At the engine manufacturer Deutz, there is apparently a need for discussion after the chairman of the supervisory board and the chairman of the board argued about the new statutory quota for women on the board around Christmas. According to SZ information, the supervisory board is to meet unscheduled this Wednesday. A company spokesman confirmed on request that the panel “is convening for an extraordinary meeting this week”.
Background to the debate mentioned: So far, the Deutz board has consisted of four men. However, since the summer of 2021, the second management positions law has stipulated that listed and co-determined companies with more than three board members must in future appoint at least one woman to the management board.
In the actual matter, Deutz has apparently not yet found a solution
The Deutz supervisory board then examined whether it could prematurely extend the contracts of the board members before the quota takes effect. But this path did not stand up to legal scrutiny. Alternatively, chief controller Bernd Bohr spoke to a board member about whether he would be willing to be demoted to the role of general manager. The new requirement would not apply to the remaining trio. Bohr confirmed that the supervisory board “also pursued unusual ideas”, whereby some were rejected on the advice of the lawyers. Deutz is satisfied with all four board members, explained Bohr.
But CEO Frank Hiller warned in a letter to the control body that the public could unmask such ideas as a trick: “Namely in the way that we don’t accept women in board positions.” As a result, chief controller Bohr criticized in an e-mail that Hiller had “willfully torpedoed” a solution and restricted the scope of the supervisory board “in an absolutely inadmissible way”. Bohr questioned whether he could still work trustingly with the CEO “after this incident”, but later qualified this statement.
Even if the supervisory board will soon meet unscheduled, the company does not seem to have found a solution to the actual matter. Personnel issues are “not the subject of the consultations,” the spokesman said. Bohr had set the goal that Deutz should find a solution by the end of the year.