Despite ongoing progress, many boardrooms and leadership teams still do not reflect the diversity of their workforce or customer base. The FTSE Women Leaders Review 2025 does show meaningful improvement, with women now holding 43% of FTSE 350 board seats and nearly 45% in FTSE 100 companies, surpassing the voluntary 40% target for 2025. Encouragingly, more than 70% of FTSE 350 companies have already met or exceeded this benchmark.
However, representation declines sharply below board level. Women hold around 35% of senior leadership roles, and there are only 19 female CEOs across the FTSE 350, a number that has remained stubbornly low in recent years.
Having marked International Women’s Day on Sunday, it is important not only to acknowledge this progress but also to strengthen commitment to long term, systemic change. A powerful way for organisations to do this is by aligning efforts with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 5: Gender Equality (SDG 5), which calls for women’s full participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels. SDG 5 provides a consistent, globally recognised framework to guide action, measure progress, and enhance accountability.
So how should businesses go about it? More gender balanced leadership is proven to improve decision making, spur innovation, and foster healthier, more resilient cultures. Many organisations have learned costly lessons from homogenous thinking, whether through products that missed key user needs or preventable reputational challenges. Companies that set clear targets and actively sponsor women into pivotal leadership roles consistently outperform competitors and attract stronger talent.
Achieving progress is not accidental; it requires deliberate and sustained investment in people, pathways, and structural systems. The most effective organisations build inclusive leadership capability, accelerate high potential women through visible sponsorship, and reinforce these actions with systems and policies that embed equity at scale.
SDG 5 also highlights practical, high impact actions employers can prioritise, with inclusive leadership and pipeline development central to this. Training that strengthens inclusive leadership behaviours, reduces bias, and supports fair hiring, evaluation, and promotion decisions will help create more equitable pathways into leadership.
Leadership sponsorship is equally important. Pairing high potential women with senior sponsors expands access to critical experiences and opportunities, increases visibility, and accelerates progression into senior and transformation roles.
Structural enablers and transparent data must reinforce these efforts. Flexible working, equitable parental leave, and fair pay systems are not “perks” but essential infrastructure for performance. Organisations that regularly review pay equity, publish representation data, and monitor promotion and attrition rates can spot gaps early and intervene effectively.
It is clear that those organisations that elevate women into leadership roles and maintain gender balance benefit from stronger collaboration, improved productivity, and greater customer relevance - advantages that contribute directly to growth and resilience. To drive real progress, start with clear targets and leadership accountability, invest in inclusive leadership capability and sponsorship, and embed fairness into both policies and everyday behaviours.
On the back of this year’s International Women’s Day, let’s move beyond celebration towards sustained, strategic action that aligns with global standards and accelerates long term change. It is an opportunity to recognise, support, and champion the current and future women leaders who power our organisations and communities. Let’s not pass that opportunity up.
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