Women Don't Mean Business? Gender Penalty in Board Composition

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Solal, Isabelle; Snellman, Kaisa
• 署名单位: INSEAD Business School
• 刊物名称: ORGANIZATION SCIENCE
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1047-7039
• DOI: 10.1287/orsc.2019.1301
• 发表日期: 2019
• 页码: 1270-1288
• 关键词: diversity; GENDER; corporate boards; financial markets; SHAREHOLDER VALUE; SOCIAL PERFORMANCE; market signals

摘要

We examine investor responses to board diversity and highlight a previously unexplored mechanism to explain negative market reactions to senior female appointments. Drawing on signaling theory, we propose that an increase in board diversity leads investors to update their beliefs about firm preferences. Specifically, we argue that a gender-diverse board is interpreted as revealing a preference for diversity and a weaker commitment to shareholder value. Consequently, firms with more female directors will be penalized. We test our argument using 14 years of panel data on U.S. public firms. We find that firms that increase board diversity suffer a decrease in market value and that this effect is amplified for firms that have received higher ratings for their diversity practices across the organization. These results suggest that observers respond to the presence of female leaders not simply on their own merit but as broader cues of firm preferences and that firms may counteract any potential signaling effect through careful framing.