We show evidence that female board representation is associated with greater innovative success, and thus enhances firm performance in innovation-intensive industries. Firms with female directors tend to invest more in innovation and obtain more patents and citations for given R&D expenditures....

This study investigates the effect of gender diversity on boards on information asymmetry problems in the French stock market. We use Bid-Ask Spread BASP estimator of Corwin and Schultz (2012) as a proxy for asymmetric information in stock markets. The study shows the following results. First,...

We examine the role and influence of female directors in high risk strategic board decision-making by applying critical mass theory to mergers’ and acquisitions’ decisions of Fortune 100 corporations. Applying critical mass theory, we analyze whether behavioral differences manifest...

Gender diversity on corporate boards can be approached from two perspectives: first, women on boards are good for business since that contributes to better decision making and hence better governance and performance; second, as a social equity issue, women constituting about half the human...

The under-representation of women on boards is a heavily discussed topic – not only in Germany. Based on critical mass theory and with the help of a hand-collected panel data set of 151 listed German firms for the years 2000-2005, we explore whether the link between gender diversity and firm...

We assess the role of women in bank boardrooms in a sample of 461 large banks from OECD countries. After controlling for bank and country specific effects, we find that women's participation in boardrooms, both presence and percentage, has a positive influence on the return equity, the return on...

This paper investigates the relationship between board gender diversity and firm performance has been investigated using a panel dataset over the period 2009-2011. Applying quantile regression, we show that board gender diversity has a different effect on firm performance over different points...

Boards of directors have received limited guidance about the types and diversity of professional expertise expected on corporate boards. This is because little is actually known about the expertise that exists on corporate boards. In this study, we categorize directors by 11 types of...

This study investigates boards of (non-executive) directors and whether employee representation has a positive effect on gender diversity on boards. We exploit rich, newly assembled board–director matched panel data for Norway and Germany, which contain unique information on whether a director...

Companies that are serious about corporate governance and business ethics are turning their attention to gender diversity at the most senior levels of business (Institute of Business Ethics, Business Ethics Briefing 21:1, 2011). Board gender diversity has been the subject of several studies...