While women in finance see the experience of serving on the board of directors of a public company as a stepping stone to top corporate positions, progress in this arena has been slow, as shown by several recent studies.

In 2011, women held 16.1% of the board seats at Fortune 500 companies, a barely discernible gain from 15.7% in 2010, according to a Catalyst survey released in December, which also pointed out that about one in 10 of the companies have no women on their boards.

A study GMI Ratings released in March shows incrementally small improvement for women board members globally, up 0.7 percentage point to 10.5% of the directors of 4,300 companies in 45 countries. The study notes that national statistics vary widely: in Norway, 36% of company directors are women, while in Germany, only 13% are. France clocked the biggest increase in women on boards last year after a law was passed mandating 20% female representation within three years and 40% in six.