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Cheerful business people having a casual conversation (symbolic image)
Photo: Luis Alvarez / Digital Vision / Getty Images
There was much praise when the coalition working group recently unexpectedly announced an agreement on the Executive Positions Act.
But the draft law, which is to be passed in the cabinet on January 6, 2021, does not do justice to the praise, because it falls far too short.
First, it does not provide for a fixed quota on company boards.
Instead, a so-called minimum participation is to be introduced, which secondly only applies to an extremely small group of companies.
Of over 15,000 large companies in Germany, a minimum participation only applies to around 70 companies.
Only in the case of jointly determined and listed companies with a management board of more than three people would at least one woman have to move up to the management board when new appointments are made.
However, there is already at least one woman on just over half of these company boards.
This means that with this new law only 29 women would be appointed to boards.
That's progress with the handbrake on.
To person
Icon: enlarge Photo: via www.imago-images.de / imago images / Political-Moments
Ulle Schauws
has been a member of the German Bundestag for the Greens since October 2013.
She is currently spokeswoman for women's policy in her parliamentary group and deputy chairwoman of the committee on family, senior citizens, women and youth.
The current view of Germany's executive floors is reminiscent of an outdated image of women.
While the proportion of women on management levels is increasing in other European countries, it has even fallen on Dax boards during the corona crisis: According to the Allbright Foundation, 101 of the 160 most important listed companies have no women on the board.
That is 63 percent of German listed companies.
These include companies such as Hugo Boss, Fielmann, Adidas and Sixt, although they have many female employees in their workforce.
In the executive suite we are still a long way from rethinking.
75 of the listed companies are also planning with a »target value of zero« in the future.
A woman on the board?
No thanks.
There is also no real progress in sight on the supervisory boards.
Although the evaluation of the 30 percent quota for supervisory boards of listed companies with equal co-determination, which has been in force since 2015, clearly demonstrates its positive effect, the expansion of the quota originally contained in the draft law to include around 600 companies with equal co-determination has been canceled.
It is now only to be extended to the roughly one hundred companies with a majority stake in the federal government.
The federal government actually wanted to set a good example itself, but it also backed down there.
Instead of holding equal board positions in state-owned companies, as the draft law originally intended, only the minimum participation of one woman per board should apply here.
One thing is certain: the Executive Positions Act certainly does not achieve one thing: a fair distribution of power.
more on the subject
Icon: Spiegel Plus Suddenly for the women's quota: This led to a change of opinion at the Union
Decision on the quota for women on board members: Better moan softly on the penguin floors A comment by Michaela Schießl
Icon: Spiegel PlusEnd of male rule: "The patriarchy is an anomaly in human history" An interview by Rafaela von Bredow
The grand coalition has no reason to be despondent.
Because companies would benefit most if more women had a say.
Women in management positions are open to models such as flexible working hours, which favor a better work-life balance.
This increases the satisfaction of the entire team and helps to improve the corporate culture, as examples from Sweden and Norway show, where women are a matter of course at the top.
In Germany, on the other hand, most companies only draw from the male pool of talent, and women are highly qualified and motivated.
Companies lack a boost for more diversity.
Because it is not enough for women on board members to be lone fighters.
Research shows that a change in corporate culture takes around a third of women.
We need a fixed quota of at least 30 percent for company boards.
That would have brought the companies forward, not the discouraged proposal of the grand coalition.
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