Great to have more women on board but not if they're there to tick boxes

Progress towards correcting the imbalance has been swift. The Professional Boards Forum's BoardWatch survey found that 27% of appointments to the boards of blue-chip companies last year were women. Anecdotally, the trend has accelerated further since then. By some measures, 17 of the last 20 FTSE 100 board appointments have been women.

But there is still a long way to go. Men have ceded only 15% of board jobs so far - although admittedly that is the fairer sex's best-ever showing. However, there are some signs that the system has cranked into overdrive.

Curtains and bedding retailer Dunelm virtually apologised the other week when its new non-executive director was a man, not a woman, reporting that "it asked its nominated search adviser to prioritise the presentation of suitably qualified women".

Separately, one large company was keen on finding a female strategy director but found that most candidates were asking for more than it was prepared to pay. It plumped for a man, in part because he was cheaper. The (high-heeled) shoe is shifting onto the other foot now.

Cost pressures aside, some headhunters report that weak female candidates are being preferred over stronger males just so that companies can demonstrate they are doing their bit in the face of pressure from lobby groups and investors.

This is wrong. UK Plc has achieved a lot by getting this issue firmly on the agenda. But putting women into top jobs simply to keep up appearances risks a rearguard action if a board's decision-making is found to be wanting. Better to miss the targets - and ignore David Cameron's threat of imposing boardroom quotas - to do this properly.