If Iceland Is a Gender Paradise, Where Are the Women CEOs of Listed Companies?

Abstract

Gender inequality remains a global phenomenon and according to the World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report 2020 it will take more than 100 years to reach full gender equality in the world. Iceland has made the greatest progress toward closing the Gender Gap, 87.7%. Yet no woman is CEO of a listed company on the Icelandic stock exchange in 2020. Women CEOs are more likely to lead small enterprises, and women count for 13% of CEOs in larger companies. Women’s board membership and leadership positions in Icelandic companies are currently receiving a lot of attention and companies are encouraged to improve the gender ratio on boards and in the C-suite. The chapter reports on the results of a survey of Icelandic women business leaders regarding their beliefs on why no woman is CEO of a listed company in Iceland and what actions they deem feasible to increase the number of women in senior positions. Responses from 189 women revealed that they feel that action must be taken, even legislative, such as enforcing gender quotas for executive positions, business cultures, and attitudes must change, women need more opportunities.

Do Women Have the Right Skills, Network and Support to Become CEOs?

“…Males are less likely than females to believe that women can be successful CEOs and with rising age and lower education this attitude becomes more established. Recent research indicates that in Iceland professionalism is lacking in the CEO recruitment and selection process for listed companies (Christiansen et al 2021;Óladóttir et al 2021). Practices of exclusion and discrimination towards women are not unique to Iceland and have also been found to occur in executive search practices in Finland, for example (Meriläinen et al 2015).…”