The birthplaces, languages, ancestries and religions of chief executive officers and managing directors in Australia

This paper provides detailed comparisons of the birthplace, language, ancestry and religious profiles of chief executive officers and managing directors (CEO&MDs) to those of the broader Australian workforce, using 2011 Australian census data, and assesses the extent to which these differences are attributable to the age profiles of these groups. The results show the percentages of migrants from English‐speaking and north‐west European countries, English, Dutch and German speakers, and people with British, Dutch or German ancestry among CEO&MDs are above the percentages of the wider national workforce these groups form. In contrast, migrants from most Asian countries are less prevalent among CEO&MDs than in the wider national workforce. Second and higher order generation southern Europeans are well represented among CEO&MDs, in contrast to the first generation. The patterns are linked to the historical sizes and selectivity of different migration flows, and may raise equal opportunity concerns.