Mar 11, 2017

White men 'endangered species' in UK boardrooms - Tesco chairman

John Allan told a retail conference "The pendulum has swung very significantly" - even though white men still dominate in UK boardrooms. "In his speech, the day after International Women's Day, about the recruitment of prospective non-executive directors, Mr Allan said:"For a thousand years men have got most of these jobs, the pendulum has swung very significantly the other way now and will do for the foreseeable future I think. Mr Allan sits alongside eight other white men and three white women on Tesco's board. "Speaking to the Guardian newspaper after the Retail Week Live conference in London, Mr Allan said:"The context was [that] I was talking to a bunch of aspiring non-executive directors, many of whom were women, and I wanted to give them some encouragement and I used that rather colourful turn of speech. "It was intended to be humorous, a bit hyperbolic. Clearly, white men are not literally an endangered species but I was actually wanting to make the reverse point, which is that it is a great time for women and people of ethnic minorities who want to get on in business."

Read the full story

 Related companies

Make a complaint about Tesco by viewing their customer service contacts.