The boards of public companies are watched carefully to see how they’re doing on gender parity and other measures of diversity. Joint venture boards get far less scrutiny — and it shows. According to our latest research, which covered more than 200 joint ventures across industries and geographies, only about 10 percent of JV directors are women. Compare that with the S&P 500 corporate boards, where 26 percent of directors are women. (That’s still a small number, but it’s been moving up.)
Research: Only 10% of Joint Venture Board Members Are Women
JVs are subject to far less public exposure — and fewer quotas and disclosure requirements — than other businesses.
July 08, 2020
Illustration by Klawe Rzeczy
Summary.
Joint venture boards are a great place for women (and other groups who are under-represented in senior management) to gain leadership and governance skills, which will position them for more senior positions within organizations or on public-company boards. And more women on boards, research has shown, is correlated with higher performance. Yet the number of women serving on these boards is very low, in part because the boards don’t tend to get much scrutiny or public oversight. Diversifying board makeup in this way appears to be a solid win-win for individuals, joint ventures, and their parent corporations.