'Hardwiring' helps close gender gap

Elizabeth Bryan is the chair of Caltex and a director of Westpac who was recently appointed a member of the Order of Australia for services to financial services, superannuation and corporate governance. Investors often watch commentary from experienced board members like her because she has sat on around 25 boards since the 1980s and speaks about practical corporate-governance changes that can affect company culture, talent retention and long-term performance.

According to Elizabeth Bryan, 'hardwiring' means making structural changes so gender diversity is part of day-to-day corporate governance—for example, including targets for female participation in executives’ key performance indicators and tying those KPIs to CEO bonuses. For investors, that signals companies are taking measurable, accountable steps to improve gender balance.

Linking CEO bonuses to female participation creates a direct incentive for management to prioritise gender diversity. Elizabeth Bryan says this approach embeds diversity goals into what a company ‘has got to do,’ which increases executive accountability and makes diversity an operational priority rather than a voluntary initiative—something investors can monitor as a governance metric.

The article notes flexible working hours have come to the fore because many women leave at middle and upper-middle management levels due to competing responsibilities like childcare and household duties. Bryan also points out men increasingly want flexibility. For investors, widespread flexible-work policies can reduce talent loss, support career continuity for female managers and contribute to a more stable, diverse leadership pipeline.

Bryan says the greatest loss of women is at middle management and upper-middle management levels—stages where roles are harder to obtain and employees often face family responsibilities. Losing women at these levels can shrink the pool of future senior leaders, which may limit a company’s ability to build diverse, experienced executive teams over time—an issue investors may want to factor into assessments of long-term leadership depth.

Elizabeth Bryan suggests the focus should be on women in management more broadly rather than just counting board seats. While board diversity is important, she highlights that the bulk of female employees need career opportunities at managerial levels. For investors, this means looking beyond board composition to promotion pipelines and management-level gender balance.

The article mentions Caltex, where Elizabeth Bryan is chair, and Westpac, where she serves as a director. Their relevance comes from Bryan’s directorship experience and governance insight—her comments reflect the kinds of structural diversity measures progressive companies, including large corporates, are adopting.

Based on the article, investors can look for concrete governance signals such as published targets for female participation, disclosure that CEO or executive bonuses include KPIs tied to those targets, and formal flexible-work policies aimed at retaining mid-level managers. These tangible actions suggest a company is 'hardwiring' diversity rather than offering only symbolic commitments.