low level of female nominations to supervisory boards by domestic institutional investors. The report was initiated by 30% Club Poland Investor Group and it shows the results of a survey conducted among institutional investors in Poland.

Majority of surveyed institutional investors’ representatives recognise the problem of low diversity of Polish listed companies’ boards. 50% of respondents consider broad diversity on boards (gender, education, age, etc.) in their investment decisions. When narrowing down to the gender diversity of corporate boards, 1/3 of respondents take this indicator into account, while incorporating ESG criteria into their decision making.

However, institutional investors rarely nominate women to supervisory boards – only one in ten respondents regularly does so. As the key reasons, they point to the insufficient number of women in their own candidate bases and the less active way in which women promote their candidacies.

Based on these declarative responses, a solution to the problem of low female representation on supervisory boards is within reach, and institutional investors have the potential to change the status quo. 16.6% of respondents consider the gender ratio of the board when nominating a candidate. 43.8% are not doing so yet, but say that ongoing changes in the market environment may prompt them to take this aspect into account in the future.

Read the report

Women on boards and company performance, January 2021

The share of women on boards of 140 Polish listed companies from the WIG20, mWIG40 and sWIG80 indices was a mere 13.8% by the end of 2019. Additionally, progress to rectify this imbalance has been slow, with an increase of only 3.8pp observed over the last decade. Firms with a higher representation of women on boards saw competitive advantages in terms of higher net margins and lower share price volatility. This data is drawn from “Women on boards and company performance”, a report published by CFA Society Poland.

Read the report (English version)

Read the report (Polish version)

As asset owners and asset managers we are responsible for the stewardship of the investments we make on behalf of our members and clients. Part of that responsibility includes the assessment of the boards and senior management teams of our investee companies. We believe boards that genuinely embrace cognitive diversity, as manifested through appropriate gender representation and a broad spectrum of skills and experience, are more likely to achieve better outcomes for investors. There is increasing research to support this hypothesis.

Main Aim

As members of the 30% Club Poland Chapter Investor Group, we are committed to promote our target of a minimum of 30% women on boards of 140 largest WSE-listed companies by the end of 2030. By boards we understand management and supervisory boards combined. We support the interim target of 20% of women on boards by the end of 2025 and no board without a woman by the end of 2025.

STATEMENT OF INTENT

We joined the 30% Club initiative because it fits very well in our company’s DNA. We are committed to promoting a strong women’s voice in the business world. There is a long way to go ahead of us, because so far only 15% of the boards seats of the largest Polish listed companies are occupied by women. But with small steps, the reality around us is changing. As a large and responsible institutional investor, we want to take part in the change. We are convinced that the diversification of companies’ executive boards is conducive to their development.

     Małgorzata Barska, CEO NN IP

As employers, we care about a diverse work environment in many ways, and we see many benefits for the entire team. However, we can go one step further and, taking advantage of the fact that our funds are stakeholders in many companies, we can also influence the behaviour of other market participants. We hope that our presence at general meetings and our activity during meetings with management boards will allow for an increase in participation of women in the highest governing bodies of listed companies, because we consider the current level of 15% to be unsatisfactory and in the long run detrimental to the issuers themselves.

   Paweł Homiński, CEO Noble Funds

To support our members in increasing the representation of women in top positions, we are offering the opportunity to participate in an intercompany and cross-sector mentoring program.

The program has been run, in partnership with specialised firm Moving Ahead, around the world for 8 years. During that time, it trained over 12,000 participants from more than 200 organizations in 31 countries. The programme builds and strengthens the necessary pipelines to achieve parity of women in leadership and board roles. It matches women mentee from all levels of the career pyramid to more senior mentors (men and women) from another organisation.

The programme is a proven, practical and powerful way to achieve greater gender balance at senior levels within organisations, as well as delivering on gender pay gap reporting, and broader diversity and inclusion goals.

More information in January 2022.