Women in Business in Poland — statistics, facts & overview 2020
There are still half fewer women on the boards of Polish companies than men. Also, half fewer women in Poland decide to run their own businesses. Learn more about female entrepreneurship facts and statistics.
The everyday life of our technology company has one big advantage - by constantly aggregating data from business registers from Poland, we have the opportunity to use them in other ways than just packing information in the API for our clients. Today, we have tempted to data showing the entrepreneurship of Polish women.
Female entrepreneurship in Poland
Introduction to different types of businesses in Poland
In Poland, there are two separate commercial registers from which we can get information about entrepreneurs — Central Register and Information on Economic Activity (CEIDG) and the National Court Register (KRS).
Commonly, many people do not distinguish between entities entered in them from each other. For the average John Smith, it is not important whether someone runs his own sole proprietorship business (registered in CEIDG) or is the owner or a member of the board of the company (registered in the National Court Register (KRS)) - the most important thing is that someone is the head of the company.
Importantly, sole proprietorships do not have management boards - the entrepreneur to whom the activity is registered is its owner. In the companies registered in the National Court Register (KRS), we will meet board members who can be both owners of companies and exercise real management control in them.
View the latest 2023 report on women’s entrepreneurship in Poland
How many women in Poland are self-employed? Sole proprietorships from CEIDG business register
Poland, February 2020
Currently (data from February 2020), 0.79 million women and 1.56 million men run their own sole proprietorship businesses in Poland. We see, therefore, that there are twice as many self-employed men than women in Poland.
Sole proprietorships, entered in the CEIDG commercial register, are currently the most popular legal form of doing business in Poland. Although, as the name suggests, these are small "one-man" companies, often in practice, the owners of this type of entities are not only "bosses of themselves", but also employ a few to several people.
The domination of men in business can be seen not only in the data from CEIDG but also from the National Court Register (KRS).
Women in companies in Poland — women on company boards & female presidents (data from National Court Register (KRS))
Poland, February 2020
If we analyze economic entities commonly understood in Poland as companies — limited liability companies, joint-stock companies, limited partnerships, public partnerships and branches of a foreign entrepreneur — and treat them as “business”, on their management boards we will find 253,000 women and 518,000 men.
Therefore, women constitute a half smaller group than men.
The position of president is being held by 88.7 thousand of women and as many as 167.6 thousand men. Therefore, women constitute 34.6% of all CEOs and presidents of Polish companies.
When we take a closer look at companies from the Polish National Court Register (KRS), it is clearly visible in which legal forms of companies there are the least and the most women on management boards:
Polish women sit most often on the boards of limited liability partnerships (47.7%), and the least often they sit on the boards of branches of a foreign entrepreneur (only 8.6%).
In the remaining types of commercial companies, women constitute between 35% and 27% of all board members.
Considering only numbers, not % share, the majority of women on management boards are in limited liability companies (191,000), and the least in limited joint-stock partnerships (345), but it results only from the fact that there are the most and the smallest number of such companies in Poland in general.
100% female management boards
Poland, February 2020
We also checked business entities that have only 100% female composition or 100% male composition of the management board:
Interestingly, the largest disproportion can be seen in joint-stock companies. There are 41 times more joint-stock companies with only male management than only with female management.
In other forms of companies, the difference is not that great.
There are usually 5 times more “purely male” boards.
Only among partner companies can be seen about the same number of companies with 100% female management as 100% with male management.
And what about different entities that occur in Poland?
Women in foundations, associations & other types of entities
Poland, February 2020
Even on the boards of foundations and associations, which are often associated as entities in which women lead the way, they do not constitute in Poland a majority on the board. In foundations, women constitute 46.3% of boards, and in associations 36.8%.
Trade unions and cooperatives are close to the magical, coveted half, giving gender balance - there, women account for 45.4% and 45.6% of board members, respectively.
In turn, in such entities recognized as prestigious, such as chambers of commerce or employers' associations, there are significantly fewer women. They constitute only 20% of the members of the boards of chambers of commerce and 27% of the members of the boards of employers' associations.
