There are still hardly any women in the top positions in German first and second division clubs. According to a recent report by the organization “Football Can Do More” (FKM), only six of the 84 positions in the management levels of clubs are held by women. Only four clubs have any women in top management at all, namely Schalke 04, FC St. Pauli, 1. FC Heidenheim and Werder Bremen.
For the report, the organization surveyed all clubs in the first and second divisions of the previous season. 32 of 36 clubs took part in the survey; only Leverkusen, Darmstadt, Kiel and Wiesbaden did not. 28 of the 32 clubs have no women in top management at all. In addition, only four people have a citizenship other than German. Top management is the highest full-time operational management level that is responsible for professional football at the clubs.
“Football moves people, but it will not live up to its potential as long as it does not reflect social diversity in the management bodies,” says Katja Kraus, FKM’s advisory board chairwoman. The former national goalkeeper was the first woman to join the board of a Bundesliga football club in 2003, when she played for Hamburger SV. “With women in top management, risk management improves, performance increases and innovation increases,” she says.
Lack of diversity in football “even more extreme” than in business
The FKM survey is based on the AllBright reports, which regularly analyze the composition of the executive and supervisory boards of DAX companies. “In international comparison, German companies are already far behind when it comes to equal opportunities and diversity in management, but the football industry is in a much more extreme position,” summarizes Wiebke Ankersen, co-director of the German-Swedish AllBright Foundation. German football should take an example from companies or the football industry in other countries.
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