City grandee to increase female representation in FTSE 350 boardrooms

The chairman of GlaxoSmithKline will continue from Lord Davies’s Women on Boards Review, a voluntary business-led initiative, which saw female representation on boards in the FTSE 100 rise from 12.5 per cent to beyond the target of 25 per cent.

The next phase of the review will focus on building the pipeline for female executives and emerging non-executive directors, to continue the work already done on increasing board representation, one of the key recommendations from Lord Davies’s report.

Sir Philip said: “I am delighted to take on Lord Davies’s great work around Women on Boards and I want to now turn my attention to the FTSE 350.

“I will focus on improving representation in the executive layer of companies, as well as maintaining the momentum on boards.

“This means looking at the talent pipeline for female executives and emerging non-executive directors to ensure we create opportunities and the right conditions for women to succeed.”

In his first move, Sir Philip has appointed Dame Helen Alexander as his deputy chair to work alongside him on the review. Dame Helen is chair of UBM plc and also a non-executive director of Rolls-Royce Group plc, Huawei UK, and a senior adviser to Bain Capital.

Business Secretary Sajid Javid said: “The employment rate for women has never been higher and there are now more women on FTSE boards than ever before. But we need to go further.”