hen Jean Sisco, veteran of 24 consecutive board directorships and a pioneer for women holding board positions
 in Americas top companies, heard that there was 11.1% representation of women in the board rooms of U.S. Fortune 500 companies, she stated that "It’s nowhere near enough." It was an apt remark given the fact that the progress of women holding corporate board positions has been slow and incremental over the years. Strides have been made, nevertheless, as evidenced by the fact that 86% of American companies now have at least one woman on their Board of Directors, according to Catalyst, a research organization which has tracked women's advances as corporate directors.

Among women corporate directors, there are some but not many entrepreneurs who have been invited to serve on the elite boardrooms of this country. Linda Alvarado, founder and CEO of Alvarado Construction, a multimillion-dollar general contracting firm, is one of the few women who serves on multiple corporate boards: Pitney Bowes, 3M (Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing), Lennox International and Engelhard Corporation. Another is Ruth Owades, Chairman and CEO Calyx & Corolla, a highly successful fresh flower catalog company, who is on the board of PVN Providian Financial Corporation. Yet another is Remedios Diaz-Oliver, CEO of All American Container Corporation, who was a former corporate director of Barnett Bank, US West and Avon Products Inc. These women are exceptions to the rule, however, since most board directors come from the corporate rather than the entrepreneurial community.

No matter what professional field they come from, the question that arises is why are there so few of these women directors? For one thing, corporate directors are drawn from the most part from senior management of the Fortune 500 companies where there are still too few women. In the United States, 95% of senior executive positions are still held by men, even as a sizeable number of women have entered mid-level managerial ranks. This means that the women's glass ceiling in executive positions creates a glass ceiling, in turn, for corporate directorships. Secondly, the director recruitment process is often not a process, nominations committees and recruitment firms notwithstanding. Instead, there is still very much in place an informal referral system among male directors. The majority of women directors are, in fact, recruited in the same way; and they tend to be, as one woman director labeled them, the "safe" names -- those who are familiar to male directors because they are already on other boards, or they are highly visible women in government or the professions.

A third reason for women's meager presence on corporate boards is the fear among some CEOs that women directors will bring a women's agenda, as opposed to a general agenda of increasing shareholder value and the company's profit margin. This fear is sensed by many women directors, so they, in turn, become reluctant to bring up gender-related issues, such as the status of women senior executives in succession planning; or just how many women managers or employees there are in the entire company; the company's plans in making diversity real as opposed to just being a goal, and so on. Many women directors I’ve spoken with agree that to bring up such issues tags a woman director and may limit her capacity to be seen as effective in other corporate governance issue areas.

The last reason, of course, is deeply rooted in cultural assumptions about women's roles. Carolyn Hewson, a board director in four of Australia's major companies, states aptly that Amen are still doing the majority of the promotions within business and they probably often feel comfortable with people in their own mold." Even if women have the requisite senior executive experience that boards want, they will not necessarily be called upon to serve simply because

they are different from the powers that be or may not be visible to this small, insulated but important group of men. The recent trend towards greater consolidation of major companies through mergers and acquisitions has also decreased women's opportunities for board seats, according to Michael Cooke, former Chairman and CEO of Deloitte and Touche: "Unfortunately, there is still a sense of one woman on the board being sufficient," so others tend to fall by the wayside when boards merge.

All these reasons aside, the rationale for women's inclusion on corporate boards should be based on sound business realities that need to be articulated repeatedly -- that women's increased earning capacities has resulted in the majority of buying decisions being made by women, not only for their families but for the organizations where they work. In addition, women workers now comprise nearly half of the labor force and they will be the majority of the workers in the future. Women entrepreneurs now make up nearly 40% of small business owners in the United States and their numbers are growing rapidly. Lastly, women are also increasingly shareholders, either directly or through their pension funds.

Women, therefore, are important business stakeholders -- as consumers, employees, employers and shareholders -- whose interests must be known and represented on the boards of companies who sell products and services to them, who employ them, or who contract with some of them for services or products, and whose shares are held by many of them. With women now comprising not a market niche but a market majority, it would be important to have expertise that knows how to appeal to them, understands their priorities and concerns.

In addition to this business "constituency" argument, there are forces of change that will promote the greater inclusion of women. First, the need to address global competition will require new competencies from board directors that includes a greater understanding and experience with diverse markets and diverse workforces that women directors can bring. Secondly, many boards have members who are aging and whose competencies no longer match the technologically competitive global market. Some came on boards when the Anew economy@ was not even in place. Thirdly, institutional shareholders are now insisting on greater accountability and transparency from corporate directors. Union and pension fund boards in the United States (such as TIAA-CREF and CALPERS) are now demanding diversity in board composition from companies in which they have large investments. These trends create opportunities or at the very least, a climate of acceptance for more women on corporate boards.

Until these forces of change come into fruition, boards must be persuaded to broaden their currently narrow definition of needed competencies to include the more varied business experience that women bring. They should look uppermost into the burgeoning field of small business CEOs, who run multimillion dollar enterprises, and who may be able to bring a spirit of innovation to corporate boards. Women's business groups should take on the re-education of corporations as to the business rationale for the increased appointments of women to corporate boards. Women directors must take on some of the burden for instituting change B by recommending other women for corporate board openings and by mentoring others interested in board positions. There are no good guys or "bad" guys on this issue B only set practices based on outdated stereotypes and corporate practices.