Airport operator achieves gender balance aim
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Airports operator Highlands and Islands Airports Ltd (HIAL) has achieved gender balance in the boardroom with a 50/50 split between men and women.
HIAL has published its first bBoard gender representation report which reveals the organisation has made progress in addressing the under-representation of women in public bodies and has an equal number of men and women on its board.
HIAL chairwoman Lorna Jack, said: “Across all aspects of society, women have an invaluable contribution to make and it is important that they have equal opportunity to undertake strategic roles in public bodies.
“Having 50 per cent of the HIAL Board made up of women is a significant step in our journey to achieving a diverse board membership and we welcome applications from individuals, of all gender identifications and from under-represented backgrounds, for any future vacancies on our board.”
The Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Act 2018 sets a gender representative objective that a Board should have a minimum of 50 per cent of non-executive members who are women.
The HIAL board is currently made up of eight members, two executive and six non-executive members and both groups achieve this gender balance.
The female Board members are:
• Lorna Jack. The non-executive director and chairwoman of HIAL is a chartered accountant and a graduate of Aberdeen University, and has served on the board as non-executive director since March 2014.
• Loraine Strachan, non-executive director, is also a chartered accountant, having completed her training with Ernst & Young in South Africa.
• Isabel Todenhoefer, non-executive director, is a finance and mergers and acquisitions expert with more than 12 years of experience in the aviation industry, where she worked as head of M&A Deutsche Lufthansa AG in Frankfurt. After leaving Lufthansa she co-founded the real estate financing platform Everge Financing (Sl), based in Madrid.
• Johanna Wallace, finance and commercial director, joined HIAL in November 2020. Originally from Inverness-shire, Johanna graduated with an honours degree in maths from the University of Aberdeen and qualified as a chartered accountant in 2001 whilst working for EY in Glasgow.
The full gender representation report is published on HIAL’s website www.HIAL.co.uk
