Group scrutinizes makeup of area boards
The number of women executives heading up top publicly traded suburban companies in the Chicago area has declined 2.2 percentage points to 14.7 percent this year, according to the 2007 Chicago Network Census released Wednesday.
"It is really depressing," said Hedy Ratner, co-president of the Women's Business Development Center in Chicago. "Here we have a woman running for president and we are looking at these dismal statistics about women in leadership."
Chicago Network tracks the representation of women in leadership positions from the 50 largest publicly traded companies by revenue in the Chicago area. Of these 50 companies, 31 are based in suburban communities for the 2007 census.
The survey showed of the 31 suburban companies, Naperville-based Nalco Holding Co. and Lake Forest-based Packaging Corp. of America have neither women directors nor women executive officers. Another company has no women directors and seven others have no women executive officers.
"We do have three women vice presidents that we consider executive officers," said Charlie Pajor, senior manager of external communication at Nalco. "We think that the census is too narrowly defining the term."
Packing Corp. was unavailable for comment.
Four of the companies have boards where at least 25 percent of its directors are women. Those include Northfield-based Kraft Foods Inc., Hoffman Estates-based Sears Holdings Corp. and Lincolnshire-based Hewitt Associates Inc.
At least 25 percent of the executive officers at Kraft, Hewitt and Naperville-based Laidlaw International Inc. are women, the survey said.
Downers Grove-based Sara Lee Corp.'s board and its executive officer roster is at least 25 percent female.
Kraft and Sara Lee both have women CEOs.
According to Chicago Network, women represent half of the work force and influence 95 percent of goods and services purchased, yet hold only 14.3 percent of the director positions of the top 50 Chicago companies, up from 13.8 percent the year before. Women hold only 13.8 percent of the executive officer positions, down from 14.6 percent from 2006.
Companies might make better connections with their customers with women in leadership positions, said Amy Osler, executive director of Chicago Network.