Reflections from leading “Leadership for the Equity Challenge: Closing the Gap at the Top” at the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leaders Annual Summit in Geneva.
In September 2025 I served as a discussion leader for an Impact Session at the Young Global Leaders Annual Summit in Geneva, convened in close collaboration with the World Economic Forum’s Centre for the New Economy and Society. The subject was one of the most persistent problems in leadership: why diverse leaders remain so scarce at the very top.
The gap at the top
The Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2025 put the reality plainly. Women held just 28.8% of top leadership positions, and at current rates full gender parity remains 123 years away. Representation narrows as seniority rises, and the narrowing is steeper still for leaders from other under-represented groups.
A century is not a timeline. It is a verdict on the systems we have built.
Fix the system, not the woman
In our session I invited the group to shift the focus from fixing women to fixing systems: the inherited structures that continue to filter talent out long before it reaches the boardroom or the investment committee. Five priorities stood out.
- Leadership redefined for a new era: collective, values-driven and diverse.
- Capital as a catalyst: allocated with intent, as a force for equity anchored in purpose.
- Governance that is intentional, inclusive and accountable.
- Transparency that turns commitments into measurable outcomes.
- Organisations and cultures redesigned to remove systemic barriers, rather than asking individuals to work around them.
Levers that work, and how fragile they are
Systems change when the people who control access decide that they should. The Equality Fund, on whose founding board I served, shows how capital can be structured to deliver social and financial returns together. Goldman Sachs’ former policy of declining to take companies public without diverse boards showed how quickly a single gatekeeper can move an entire market. Its withdrawal in February 2025 showed how quickly such a lever can be lost.
That is the lesson I return to as an investor and board director. Progress that depends on goodwill is reversible. Progress built into how capital is allocated, how boards are composed and how performance is measured is far harder to undo.
The real question
The question is no longer whether diverse leadership adds value. It strengthens performance, innovation, resilience and trust. The real question is whether we are willing to lead boldly enough to make equity in leadership non-negotiable.
My thanks to my fellow discussion leaders and to the World Economic Forum team who convened the session, including Silja Baller, Julia Hakspiel and Antonia Pérez López.
Adapted from reflections first published in September 2025.
