Dramatic drop in executive director numbers
Higgs guidelines see numbers drop by 20%
Boardroom guidelines recommended by Sir Derek Higgs in his 2002 report have
resulted in the number of executive directors of FTSE companies falling by 20%
since 2002.
A survey of FTSE 350 companies by Deloitte revealed that executive directors
on main boards dropped by 6.5% this year, the fourth successive year they have
declined.
This has come about because UK plcs have been cutting the number of
executives faster than they add non-executive directors – the number of
non-executive directors remained unchanged from last year, and has only
increased by 12% over the last four years
Carol Arrowsmith, head of the remuneration team at Deloitte, said; ‘FTSE 350
companies are striving to achieve the boardroom equilibrium recommended by Sir
Derek Higgs, but not in the way many people expected. By reducing the number of
executive directors, companies are striking a better balance between executive
and independent board members, and at the same time making the boards less
unwieldy.’