Women in Sport Leadership Snapshot

In line with its Policy on Women in Sport, Sport Ireland has published the latest snapshot of female representations on the boards of funded National Governing Bodies of Sport and Local Sports Partnerships.

The snapshot is published as part of the Leadership & Governance pillar of the Sport Ireland Women in Sport Policy and outlines the current position and progress made since the publication of the Policy.

A key objective of the Leadership and Governance target area is to progress towards greater gender balance in board membership of funded bodies. The second objective is to provide a pathway for women aspiring to become leaders of funded bodies.

The first update, published in March 2020, showed that females made up an average of 29% of boards across funded National Governing Bodies. This was an increase from 24% when the Sport Ireland Policy on Women in Sport was published in 2019. This figure now stands at 36% in National Governing Bodies (including Sport Ireland, the Federation of Irish Sport, Olympic Federation of Ireland and Paralympics Ireland). The same figure for Local Sports Partnerships has increased by 2% over the last year with females accounting for 39% of Board members.

Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, Catherine Martin welcomed the publication of the snapshot and said: “The continued growth in female representation on boards is very encouraging. I am delighted to see that the average number of females on NGB Boards has increased again over the past year from 32% to 36%. Sporting bodies are clearly prioritising gender diversity on their boards, and I want to acknowledge the significant efforts they are making. There is a final push needed over the next 12 months to achieve the target of 40% gender representation on their boards by the end of 2023 as outlined in Action Plan for Sport 2021-2023.”

Action 32 of the Government’s National Sports Policy 2018-2027 tasks National Governing Bodies with developing equality action plans and setting gender diversity targets.

Sport Ireland CEO, Dr Una May, commented; “Sport Ireland monitor and report on gender diversity in our funded bodies and we are working closely with organisations to provide resources and support to help them attain the target of 40% gender representation on their boards. If the current trajectory is maintained that target will be achieved next year.”

As well as acknowledging the board composition of funded bodies, Sport Ireland is also monitoring the proportion of women in leadership positions within funded bodies. At present, female CEOs represent 30% of the total CEOs in NGBs (including the Federation of Irish Sport, Olympic Federation and Paralympics Ireland). A 2% increase since last year. Twelve NGBs have a female President (an increase of two on 2021 snapshot) while 15% of Boards have a female Chairperson. Females also account for 50% of Coordinator roles in the Local Sports Partnerships, however females in Chairperson roles have dropped from 21% to 14% over the last year.

Sport Ireland Women in Sport Lead, Nora Stapleton, added: “In analysing the information for this year’s snapshot, we have seen a number of sporting organisations make positive progress to achieve or exceed the Government target of 40% gender balance on Boards. For example, Cycling Ireland have progressed from 13% in 2021 to 50% in this year’s snapshot, while Irish Tenpin Bowling have moved from having no women on their board in 2021 to 50% females in 2022. Through the Sport Ireland Women in Sport Funding Programme, we will continue to encourage NGBs and other sporting bodies to utilise the funding to provide dedicated women in sport leadership training and develop initiatives and resources for their volunteers and board members.

Ends.

More information:

Fergus Hannigan

fhannigan@sportireland.ie

 

LSPs who have obtained minimum standard of 40% = 12

LSPs who have yet to obtain minimum standard of 40% = 17