A Dutch website is 'naming and shaming' companies it claims have no women in senior positions

A Dutch website is "naming and shaming" companies it claims have no women on their Boards of Directors or Supervisory Boards.

The website, titled “Deze mannen kunnen geen vrouw krijge” (These men cannot get a woman) contains images and names of 123 directors and other senior officials.

Not one of them is a woman.

The Social Progress Index, which ranks countries around the world using three indicators - (1) basic human needs (2) foundations of wellbeing and (3) opportunity - placed the Netherlands 9th out of 133 countries for being the most socially progressive.

And yet the Dutch Female Board Index, which looks at women in directorial roles in 84 listed Dutch companies, found that, as of 2015, only 17 per cent were women.

Mijntje Luckerath, a professor at TIAS School for Business and Society, who created the index told i100:

The website makes it even more visible that still large listed companies have all male boards which is very old-fashioned and is not good for decision making.

I do think it is changing, many companies that were at the bottom of my list in 2008 are now in the top 20.

So why are women so under-represented in leadership roles?

The reasons can vary from high proportion of part time work in the Netherlands, to biased selection processes.

• Mijntje Luckerath

There is evidence to suggest that companies who have more women in board-level positions tend to perform better in the global financial market.

Editor-in-chief, Janine Abbring, told i100:

Numbers show that hardly ten per cent of 'top jobs' - for example CEOs and board members - in the Netherlands are taken by women. Compared to other European countries this is a very low number.

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