Lloyds to hit target for women in senior jobs

Lloyds presently has 29 per cent of senior posts filled by women

Lloyds is on course to have 40 per cent of senior roles at the bank filled by women in the next five years (Getty Images)

Taxpayer-backed Lloyds Banking Group yesterday said it was on course to have 40 per cent of senior roles at the bank filled by women in the next five years as it looks to remove “roadblocks” to female career progression.

Lloyds presently has 29 per cent of senior posts filled by women – including three independent directors on the board – after a drive to improve representation. The advance follows recent progress on the issue by companies across the FTSE 100, which is now just 17 women short of meeting Lord Davies’ target of 25 per cent of all blue-chip directors being female by the end of this year. Representation has almost doubled since 2011 with 263 female directors in FTSE 100 companies so far – a 23.5 per cent share.

Lloyds’ diversity director Fiona Cannon said the bank had put in place specific “comply or explain” policies for shortlists of candidates for senior jobs not including women, as well as schemes to develop leadership potential among middle management-level women.

Ms Cannon said the bank had made good progress but had more work to do. She added: “We need to identify where many of these roadblocks are, and importantly, how we can try to break them down.

“The group will need to overcome a number of challenges before it becomes a fully inclusive workplace for women.”