More women aiming for top jobs

Tuesday 18 November 2014

A new apprenticeship scheme is now running to get more women into the boardroom. The first group of apprentices is currently working through the Board Apprenticeship Scheme, with one of them one of them based in Jersey.

Charlotte Valeur, who has 30 years investment business experience and who sits on and chairs boards of listed companies, is one of the people behind it. The idea is to provide a route to Non-Executive Director (NED) positions besides social contacts, and because it provides a gateway to directorships of listed companies in particular.

Often, listed companies require directors to already have experience on a listed company’s board, creating a closed circle of available directors.

"On many boards, I have been the only woman. Luckily, I have been working with men all my life, so I become ‘one of the guys’ very easily. But that’s not what we are looking for, not women acting like men, but women acting like women.

“We want to offer people who are ready for the opportunity to learn the trade. We take the apprentices through a full financial year. There is one scheme for people who have board experience already, and one group for people who have reported to boards but not sat on them, and they go to unlisted companies.

“We started in May, and we have two that have started and up to seven in the pipeline. One is here, on a FTSE250 company – that is good for Jersey.

“We are looking to diversify the pool of board-ready candidates. If the apprentices don’t become NEDs, we won’t have achieved that much."

Her comments were supported by the Chairman of the Jersey branch of the Institute of Directors, Wendy Dorman, who would not support quotas for female board members being given to companies, and says that the issue is better tackled at the supply side:

“I am not someone who has ever been a fan of quotas because I do not think many women would like to be on a board because they needed a token woman,” she said.

“They would rather be there because they thought of them as the right person for the role. For me, I would far rather see public opinion sway board appointments, rather than legislation.

“I think that over the next ten years things will change – there’s a drag effect of things changing within the professions, plus demand goes up because there is public awareness and pressure on boards to be more diverse.”

Today also sees the launch of a new series of events entitled "Women in Business", by the Jersey Community Relations Trust, aimed at generating more opportunities for women. The series begins tonight with a speech at the Grand Hotel by Jo Fairley, who is best known for co-founding Green and Black's.

The full interview with Ms Valeur and Mrs Dorman is published in the November/December issue of Connect, which can be read here.