Confidence and attitude are crucial to women's business success, according to DB RREEF Funds Management chief operating officer and company secretary Tanya Cox.
"You need to learn to behave like a leader. If you want to be treated like a manager you can't act like a secretary," Cox told a female-centric Financial Services Institute of Australasia event.
There are only six female chief executive officers in Australia's top 200 Australian Stock Exchange listed companies, Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency 2006 consensus has shown. And just 12 per cent of executive management positions are held by women - a statistic which has remained static for the past two years, Cox said.
"The 2006 consensus confirms Australian female representation in corporate leadership continues to lag behind our leading trading nations, particularly the United States and the United Kingdom," Cox said.
There are only four female chairpersons in the top 200 ASX listed companies. And the number of boards that include at least one woman is declining. It fell from 51.5 per cent in 2003 and 51 per cent in 2004 to 50 per cent in 2006, the consensus found. This is in comparison to 89 per cent of United States boards, 78 per cent in the UK, 55 per cent in South Africa, Cox stated.
Cox advised women to build confidence and experience through continued education, and find a successful male mentor.
