{"id":1216,"date":"2017-04-10T08:00:01","date_gmt":"2017-04-10T12:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/annelitwin.com\/?p=1216"},"modified":"2017-04-10T08:00:01","modified_gmt":"2017-04-10T12:00:01","slug":"taking-stand-women-boards-fearless-girl-bull","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/blog-posts\/taking-stand-women-boards-fearless-girl-bull\/","title":{"rendered":"Taking a Stand for Women on Boards: The Fearless Girl and the Bull"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\tCould a bold and creative act by the Boston-based State Street Global Advisors (SSGA) finally bring gender equity to corporate boards in the United States? When senior female executives at SSGA decided to commission the statue \u201cThe Fearless Girl,\u201d their goal was to bring visibility to the lack of women on boards. By placing the statue in front of New York City\u2019s iconic Bull of Wall Street in during the middle of the night prior to International Women\u2019s Day on March 9, 2017, they hoped to spotlight this issue.\nRachael Levy<\/a>, writing for Business Insider<\/em>, explains that the statue is part of a new campaign by SSGA to pressure companies to add more women to their boards. Levy reports that\u2014as the third largest asset manager in the world handling $2.5 trillion in funds\u2014SSGA wields a lot of clout and has vowed to vote against boards of companies \u201cthat fail to take steps to increase the number of women.\u201d\nThe SSGA executives note that, despite much industry discussion about this issue for many years, little has changed. Why does gender diversity matter? They add that gender diversity improves company performance, and gender diversity increases shareholder value. In other words, gender diversity is good for business.\nAssociated Press reporter \u00a0Stan Choe<\/a> writes that while woman have been gaining board seats, the progress is very slow. Women in the United States held 15 percent of board seats in 2015, up from 14 percent in 2014. Choe notes that, at this rate, it will take until 2055 to gain parity. He also notes that many companies have no women at all on their boards, and only 4 percent of CEOs are women. Other countries have a better record, with women holding 24 percent of board seats in Europe because of government pressure and targets.\nShirley Leung<\/a> of the Boston Globe<\/em> notes that the placement of the Fearless Girl statue raises some important questions:\n\n\n