The Guidelines for Gender Balance Performance and Reporting are a practical and relevant framework to enable Australian entities to raise their performance and reporting of gender balance in their workforce.
The Guidelines are the brainchild of Women on Boards, which formed a coalition to develop a practical and relevant framework to help organisations measure, report and improve performance in relation to gender balance. They were developed by the Guidelines Development Committee and are published by Women on Boards and Chartered Secretaries Australia.
The Guidelines are applicable for public and private entities, from the largest ASX listed company to small to medium-sized enterprises. They are a resource for entities to achieve cultural change, rather than to achieve compliance with reporting obligations.
The Guidelines contain gender balance indicators that entities can adopt in order to:
The key element of the Guidelines is the Framework for data collection, analysis, reporting and performance improvement (the Framework), which is intended to assist entities to set measurable targets for increased participation by women. The Framework covers seven sections as follows:
The Framework is progressive, so that entities can identify at which stage of the gender balance journey they find themselves, and select activities for implementation that progresses them to the next stage.
The Guidelines also contain a sample of a dashboard/ scorecard that can be used to report to the board on gender balance within the entity.