Canadian Companies Need More Women on Corporate Boards

You are to write a 250?350-word essay, using only the references you have provided in your

annotated bibliography. (Your references do not count in the assignment word count, but the title

of your essay does.) You must use a minimum of three citations in your essay; however, if you

have more than three items in your annotated bibliography, you may use more than three citations,

at your discretion. References must follow APA style (refer to A Canadian Writer’s Pocket Guide,

pp. 109-126).

Format: Your essay should be printed in Times New Roman, single-spaced, 11-point font. Please

use the following format:

[line 1, left justified] ZHOU, Jiajing (260 words)

[line 3, centred] Title (must be identical to your annotated bibliography)

[line 5, left justified] begin essay

[line n, centred] References

[line n+1]

[line n+2, left justified] begin references

Failure to follow this format will result in a 20 percent grade reduction. Penalties will also be

imposed if you exceed the maximum word length, and will increase with increased length. NOTE:

You must use the same title for your submission as you did when you submitted your annotated

Li, Yanbo

Annotated Bibliography

Canadian Companies Need More Women on Corporate Boards

Caranci, B., Preston, L.,& Labelle, A. (2013).Get on board corporate Canada: Greater transparency needed for gender diversity on Canadian boards. Td Economics. Retrieved from

http://www.td.com/document/pdf/economics/special/getonboardcorporatecanada.pdf

The special report by TD economics criticizes the dropping position of Canada among industrialized countries of its women board representation from position six (2009) to nine (2011). The S&P/TSX Composite Index has only

11% women directors (2012).  One solution is enforcing women board representation quotas; however, this solution diminishes the merit value of position of women in boards. A ‘comply’ and ‘explain’ policy is a more suitable

solution.  The report is concise and factual, thus highly instrumental in understanding the impact of various policies of improving the number of women on boards.

CNR News Wire Canada. (2013, 10 June). Harper Government Increasing Participation of Women on Corporate Boards.CNR news wire Canada. Retrieved from http://www.newswire.ca/en/story/1180935/harper-government-

increasing-participation-of-women-on-corporate-boards

The low number of women across corporate boards in Canada is disappointing despite their positive influence in terms of improvement of bottom line. The article reports on the government response, which is the formation of the

Advisory Council for Promoting Women on Boards in March, 2013. The board of 23 panel members’ main objective is to provide advice on ways to increase number of women on boards. The article provides insight on the

Advisory Council for Promoting Women on Boards, which is important for the development of the paper on women’s board representation.

Eichler, L. (2013, 26 April). To get more women on corporate boards, Canada must be bold. The Globe and Mail. Retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/careers/career-advice/life-at-work/to-get-

more-women-on-corporate-boards-canada-must-be-bold/article11580193/

Eichler’s article paints the grim picture of women across corporate boards, with the country lagging behind other industrialized countries. Recent government efforts to form the the Advisory Council for Promoting Women on

Boards can utilize the situation as a learning experience; proposals on ways to achieve goals of increase number of women on boards include setting quota, improving transparency and disclosure of organisational efforts of

improving gender balance. Moreover, the provocative paper advises the government should seek to correct the prevailing situation and create precedence that other countries can follow; the researcher will follow up on this line of

thought.

Ontario Women’s Directorate. (2013). The business case for women on boards. Ontario Women’s Directorate. Retrieved from

http://www.women.gov.on.ca/owd_new/docs/women_on_boards.pdf

Ontario Women’s Directorate is detailed in its analysis,identifying six key benefits of having women on boards. First, presence of women on boards improves financial performance of companies across most financial measures,

with higher positive impact being during in the occurrence of crisis. Secondly, it increases talent at organisations as firms that have equal employment opportunities have limited employment bias and thus are more competitive

workplaces. Additionally, more women on boards lead to increases in the innovation; enhances client insight; increases the performance on non-financial indicators; improves board effectiveness. This will form the core of

postulations in the researcher’s paper.

Sit At The Table, org. (2013). The genesis of Sit at the Table. Sit at the table. Online. Retrieved from http://www.sitatthetable.org/

Increasing the number of women on corporate boards has significant impact on the financial performance of an organisation: increase of women on corporate boards results in return of sales, return on invested capital and return

on equity growing by 42%, 66% and 53% respectively. Sit at The Table reports that despite even the 47% of women labour force they comprise only 3% and 14.1% of Fortune 500 corporate boards and executive officers (2011).

This is unlike other countries such as Norway (44%) and Sweden (27%). The report is essential in showing the need of more women in Canada Corporate Boards.