Women executives feel rays of Sunshine State

The glass ceiling, in Florida at least, has grown a little thinner.

In fact, the state had the largest increase in the percentage of women executives, 5%, in 2011 compared with 2010, according to a survey from the InterOrganization Network (ION).

The survey, which studies 14 regions of the United States, is ION's eighth annual status report on women directors and executive officers of public companies. Suburban Philadelphia-based ION is a national nonprofit focused on increasing the amount of women executives and women who sit on for-profit boards.

In addition to more women executives, Florida, according to the survey, also had the largest decrease in companies with no women executive officers. But on a nationwide basis women still lag behind men, according to the survey, especially on boards of public companies.

On that segment, the survey reports that 87 of 542 newly elected company directors were women, a total of 16.1%. On a regional basis, adds the survey, between 70% and 90% of newly elected company directors were men. “Although these stagnant numbers are disappointing,” says ION President Charlotte Laurent-Ottomane in a statement, “they increase our determination to transform the landscape.”