A third of largest charities ‘have all-white senior leadership teams and boards’
Green Park has released new research reviewing the diversity in Major UK Charities which has found that more than a third (34) of the largest 100 UK charities by turnover have no ethno-cultural diversity in their senior leadership team.
- Only 8.1% of senior positions in the largest 100 UK charities are held by ethnic minority leaders and at the most senior level of Chair, CEO and CFO this drops to 6.2%
- While 41% of senior positions in the top 100 UK Charities are held by women, female representation in the Top 3 roles of Chair, CEO and CFO is significantly less at just 27.5%
- Women hold just 23% of Chair positions across the largest 100 UK charities
The Green Park ‘Third Sector Leadership 2,000’ examines the backgrounds of 1,866 individuals in total. The aggregate analysis of the cohort by gender and ethno-cultural background is derived from a sophisticated software, using a database of 1.2 billion individual records globally.
The analysis highlights that the largest charitable institutions have incredibly limited ethno-cultural representation at the highest levels of management, with 92% of the senior leadership team being white. Only 8.1% of senior positions in the largest 100 UK charities are held by ethnic minority leaders and at the most senior level of Chair, CEO and CFO this drops to 6.2%.
Women hold only 41% of senior leadership positions in leading UK charities, despite representing 51% of the UK population. At the Top 3 level, this is even less at just 27.5%, demonstrating that there may still be a glass ceiling holding women back from the most senior decision-making roles. With 77% of Chair positions currently being held by men; the role of Chair is the most male-dominated of the Top 3 roles.
This is the fourth year of the Green Park Leadership Series, and the first Leadership 2,000 report specifically written for the Voluntary Sector. The sample is carefully designed to allow meaningful comparison with the Top 3 and Top 20 levels of The Green Park Leadership 10,000, which analyses equivalent senior leaders in FTSE 100 companies, and The Green Park Leadership 5,000, which looks at Public Sector leaders.
The report examines the backgrounds of 1,866 individuals working in the largest 100 UK charities (Major UK Charities), categorised by annual turnover and broken down into 10 sub-sectors.
