San Diego, CA : Bench International, a leading global executive search firm, announces the launch of its proprietary Bank of Women®. The introduction of Bank of Women represents a unique and innovative opportunity for the life science industry to recruit experienced women leaders for their C-suite and board of director positions.
Bench International’s Bank of Women is positioned to meet a growing demand for women in the boardroom. NASDAQ filed a proposal late November with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that would require listed companies to have at least one woman on their boards, impacting nearly 3,000 corporations listed on its exchange. If approved by the SEC, companies would have to disclose board-diversity statistics within one year.
“We recognized an unmet need for board ready and C-suite women executives,” said DeeDee DeMan, Chairman and CEO of Bench International. “We explored and prudently developed a program to provide coaching, mentoring and sponsoring of women leaders to meet the growing demand. Today we have over 550 women who are ‘banked’ and ready for placement.”
Substantial research demonstrates that diversity brings many advantages to an organization, including increased profitability and creativity, stronger governance and better problem-solving abilities. According to a recent Boston Consulting Group study, companies with more diverse management teams have 19% higher revenues due to innovation.
“The Bank of Women is a powerful resource for both life science organizations and women pursuing their first board position,” said Dr. Freda Lewis Hall, former Chief Medical and Chief Patient Officer at Pfizer and current board member for three public and one private company. “There are many talented, qualified women that are just not being recognized to the detriment of many companies. The Bank of Women and Bench International will help guide their development and promote their talents as highly qualified board members and C-suite executives.”
