Women can make it to the top, but must prove their worth…

I would like the opportunity to respond to your editorial item on women working in the design sector (Comment, DW 13 December).

For four years, I was a designer at Pentagram. I recall that there was a set of criteria which were used to determine basic eligibility for promotion to partnership.

To the best of my knowledge, such eligibility was not gender-based. It was suggested that to become a partner you had to leave and make your mark elsewhere, at the very least nationally, before there could be any chance of being invited back. That made perfect sense to me, given the work, responsibility, reputation and culture at Pentagram.

It doesn’t come as a surprise that a woman has been made an ‘associate’ after nine years, but it’s perhaps more surprising to me that anyone remains there for that length of time.

There are, of course, two very distinguished women Pentagram partners – Paula Sher (1991) and Lisa Strausfield (2002).

Lynda Brockbank, Creative and managing director, Crescent Lodge, London E2