Corporate Governance Centre

Prague, 20. November 2014 – The largest share of women in the boardrooms of companies in the Czech Republic is found in the health care, pharmaceutical and insurance sectors. On the contrary, the smallest share of female managers is found in sectors such as energy, banking and telecommunications.  While the average percentage of women in the statutory bodies (the boards of directors and statutory executives) of the 100 largest companies in the Czech Republic is 9.14%, roughly a quarter (25.5%) of managerial posts in healthcare institutions are held by women. This is according to the latest study of the Deloitte Corporate Governance Centre in the Czech Republic. The study monitors 20 companies with the largest revenue from 10 significant sectors of the Czech economy.

The comparison of the total share of women in supervisory boards, which are the non-executive bodies concerned by the EU regulation, shows that the largest share of women is found in the telecommunications, transport and IT sectors (20%), the pharmaceutical industry (20%) and health care (20%), followed by the construction industry (16.9%) and retail (14.8%). The smallest number of women in supervisory boards is in financial institutions – banks and insurance companies. While 8.4% of the supervisory bodies of banks are women, it is only 7.4% in insurance company supervisory bodies. In the energy sector, the ratio of women to men is approximately 1:10 (a 9.2% share of women); this also applies to marketing, PR and the media (10.9%).

The total share of women in companies that are listed on the Prague Stock Exchange has dropped from 7.38% to 6.14%. While the percentage of women in company bodies (the board of directors and the company’s statutory executives) amounts to 9.62%, there are three times fewer women in supervisory boards (3.23%), which means that the ratio of women to men is 1:31.

“The share of women should significantly increase after the new EU regulation is adopted, which should regulate this issue in the future. The proposed regulation should introduce a 40% share of women in non-executive bodies of listed companies within three to five years,” added Jaroslava Ignáciková, a lawyer at Ambruz & Dark Deloitte Legal, one of the authors of the survey of the Deloitte Corporate Governance Centre in the Czech Republic.

About the Deloitte Corporate Governance Centre in the Czech Republic

The Deloitte Corporate Governance Centre is a platform whose goal is to inform companies of the latest developments in corporate governance and to align stakeholders and professionals in response to current economic developments, legislative changes and new judicial decisions. We organise, on a regular basis, discussions and workshops regarding the latest trends and issues, round tables, surveys and other activities reflecting the situation in corporate governance.