What does it take to be a woman on the board of directors of a top U.S. corporation today?

It takes what you've probably already got: smarts and experience in top management, according to the "Women of the West" research sponsored by Champion Boards®, a service of Santa Monica-based Technology Place Inc.

The 123 women on the top 110 California-based Fortune 1000 boards of directors are not movie stars or TV personalities. Nor was service at non-profits, charities, and foundations their primary stepping-stone to board directorships. For the most part, they have just been quietly succeeding in performing the tough jobs required in today's highly competitive, risk-taking leadership positions at American businesses, reports Elizabeth Ghaffari, President of Technology Place Inc. and director of Champion Boards®.

Ms. Ghaffari described this report as a first-time look at what it takes, today, to be a woman on the board of directors at top U.S. corporations.

"With this survey of the background, the experience, and the education of today's women on boards, women in top management positions will be able to understand what is required, today, if they want to pursue candidacy at top boards of directors. Most of these names are not familiar ones. What we see is that these are talented, competent women who charted this path pretty much on their own."

The first part of the research, released in May of this year, found that California firms dropped to a 12.0% share of women on their top boards of directors in 2005 compared to 12.8% in 2004 primarily because of the departure of two major firms, WellPoint Health Networks and Tenet HealthCare, both with significant female representation on their boards.

The second part of the research, entitled "Women of the West", examines the qualifications of women on California boards of directors: levels of corporate experience, entrepreneurial backgrounds, as well as academic, government, and charitable experience. It also looks at the number of other boards on which these women serve, whether they are from California or from other states, their average age and their tenure with their current boards.

Most of the women on boards were chosen because they were making significant, meaningful, financially profitable contributions to the corporations where they worked.

Still, the number of women added to corporate boards nationwide has increased only one-half of one percent a year for over a decade. Part of the reason for this glacial pace is that not enough women in top management stay long enough to get the caliber of top quality corporate experience necessary for eligibility for the top level public corporate boards.

Ms. Ghaffari said, "Over 73 percent of the Women of the West reported having "corporate experience". Almost 68 percent reported some "other board experience" -- either previously or concurrently."

"The old wives' tale that non-profits, charities, foundations, and academic backgrounds offer the majority of women paths to the board room is just plain wrong in 2005."

Only a very few women play the parlor game of sitting on multiple boards, concurrently. Most women invest themselves fully in the 200-plus hours a year it takes to meet the exacting demands of service on each corporate board in the post-Sarbanes-Oxley world. Currently, 9 women sit on a total of 35 corporate boards across the nation. Ms. Ghaffari suggests that this presents opportunities for such women to "pass the baton" to the up-and-coming generation of women in leadership positions.

Other opportunities arise from the fact that California female board members serve on an average of almost 2 committees each, including the Nominating Committee which, today, is principally responsible for establishing board candidacy selection and search criteria. Women also serve as chairs on several committees, which is a measure of confidence and credibility almost unheard of in years past.

The "Women of the West" results and recommendations are being presented by Ms. Ghaffari in a series of speaking engagements and presentations to corporate clients and research sponsors.

The 2005 Survey of Women on Boards of California-Based Fortune 1000 Firms is available for purchase from the web site: www.ChampionBoards.com.

Champion Boards® is a service of Technology Place Inc. -- designing great boards of directors through knowledge and information -- an advisory service for female candidates for board roles, to help women prepare themselves to pursue board opportunities . . . intelligently.

For further information or to schedule a presentation about the 2005 Survey of Women on Boards of California-Based Fortune 1000 Firms, for your company/organization,

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