The Huffington Post has released a study of board memberships of the Nasdaq 100. Thirty-seven of those companies have only one female board member and none of them have more than five. The most number of male board members is 14 and none of the companies has fewer than five men serving on its board.
According to the report, some companies outside the U.S. are setting quotas to increase their female board membership: “Next year, big German companies will have to have boards that are at least 30 percent female. Norway, Italy, France and Spain have set the bar higher, at 40 percent.”
American business is generally opposed to quotas and tends to select board members from among top corporate executives. The theory is that as more women advance to C-suite positions, the composition of corporate boards will follow.