By Darlene Bremer

Trends in Hiring Practices

When examining the increasing presence of women in the real estate industry it makes sense to tackle the subject from the point of view of those women who have ascended the corporate ladder. An alternative perspective comes from the third-party recruitment firms that have witnessed changes in the requests of their corporate clients.

Most public real estate companies are focusing today on adding diversity to their boards, according to William J. Ferguson, CEO of Ferguson Partners, Ltd. "We perform 20 to 25 board searches a year, and I would have to say that half of them are mandated by the need to increase diversity," Ferguson says.

The same focus holds true for executive positions as well. "REITs are becoming more enlightened than other industries and are actively searching for women and people of color to fill executive positions," Ferguson adds.

However, the number of female independent board members still lags behind other industries. "Of the independent board members of REITs in 2002, only four percent were women. Interestingly enough, in most of the better-managed public companies outside of real estate, 20 percent of the independent board members were women," Ferguson points out.

Anthony J. LoPinto, managing director and CEO of Equinox Partners, agrees that companies are increasingly interested in and aggressively pursuing women for senior positions. "Because the real estate industry has been historically short of female talent, companies have come to recognize the need for increased diversity and to view it as critical to long-term development and growth," he says.

Over the last 10 years, according to Ferguson, women have increasingly gravitated into senior management roles that put them on the track to CEO positions. "Women are in a much better position today to be promoted to executive-level positions," he observes. Ferguson also expects that opportunities for women will continue to multiply as more REITs and real estate companies become public and must comply with diversity standards. The progress has already started, with about 25 of the approximately 200 REITs in the U.S. with a woman in a senior management position, such as CEO, CFO or COO.

Over the next five to 10 years, LoPinto expects to see an increasing number of women in transactional and senior-level positions. "The future holds a great deal of promise that women will continue to increase their presence in the executive and senior-level professional positions," he says.