Reason and possible remedies for the gender diversity deficit on boards within the UK’s soft-law regime: Directors’ perspective

A soft-law approach is followed in the UK for improving gender diversity on boards. Regulatory authorities recommend voluntary targets and companies endeavour to achieve them. In this paper, the authors present the result of a study exploring the causes and solutions of gender homogeneity on British boards. The paper is based on thirty-three interviews with board members of FTSE 350 companies. It posits that British boards have gender homogeneity due to discrimination perpetrated against women, which has wide repercussions including a lack of confidence in women. Hence regulatory intervention is warranted to improve gender diversity on boards. There is an increasing demand for more intrusive statutory action if the current approach fails to achieve gender parity on boards soon enough. However, the current soft-law approach is the best-suited strategy for the UK due to established institutional processes. The paper contributes to Institutional theory, Social Identity theory, public policy, and corporate praxis.