Alliance Trust

At the end of 2008 the InternationalCentre for Women Business Leaders at Cranfield School of Management published The Female FTSE* Report 2008: A Decade of Delay. It looked at the number of women on UK boards. The research revealed that the number of female-held directorships in the FTSE 100 stands at 11.7% overall, whilst women make up only 4.8% of executive directorships. 39% of boards have multiple women directors, yet 22% of boards in the FTSE 100 still have no women at all.
The report ranked organisations according to how many women they had on their boards. Alliance Trust had the highest level overall (43% of its board are women with three female Directors in total, including a female Chairman and Female CEO) whilst Pearson had the highest number of women Executive Directors, (23% of its board are women with two Executive Directors.) This year Opportunity Now will recognise both organisations for their commitment to women leaders.

Alliance Trust is a self-managed FTSE 100 investment company with investment trust status.

Headquartered in Dundee and employing around 300 people, it has been investing since 1888 and is the largest UK investment trust by market capitalisation listed on the London Stock Exchange. The two senior members of its Board, the Chief Executive and Chairman,
who has been a Director since 2001, are both women. A single-minded pursuit of talent has resulted in Alliance Trust having the highest  percentage of women on its board within the FTSE 100, although it has never set any targets  for a particular mix of men and women. For instance, when Alliance Trust’s current Chief Executive was originally recruited for the post of Chief Investment Officer, she was targeted as the company’s first choice, based on her outstanding track record and leadership skills, in a list of candidates from around the world, most of whom happened to be men.

The company considers it should be a natural process for every organisation to allow  talent to flourish and to embrace it wherever it is found. Such an approach will result in a meritocracy and ultimately a workforce more representative of society as a whole. The  company also believes that creating a Board with a diverse complement of skills, experiences and backgrounds enables it to make better business decisions and to respond better to  stakeholder and shareholder expectations.

*FTS

*FTSE International Limited (“FTSE”)© FTSE 2009. FTSE® is a trademark of London Stock Exchange Plc and The Financial Times Limited and is used by FTSE under licence. The Female FTSE 100 award is not in any way licensed, sponsored or endorsed by FTSE