It’s still too much of a man’s world leading business

When it comes to business it is still very much a man’s world, as our report reveals today.

Even in the metropolis less than one company in five is headed by a woman. Among fast-growth businesses the proportion is even lower, fewer than one in 10.

Over the past decade huge strides have been made in the level of female representation in Britain’s biggest and most visible companies, those that make up the FTSE-100.

For large quoted companies there is no hiding place if the boardroom is overwhelmingly pale, male and stale.

The piercing light that has been shone on FTSE-100 companies in recent years means that almost 40% of directors of the biggest blue-chip companies are women — although they still lag behind in the key C-Suite executive roles.

But only now, thanks to the work of the Gender Index, are we starting to see more detailed data on the hundreds of thousands of smaller enterprises that are the bedrock of the British economy.

There the female leadership voice is far more rarely heard — if the findings are to be believed. There is progress but it appears to be glacially slow.

This has to change for all sorts of reasons, not least the broader health of the economy. Finding the answers to the problem will not be easy as it lies deep in the culture of UK society. But as with the FTSE-100, identifying it is at least a good starting point.

Britain has a growth problem and its wealth creator pool needs to be deep and wide to make sure as many of the UK’s entrepreneurial talents as possible are engaged in taking the country forward to prosperity.