L’Oréal Australia Announces Majority Female Executive Committee

Women are winning the war for greater diversity in corporate Australia with L’Oréal Australia announcing that for the first time, their Executive Committee is majority female.

Women have comprised 40% of new appointments to ASX 200 boards to date in 2016 (30 June 2016) compared to 34% in 2015, 30% in 2014, 22% in 2013 and 2012, 28% in 2011, 25% in 2010 and only 5% in 2009 and 8% in 2008.

In addition to the female representation at the highest level, L’Oréal Australia is the first Australian company to be certified with the EDGE (Economic Dividends for Gender Equality) global standard for workplace gender equality. The EDGE assessment is the only business certification for gender equality in the workplace that is universally applicable across industries and countries.
Over a six month process, L’Oréal Australia participated in the EDGE certification process, which included a comprehensive review of the company’s gender policies and practices. As part of the evaluation, employees were surveyed on gender equality relating to recruitment and promotion, leadership training and mentorship, flexible work, company culture and equal pay for equivalent work.

For over 100 years the L’Oréal Group has been passionate about building the confidence of women through its mission, Beauty for All. This is just as important internally and with a focus on developing workplace practices and policies which support women to develop their careers, the business has embedded strong female leaders who are positive roles models for all employees, as well as the broader community.

“As a leader within the global L’Oréal Group, I’m proud to see developments in the area of gender equality,” says Rodrigo Pizarro, Managing Director L’Oréal Australia. “For me, it’s always been about having the best people in roles and by having a workplace culture which encourages flexibility and development of females, we are now in the strong position of having more females who are ready to take on leadership roles. Diversity across our business will continue to be our focus and we will keep working to develop new ways to ensure our company encourages gender equality.”

We can hope many other Australian corporate businesses look to L’Oreal’s lead and appoint more women onto their boards and executive committees.