Our colleagues at the Diversity Institute has published a report and launched a new initiative aimed at evaluating the state of “diversity leads.”

Diverse Representation in Leadership

Analysis of five sectors in eight Canadian cities show women, black people and other racialized persons under-represented as board of directors. The largest Canadian study of board diversity, including the first analysis of Black leader representation on Canadian boards, was released from Ryerson University’s Diversity Institute. 

DiversityLeads 2020, supported by TD via the TD Ready Commitment, is a first-of-its kind comprehensive Canadian analysis of the representation of women, Black people, and other racialized persons among 9,843 individuals on the boards of directors across sectors in eight cities. The report also explores the board-related experiences of people who identify as Indigenous, LGBTQ2S+, and persons with disabilities through a qualitative analysis.

Report Highlights

• Women and racialized people are still under-represented on boards, and varies by sector
• Representation of Black people ranges from 1% on Voluntary and School Boards to 2.9% on Municipal agencies, boards, and commissions (ABCs)
• Women hold 47.3% of school board seats, but only 25.3% on corporate boards. Racialized people comprise 14.6% of Universities and Colleges boards of directors and 13.6% of appointments to Municipal ABCs, but only 4.5% of corporate BoDs

The analysis found that women are underrepresented, occupying 40.8% of board positions in the cities and sectors studied. The report adds, “an effective diversity and inclusion strategy needs to address more than human resources and representation, it needs to consider the entire value chain, from procurement, to product design and production, all the way to sales and marketing and service.”

Diversity Institute says that their goal is to “provide a holistic view of diversity on boards through a quantitative analysis of diverse representation on boards and a qualitative deep dive that explores diverse individuals’ experiences with pursuing and/or holding board positions.”

Read the report online by clicking on the photo below