Gender diversity in the intelligence Agencies

The new Director of GCHQ made the same point in relation to his
organisational needs:
We will not be able to keep innovating at the scale we need if we
can’t address the critical business case for diversity.5
7. The Agencies certainly recognise the importance of casting their
recruitment net as wide as possible. The former Director of GCHQ
acknowledged this in a speech paying tribute to Alan Turing:

I strongly believe [an intelligence] agency needs the widest range
of skills possible if it is to be successful, and to deny itself talent
just because the person with the talent doesn’t conform to a
social stereotype is to starve itself of what it needs to thrive.6

Gender diversity
8. GCHQ recognises the benefits in terms of diversity of thinking
and better decision-making – the former Director elaborated on the
benefits he saw from an increase in gender diversity at Board level:

… it’s radically different with two women on the Board rather
than one, it is radically different, and I find that the Board
operates in a different way and I find that the discussions are
deeper, I think they are more emotionally intelligent, and, if you
like, I think there is more intuition in the room. So it’s been good
for us. I’d love to feel what it was like with three.
We note that since these comments to the Committee in 2012,
GCHQ now has four women on the Board: a 100% increase in two
years, which we applaud.
GCHQ

“Diversity is not about
ticking boxes and
complying with legal
requirements.”

9. Sir Iain Lobban’s remarks are supported by a Canadian study, ‘Not
just the right thing… But the bright thing’,7 which found that Boards
with three or more women on them showed very different governance
behaviours from those with all-male Boards:

Inclusive and diverse Boards are more likely to be effective Boards,
better able to understand their customers and stakeholders and
to benefit from fresh perspectives, new ideas, vigorous challenge
and broad experience. This in turn leads to better decision making.
It is this broader range – “fresh perspectives, new ideas, vigorous
challenge” – that is the real benefit of greater diversity. Whilst it is
true that some women may bring greater emotional intelligence, or
intuition, that is a very simplistic view of the benefits women bring
to Boards.

5
6
7

Letter from Robert Hannigan, Director GCHQ, to the Rt. Hon. Hazel Blears, MP, dated
11 December 2014.
Sir Iain Lobban (former Director of GCHQ), ‘GCHQ and Turing’, 3 October 2012.
The Conference Board of Canada, ‘Women on Boards, Not just the right thing… but the
bright thing’, June 2002.

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