Promotion of Women in Business

Julian Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd March 2011 Westminster Hall

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

I join this debate as a head-hunter—I declare that interest—who, until recently coming into the House, worked on senior-level executive search assignments for global organisations. I am the employer in an all-women company and the proud husband of a wife who has just set up a business as part of a job-share situation. I am also a colleague of some exceptional new MPs on both sides of the House, many of whom are women. It is unfortunate that more of my Opposition colleagues are not here today.

As a small business owner, I have spoken frequently about the avalanche of regulation and red tape that hit small businesses over the 13 years of the Labour Government, and the impact of such legislation globally on Britain’s competitive position in respect of inward investment compared with Hong Kong, Asia and other international locations. As a head-hunter, I saw that people were beginning to hire in those locations rather than the UK as a result of our employment law.

Therefore, I was pleased that Lord Davies chose not to advocate legislation in his report, “Women on boards”, which came out in February. I add that I could not find a copy of it in the House of Commons yesterday when I sought one—that was not a great indication of the importance of the topic.

When I first sat on the Government Benches last May, I realised that never in my life had I been involved in something so male. When I reflected on the companies for which I had recruited as a head-hunter, I thought again about the stark differences between those that had seriously taken an interest in diversity and put it at the top of the agenda of their organisations, and those that had not. When I listened to the debate on UN Women, which I thought was one of the most productive and positive debates in this House, I resolved to try to play my part on this issue. I compliment my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant) on securing this debate, and on all her work in this country and internationally—recently in Malaysia, I believe—on the issue.

Things have been improving, but progress is so slow. Statistics in the Lord Davies report show that 12.2% of directors of FTSE 100 companies are women, and that 7.3% of people on the boards of FTSE 250 companies are women. That is appalling. Our economy, which is on its knees, and which needs to use all its talents to get out of the current crisis and to deal with a competitive world, needs to address that. There are moral reasons as well: in a society that aspires to be equal, such statistics are not acceptable.

The best companies I have worked with in recruiting at senior level have not focused solely on women. Their big focus has been on diversity. They have been hard-wiring into their organisations the approach that it is not acceptable to come up with a shortlist of white males but instead it is better to come up with a diverse list of people and then select on merit. However, the number of organisations and companies that think that way is not as large as it should be, and we need to increase it over the next few years.

[Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)]

Recently, the Monetary Policy Committee announced that it was recruiting another white man, and that it was absolutely delighted—as, indeed, we all are—with the extremely talented gentleman whom it had chosen. In small print at the end, as an afterthought, it said that only one of the 27 applicants was a woman, and that it wished that more women had applied. Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be a good idea proactively to encourage more women to apply for senior roles?

[Julian Smith]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. There is a great deal of work to be done in the public sector as well as the private sector, but the Government now need to put significant pressure on the private sector, and not just on targets. One area I would advocate as well worth looking at is performance management generally in organisations. Can the Government do more to highlight those organisations that performance manage their staff and that look at things such as the approach that my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Claire Perry) suggested? Can we highlight, as well as company growth, those companies that manage their human resources positively?

[Mary Macleod]

Does my hon. Friend think that it is important to have real performance measures and that that should affect how people are remunerated? If they are not assessed on that, which might affect what they earn, people tend to forget about it. It is a nice-to-have, but there is no focus on it and nothing ever gets resolved. If people are actually measured on that and remunerated accordingly, something might change.

[Julian Smith]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The client that I worked with that did best in this area had such considerations hard-wired into compensation and promotion at all levels in the organisation, not just at board level. To get a pipeline of candidates for board positions, one has to work right down the organisation, at every level of management. In that organisation, the key question at every performance review was, “What diversity hiring have you done in the past six months?”

A relentless focus is required in the House and at every level of government. I am not convinced that having a unit on women and equality is the right way to go. We need this to be driven from the highest level in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and we need to showcase with awards and in every way possible those organisations that are doing the right thing.

[Mrs Grant]

Could my hon. Friend say something about how head-hunters might be incentivised?

[Julian Smith]

The role of head-hunters is important. The reason for stressing companies is that head-hunters are driven by their fees, and if the underlying companies are pushing them, that is when there is a change in the approach of the head-hunters. I was pleased that Lord Davies advocated a voluntary code for head-hunters, and some are doing great work in this area, but we will probably end up having to look more closely at this unregulated part of the business world, and push hard if they do not move quickly on their voluntary code.

On parental leave, child care and other matters that have been discussed this morning, I hope that the Government, with their moratorium on regulations for small businesses, will advocate a frank conversation between employers and female employees. My best employee relationship was with someone I could talk to about her plans for child care and family development, and we interweaved her talent and desire to build her family with the business’s needs. That employee was paid more and performed better than any other person in my company.

As well as the Government’s role, there is a strong role for Parliament. There is a strong argument for setting up a new Select Committee for the lifetime of this Parliament to focus on women and diversity. It could be wrapped up at the end of this Parliament, but in the meantime it could be used as a vehicle to demonstrate that parliamentarians in the class of 2010 will ensure that we move the issue on, drag companies in and question them. We want to ensure that the matter is nailed once and for all.

My concern and my message to business, whether head-hunters, global businesses or small businesses, is that if we are still here in 2015 having these arguments about the paltry number of women in the senior echelons of our businesses, it will be very difficult for people such as me, as a great supporter of less regulation and red tape, to stand up and say that there should not be legislation and intervention. This Parliament has an opportunity, as does business, to go for it, and to make a substantial change along the lines of what Lord Davies said, but it must be done now. We must get on with it.