| dc.description.abstract | Sabanci University Corporate Governance Forum (CGFT), in strategic partnership with Egon Zehnder International
(EZI) Turkey, initiated the “Independent Women Directors (IWD)” project in 2012. The Forum was motivated by the
CMBT’s (Capital Markets Board of Turkey) ruling that came to force in January 2012 and required 1/3 of the board
members to be independent. Although the same ruling recommended inclusion of at least one female director, the
result was dilution of boards with respect to women from 12.5% to 11.5%, since companies increased their board size
and predominantly appointed men as independent directors to comply with the ruling.
IWD was a response to this unintended consequence. It aims to help companies to consider female candidates when
nominating independent directors. To this end, a database of qualified women is created based on voluntary
applications. Each candidate is evaluated against the criteria established by the Forum and EZI Turkey. As of the end
of 2019 IWD database has 304 board-qualified women. The women who are qualified by IWD project are
automatically included in GBRW database without going through an independent assessment process.
In 2013, CMBT revised its recommendation upon considering the draft proposed by IWD. Accordingly, the new clause
4.3.9 of the CMBT’s current Corporate Governance Principles required the listed companies set a target rate for
female board members of no less than 25% and a target date and establish a policy that will make it possible to
reach these targets. The board is expected to evaluate and report the progress made in reaching the target on an
annual basis. The ruling is based on “Comply or Explain” approach and the companies who do not set a target must
explain why they don’t in their mandatory annual Corporate Governance Compliance Reports.
Since 2012, IWD Project helped a number of companies and investors, including IFC, to find suitable female
candidates to nominate to boards. The Project also includes the piloting of a shareholder initiative that makes use
of mandatory electronic general assemblies in Turkey to ask questions to the boards about their gender diversity
targets. Within the scope of IWD project, researchers collect data on boards, analyze the trends, conduct research
and report. Using the data collected, researchers calculate Women Empowered Boards Index developed by a team
of scholars at Sabancı University and awards boards that score highest in various categories. | en_US |
