By 2015, 30% of Deutsche Telekom’s upper and middle management will be women. As the first major German firm to introduce such a quota system, the Chief Executive René Obermann said that, “Having a greater number of women at the top will quite simply enable us to operate better.” Only 2.5% of executive board members in the 200 largest companies in Germany are women, whilst Siemens has the sole female senior board member.
With Governments having previously taken the lead in introducing quota systems, Norway has required women to constitute 40% of the directors in listed companies since 2008; Spain and France have similar laws; and Italy and the Netherlands are considering taking the same steps.
Source: bbc.co.uk/15.03.2010