The underrepresentation of women on boards remains a key area of focus for organizations globally, but overall progress remains slow, and for women in leadership positions, even slower.

The Deloitte Global Boardroom Program’s Seventh Edition of the Women in the boardroom: A global perspective report includes updates from 72 countries on gender diversity in the boardroom, exploring insights on the political, social, and legislative trends behind these numbers. While these private and public sector efforts demonstrate steps toward achieving parity, the pace of collective progress needs to pick up.

Highlights include:

• The 2022 report reveals a disconnect between gender progress on boards and in the executive suite; only 6.7% of board chairs are women, with even fewer women holding the CEO role, at just 5%.
• A global average of just 19.7% of board seats are held by women, an increase of 2.8 percentage points since 2018. If this rate of change were to continue, we could expect to reach something near parity around 2045 – 7 years earlier than the findings of our previous report.
• Companies with women CEOs have significantly more balanced boards than those led by men—33.5% women vs. 19.4%, respectively.

This year, Deloitte Global collaborated with The 30% Club, whose mission is to achieve at least 30% representation of women in board seats and executive leadership among all listed companies. The report provides a short summary of the “story on the ground" for each country where the 30% Club maintains a chapter, portraying a world of uneven progress.

About the Deloitte Global Boardroom Program

The Deloitte Global Boardroom Program brings together the knowledge and experience of Deloitte member firms around the world to address critical topics of universal interest to company boards and management. Supplementing country programs, its mission is to promote dialogue between corporations and their boards and management, investors, the accounting profession, academia, and government. In addition to the publication of thought-pieces on critical topics, the Deloitte Global Boardroom Program hosts a series of must-see webinar discussions with eminent panelists to enable boards and management of global companies to challenge perceived wisdom. For more information about the program contact globalboardroomprogram@deloitte.com. Find us online.