IN François Ozon's latest film, "Potiche", Catherine Deneuve (pictured) plays a trophy wife, a potiche, who spends her days jogging in a scarlet jumpsuit, making breakfast for her cantankerous husband and writing poetry perched on a sofa. But then her husband, the boss of an umbrella factory, is taken hostage by striking workers. Ms Deneuve takes over the factory and charms the workers into returning to work. She jazzes up the products and generally proves that anything a man can do, a woman can do better.

在弗朗西斯•奥宗（François Ozon）最新电影《傀儡》 中，凯瑟琳•德纳芙（Catherine Deneuve，图示）饰演一个有威望的妻子。她每天穿着鲜红色的紧身连衫裤慢跑，为她脾气坏的老公做早餐，栖息在沙发上写诗歌。但是她的丈夫，一家雨伞厂的厂主，被罢工的工人所扣押。德纳芙夫人接管了工厂，并以哄诱工人重新回到了工作。她重新装饰了产品，并大体上证明了任何男人能做的事情，女人能做得更好。

The film was set in 1977, when the only women in a typical Western boardroom were serving the coffee. Times have changed. These days no one doubts that women can run companies: think of Indra Nooyi at PepsiCo, Carol Bartz at Yahoo! or Ursula Burns at Xerox. Sheryl Sandberg, the number two at Facebook, is more widely applauded than her young male boss, Mark Zuckerberg.

这部电影是以1977年为时代背景，此时在一个普通西方董事会会议室中，仅有的女性是服务咖啡的。时过境迁，而今女性毫无疑问可以经营公司：想象百事可乐公司的英德拉•努依（Indra Nooyi），雅虎的卡罗尔•巴茨（Carol Bartz）或者施乐公司的乌尔苏拉•伯恩斯（Ursula Burns）。Facebook的二把手谢勒尔•桑德伯格（Sheryl Sandberg），比他的年轻的男上司马克•扎克伯格（Mark Zuckerberg）更加广受称赞。

Yet the number of female bosses of large firms remains stubbornly small. Not a single one on France's CAC 40 share index or on Germany's DAX index is run by a woman. In America, only 15 chief executives of Fortune 500 companies are women. Britain does better, but not much: five of the FTSE-100 firms have female bosses.

然而，大型公司的女一把手数量仍然相当少。法国CAC-40股价指数或者德国DAX指数所涉及的公司均不是女性所掌控。在美国，财富500强企业中，只有15家的首席执行官为女性。英国方面相对来说好一些，单也不太多。富时指数所涉及的100家公司中，5家拥有女老板。

Several governments, especially in Europe, have decided that radical action is required to increase the number of women in the executive suite. Norway passed a law in 2003 that obliged all publicly listed firms to reserve 40% of the seats on their boards for women by 2008. Spain passed a similar law in 2007; France earlier this year. The Netherlands is working on one.

一些政府，尤其位于欧洲的政府，已经决定为了增加女性在经理层的数量，需要采取根本性的措施。挪威在2003年通过一项法案，要求到2008年，所有公开上市的公司有义务为女性保留董事会中40%的席位。西班牙在2007年通过了一项相似的法案；法国则是在今年早些时候。荷兰正在起草此类法案。

On July 6th the European Parliament passed a resolution calling for EU-wide legislation stipulating that at least 40% of seats on listed companies' supervisory boards will be reserved for women by 2020. This does not oblige member states to do anything, but it reflects a spreading mood. The German government is considering whether to impose quotas. America is not, but new rules from the Securities and Exchange Commission will require firms to reveal what, if anything, they are doing to increase diversity at the top table.

在7月16日，欧洲议会通过了一项决议，要求欧盟范围内立法规定：在到2020年上市公司监事会中应为女性保留至少40%的席位。这项决议并没有对各成员国做出任何要求，但是它却反应出了一个广泛的心情。德国政府正在考虑是否实施定额。美国并没有如此，但是证券交易委员会的新规定要求要求公司（如果有的话）公布起其在公司高层多样化中所做出的行动。

Viviane Reding, the EU commissioner for justice, argues that compulsion is the only way to overcome entrenched discrimination. For a whole year she has tried to cajole companies to take voluntary measures to promote more women. In March, she posted a "Women on the Board Pledge for Europe" on her website. This allows companies to promise that women will make up 30% of their boards by 2015 and 40% by 2020. Only seven companies have signed up so far. Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton (LVMH), a French luxury-goods maker, added itself rather ostentatiously on July 12th. But cynics doubt that this owed much to the commissioner's powers of persuasion. LVMH was only pledging to do what the new French law already obliges it to.

欧盟司法部部长薇薇安•雷丁提出，强制力是战胜已根深蒂固的歧视的唯一方式。过去一整年，她一直在试着说服公司志愿采取措施来为更多的女性升职。今年3月份，她在其个人网站上发布了一项名为"Women on the Board Pledge for Europe"的公告。该公告允许公司承诺：到2015年女性成员会占公司董事会成员的30%，到2020年，这一数字为40%。目前，只有7家公司署名。7月12日，法国奢侈品制造商路易威登（LVMH）相当炫耀地签署了承诺。但是有人怀疑说这要大部分归功于雷丁的说服力。路易威登仅仅承诺它将按照法国新法案的规定来做。

There is a powerful business case for hiring more women to run companies. They are more likely to understand the tastes and aspirations of the largest group of consumers in the world, namely women. They represent an underfished pool of talent. And there is evidence that companies with more women in top jobs perform better than those run by men only.

女性更加可能懂得世界上最大的消费者群体的喜好和愿望。有证据表明高层中女性人数更多的公司表现的比那些仅有男性掌控的公司要好的多。以下是一个招募更多女性来经营公司的一个强有力的商业案例。

McKinsey, a consultancy, recently looked at 89 listed companies in Europe with a very high proportion of women in senior management posts and compared their financial performance with the average for firms in the same industry. It found that these firms enjoyed a higher return on equity, fatter operating profits and a more buoyant share price. The authors described the correlation between promoting women and doing well as "striking", though they admitted that they could not prove what was causing what. It is possible that firms that are already doing well tend to hire more female directors.

咨询公司麦肯锡最近着眼于欧洲的89家上市公司，这些公司的高级管理职位中女性占据了很大的一个比例。它将这些公司的业绩状况与相同产业中的普通公司进行比较，结果发现，这些公司享有更高的净资产收益，更多的营业收益以及更加上扬的股价。咨询人员将晋升女性和公司业绩表现良好之间的关系形容为"给人深刻印象的"，尽管他们承认他们无法证明孰因孰果。可能是表现依然良好的公司倾向于雇佣更多的女性主管。