I first wrote about the Fearless Girl campaign in March 2017 in “How a little girl on Wall Street brought attention to a global issue,” and this year on International Women’s Day, saw a second bronze Fearless Girl statue being unveiled on Paternoster Square in front of the London Stock Exchange building, where she will stand proudly until the end of June. The original Fearless Girl, by artist Kristen Visbal, became famous by appearing in front of the iconic Wall Street bull in New York City in March 2017 and was later moved to her permanent home in front of the NYSE. Both statues were commissioned by State Street Global Advisors’ (SSGA) as a campaign to engage its portfolio companies that lacked female representation in the boardroom and since then there has been much debate and discussion around not only the event but also the underlying issue it serves to highlight.

For the past two years, the asset manager, which has an estimated $2.8 trillion in assets under management, has engaged with 1,265 companies on their lack of female board representation. More than one third (423) of those companies have subsequently added a female board director, while many others have committed to do so. One can’t argue that this episode that many have labeled a “PR stunt” has brought about change and a continuation of a much-needed conversation on the topic. But what is next for the Fearless Girl and her crusade? SSGA says the campaign will continue to evolve and focus on Board diversity but also grow to include diversity in executive positions and below within corporations with a focus on women and succession planning for executive roles who are running the day to day business operations, diversity of those women and promotion of them accordingly. “Board of Directors” and “Women CEOs running public companies” are previous pieces I have written about related to this subject and worth a read related to this topic.

Originally the campaign by SSGA targeted three countries including the US, UK and Australia and in 2018, it expanded to include public companies in Canada, Japan and Europe. They made clear at that time that it would vote against the re-election of the Chair of the Nominating Committee if the company didn’t appoint a female Board Director or commit to doing so. This year, SSGA has furthered their stance and committed to voting against all members of the Nominating Committee if female Board directors aren’t being added or seriously considered.

Lynn Blake, SSGA executive vice president and Chief Investment Officer of its Global Equity Beta Solutions business says, “It’s all centered around the business case. There’s strong evidence that shows a Board that has greater diversity and more women in Board positions leads to better financial outcomes. In the majority of instances there has been a willingness. In the cases where there hasn’t been agreement, people are often in two camps, one that feel there isn’t a correlation to female Board Directors and better financial performance and the second that suggest there isn’t a strong pipeline of Board ready women. One thing for sure, is the world will continue to watch and listen to see what progress is made, how quickly and by which companies.

Sources:

BBC news
IR Magazine
Curbed NY