Business leaders see gender quotas as ‘necessary evil’ to improve boardroom diversity

The controversial policies are an imperfect solution to the glacial pace of progress on tackling gender inequality in senior leadership positions.

The introduction of mandatory gender quotas for women on company boards would help to speed up the glacial pace of progress on tackling gender inequality in senior leadership positions, according to a group of chief executives, specialist head-hunters, board members and leadership professors.

Speaking at the St. Gallen Symposium, they called for an acceleration of a global drive to force companies to ditch “stale, male and pale” leadership teams. The calls come as governments such as Switzerland and Germany, as well as the US state of California, start mandating gender quotas.

Quotas are highly controversial, however, with critics deriding them as “box-ticking exercises” that do little to address the “glass ceiling” that holds women back from reaching the upper echelons of management. 

Jean-François Manzoni, the President of…