Leaders need to provoke and challenge the whole board to participate and engage as a group, to be ready for challenges ahead. But do they have the necessary skills?

The role of the chair has changed significantly over the past 10 years and now requires a set of skills that can balance the significant step change in a board’s responsibilities and reporting, embracing the challenges of widespread stakeholder lobbying across the environmental, social and governance (ESG) landscape.

I have been advocating for some time the necessity for accelerated action to appoint more woman as Chairman in the FTSE 350 as a driver of change at the Board level (Article: Women Covid Leadership – The Head, The Heart and The Egos, The Gender Bonus Beyond further articles on our website). My view is that greater gender diversity in the Chairman role would have a leverage effect and directly hasten and advance Executive pipeline diversity at senior leadership levels, with the percentage of women in executive roles flatlining in both the FTSE 100 and 250 in 2021. Also it would actively facilitate tackling pay gap differentials at the Board and executive levels and provide a more effective response to the growing board challenges on ESG issues, especially climate change. While advances have been made on the gender balance on Boards, the Chairman stands out as an unacknowledged ‘blind spot’ in advancing our Boards into a modern era.