9 ms·

California may mandate a woman in the boardroom, but businesses are fighting it

37 points by malvosenior 8y ago

devoply 8y ago
I guess the step after this is greater representation of minorities in the board room. In general there does need to be greater representation of minorities in upper management. That does not happen as much as it should.
- robdachshund 8y ago
  Might that have something to do with them being minorities? As in, there are less of these groups in the US based on population? Is it really any wonder that most businesses in the us are predominantly white when that reflects the population of the country? Equal representation doesn't really make sense when it does not reflect the make up of the nation.
deadmetheny 8y ago
Yet another reason it'd be insanity to incorporate in California.
- chomp 8y ago
  It's not even incorporating in California, merely having your headquarters there will cause your company to be burdened by this law.
pmdulaney 8y ago
It seems too late for that; in the context of the sexual revolution, any human can now claim to be female.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
BloodyHands 8y ago
what California is doing is horrific it is sickening and will lead to genocide the people of California provoke genocide AT THEIR PERIL!!
gamblor956 8y ago
This article is flamebait. The legislation passed the state Senate but is not expected to even get a hearing in the state Assembly before the expiration of the current legislative session. Even if passed, because the law specifically mandates sexual/gender preferences it will face a constitutional challenge and be suspended pending full review/appeals by the CA court system. Finally, if it survives all that...it would apply to any business that is incorporated, HQ'd, or otherwise does business with California. And would promptly get struck down by a federal court...
- zaroth 8y ago
  “assuming the idea could survive a likely court challenge.” ...does appear in the first sentence, after all.
vannevar 8y ago
Another way to increase the diversity and quality of corporate governance would be to outlaw the practice of interlocking boards, where the same people serve as directors on multiple boards. Besides increasing the chances of illegal collusion and insider trading, this practice promotes groupthink, tends to concentrate wealth, and discourages diversity.
- vannevar 8y ago
  Would the downvote care to share an opinion? It improves discussion when there are two sides.
  - joelhoffman 8y ago
    I didn't downvote you, but I didn't understand your proposal. Are you suggesting prohibiting anyone from serving on more than one board, or from joining a board that already contains someone who is also on a board they're already on?
    - vannevar 8y ago
      The former. One person can serve on one board only. Perhaps an exception to serve on nonprofit boards.
scarface74 8y ago
Maybe I’m just hopelessly naive, but I really don’t see most boards in corporate America purposely conspiring to only have White men on thier board. Yes, I am a member of the “underrepresented minority”. I think it may be more of a function that you choose people you know — if that’s the case somehow encourage people to broaden thier search or the classic “pipeline problem”. For that, I’ve got nothing. Not on the board level, but I use to work for a company where out of 250 employees, I was the only Black guy. I don’t think it was due to racism, but they were based in an area of TN where the overwhelming majority of people were White. I would also assume that most Black professionals who were raised and went to school in small town TN would leave as soon as possible. When the company created a satellite office in a more diverse city, they had a more diverse talent pool.
- ikeyany 8y ago
  I wouldn't call it being hopelessly naive, but is it possible you're experiencing a bit of survivorship bias? There tends to be little outright conspiring to keep outsiders on the outside, but people tends to include and give benefits to those who look/think like themselves, or have similar backgrounds to themselves. That doesn't justify having quotas, but there's more at play than blatant racism/sexism that keeps minorities from positions of power and influence.
  - trendia 8y ago
    "Those who look/think like themselves" has much more going than just sex/race. An individual choosing another board seat will likely a preference for people who went to the same Ivy League schools, who have the same wealthy family backgrounds, and, most important, share the same concept of how they want to run the business. Making a law forcing a woman to be on the board won't eliminate those preferences, it will just mean that they'll choose a woman from a well-connected family who went to HBS and would be willing to support the voting positions of whomever is appointing them. You haven't changed the voting behavior too much, just the sex/racial makeup of it. If the goal is to change how businesses behave, we would want people from entirely different fields. That is, we'd want representation from differing perspectives in the company -- perhaps from engineering or from labor. In Germany, for instance, there is an expectation that the labor union has representation on the board [0], which would do much more for the people working in the company than having a female version of the male boardroom exec. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codetermination_in_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codetermination_in_Germany
zaroth 8y ago
The question is why did anyone vote for this at all? I did see at least it was limited to public companies, but I would think you have zero understanding of business to think you should prescribe the gender mix of the Board. This would be a massive disadvantage for companies that this applied to. The Board is an extremely limited number of people making incredibly crucial decisions based on their expertise. You want the absolutely most qualified people on a well run Board. Imagine having a single opening and knowing exactly who you should hire for it, them agreeing to take on the position, and not being able to hire them... Because they identify as the incorrect gender. Why should the Board room be forced to have a specific gender balance? Why is it gender specifically which should be balanced and not other factors? Why just for the Board and not for the whole company? What about any or all other subdivisions within the company? Why target Boardrooms in particular for this policy?
humantiy 8y ago
This doesn't seem like a good idea. If this passed I would think you would question if you were hired not because of your knowledge and merit, but because you filled a quota. For publicly traded companies board members also have to be voted in. What is to stop shareholders from not voting someone in knowing that this was a 'quota board member?' Would the company be at fault (ie face penalty) in that scenario if they are publicly traded?
belorn 8y ago
Sweden is making similar suggestion, and I would like that governments first tried lead by example. The state is the single largest employer in the nation and for almost all positions there is not 50/50 gender ration. Compared to the private sector it seems to be on average worse, with many of the top 10 worst gender segregated professions being government paid positions. I am not unreasonable, they could simply set out that by 2020 they should have a policy that any new hiring should consider how gender segregated a open position is, by 2030 a policy with active measures to correct gender segregation and by 2040 if the situation has not improved then mandated affirmative action and fines for non-compliant departments. Currently there is not even a policy which honestly is a bit of a low bar given how much talking politicians do about diversity.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

37 points by malvosenior 8y ago

I guess the step after this is greater representation of minorities in the board room. In general there does need to be greater representation of minorities in upper management. That does not happen as much as it should.

robdachshund 8y ago
Might that have something to do with them being minorities? As in, there are less of these groups in the US based on population? Is it really any wonder that most businesses in the us are predominantly white when that reflects the population of the country? Equal representation doesn't really make sense when it does not reflect the make up of the nation.

deadmetheny 8y ago

Yet another reason it'd be insanity to incorporate in California.

chomp 8y ago
It's not even incorporating in California, merely having your headquarters there will cause your company to be burdened by this law.

pmdulaney 8y ago

It seems too late for that; in the context of the sexual revolution, any human can now claim to be female.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

BloodyHands 8y ago

what California is doing is horrific it is sickening and will lead to genocide the people of California provoke genocide AT THEIR PERIL!!

gamblor956 8y ago

This article is flamebait. The legislation passed the state Senate but is not expected to even get a hearing in the state Assembly before the expiration of the current legislative session. Even if passed, because the law specifically mandates sexual/gender preferences it will face a constitutional challenge and be suspended pending full review/appeals by the CA court system. Finally, if it survives all that...it would apply to any business that is incorporated, HQ'd, or otherwise does business with California. And would promptly get struck down by a federal court...

zaroth 8y ago
“assuming the idea could survive a likely court challenge.” ...does appear in the first sentence, after all.

vannevar 8y ago

Another way to increase the diversity and quality of corporate governance would be to outlaw the practice of interlocking boards, where the same people serve as directors on multiple boards. Besides increasing the chances of illegal collusion and insider trading, this practice promotes groupthink, tends to concentrate wealth, and discourages diversity.

vannevar 8y ago
Would the downvote care to share an opinion? It improves discussion when there are two sides.
- joelhoffman 8y ago
  I didn't downvote you, but I didn't understand your proposal. Are you suggesting prohibiting anyone from serving on more than one board, or from joining a board that already contains someone who is also on a board they're already on?
  - vannevar 8y ago
    The former. One person can serve on one board only. Perhaps an exception to serve on nonprofit boards.

scarface74 8y ago

Maybe I’m just hopelessly naive, but I really don’t see most boards in corporate America purposely conspiring to only have White men on thier board. Yes, I am a member of the “underrepresented minority”. I think it may be more of a function that you choose people you know — if that’s the case somehow encourage people to broaden thier search or the classic “pipeline problem”. For that, I’ve got nothing. Not on the board level, but I use to work for a company where out of 250 employees, I was the only Black guy. I don’t think it was due to racism, but they were based in an area of TN where the overwhelming majority of people were White. I would also assume that most Black professionals who were raised and went to school in small town TN would leave as soon as possible. When the company created a satellite office in a more diverse city, they had a more diverse talent pool.

ikeyany 8y ago
I wouldn't call it being hopelessly naive, but is it possible you're experiencing a bit of survivorship bias? There tends to be little outright conspiring to keep outsiders on the outside, but people tends to include and give benefits to those who look/think like themselves, or have similar backgrounds to themselves. That doesn't justify having quotas, but there's more at play than blatant racism/sexism that keeps minorities from positions of power and influence.
- trendia 8y ago
  "Those who look/think like themselves" has much more going than just sex/race. An individual choosing another board seat will likely a preference for people who went to the same Ivy League schools, who have the same wealthy family backgrounds, and, most important, share the same concept of how they want to run the business. Making a law forcing a woman to be on the board won't eliminate those preferences, it will just mean that they'll choose a woman from a well-connected family who went to HBS and would be willing to support the voting positions of whomever is appointing them. You haven't changed the voting behavior too much, just the sex/racial makeup of it. If the goal is to change how businesses behave, we would want people from entirely different fields. That is, we'd want representation from differing perspectives in the company -- perhaps from engineering or from labor. In Germany, for instance, there is an expectation that the labor union has representation on the board [0], which would do much more for the people working in the company than having a female version of the male boardroom exec. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codetermination_in_Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codetermination_in_Germany

zaroth 8y ago

The question is why did anyone vote for this at all? I did see at least it was limited to public companies, but I would think you have zero understanding of business to think you should prescribe the gender mix of the Board. This would be a massive disadvantage for companies that this applied to. The Board is an extremely limited number of people making incredibly crucial decisions based on their expertise. You want the absolutely most qualified people on a well run Board. Imagine having a single opening and knowing exactly who you should hire for it, them agreeing to take on the position, and not being able to hire them... Because they identify as the incorrect gender. Why should the Board room be forced to have a specific gender balance? Why is it gender specifically which should be balanced and not other factors? Why just for the Board and not for the whole company? What about any or all other subdivisions within the company? Why target Boardrooms in particular for this policy?

humantiy 8y ago

This doesn't seem like a good idea. If this passed I would think you would question if you were hired not because of your knowledge and merit, but because you filled a quota. For publicly traded companies board members also have to be voted in. What is to stop shareholders from not voting someone in knowing that this was a 'quota board member?' Would the company be at fault (ie face penalty) in that scenario if they are publicly traded?

belorn 8y ago

Sweden is making similar suggestion, and I would like that governments first tried lead by example. The state is the single largest employer in the nation and for almost all positions there is not 50/50 gender ration. Compared to the private sector it seems to be on average worse, with many of the top 10 worst gender segregated professions being government paid positions. I am not unreasonable, they could simply set out that by 2020 they should have a policy that any new hiring should consider how gender segregated a open position is, by 2030 a policy with active measures to correct gender segregation and by 2040 if the situation has not improved then mandated affirmative action and fines for non-compliant departments. Currently there is not even a policy which honestly is a bit of a low bar given how much talking politicians do about diversity.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]