How diverse are boards of directors at Georgia’s biggest companies?
Harvard Group International*, a Marietta-based executive search firm, wanted to find out and has released its first-ever Georgia Corporate Governance Diversity Report.
Compiled from company reports, regulatory filings and interviews with corporate executives and directors, HGI’s report not only looks at ethnic and gender diversity, but also diversity of experience among directors.
A board top-heavy with directors from the same industry, or state or age group, for example, may not be as effective as one whose directors are more professionally diverse, said HGI managing director Tom Furlong, who conducted the study in January.
“This report gives a company’s corporate governance team a chance to look at where they are and to discuss whether they need to make some changes,” said Furlong, who added that the study is not intended to pass judgment on any company. He said companies can also learn best practices from one another in fostering diversity. HGI will publish an update each year.
Over the next several weeks, the AJC will highlight report findings, with a first look at ethnic diversity among the 100 largest publicly traded companies. Generally, the study found, smaller companies have less ethnic diversity than larger ones.
A list of the 100 companies will be available on MyAJC.com for AJC subscribers. Next week we look at gender diversity.
