In the past year, only 1 of 25 CEOs appointed to lead ASX 200 organisations was a woman; the previous year, there were only 2.

Chief Executive Women’s latest report reveals that there are fewer women in the pipeline for promotion to CEO roles.  The organisational roles and positions that typically lead to CEO appointments are overwhelmingly held by men, with 2/3 of organisations having no women in these key roles. In fact, CEW identified that 96% of CEO appointments were chosen from leaders with responsibility for profit and loss, but women in company leadership roles tend to be concentrated in support function roles like HR, legal, risk and corporate affairs. It’s rare for CEOs to be selected from support function roles.

CEW President Sue Morphet says "we're not taking advantage" of female talent with only 30 out of 200 companies having 40% to 60% women in their executive leadership team. Even in industries with a predominantly female workforce, such as Health Care, there is huge under-representation in roles with profit and loss responsibility, with only 5% of leadership line roles in Health Care companies in the ASX200 filled by women, down from 15% four years ago.