Recent regulatory changes in India require the firms to improve the appointment of female directors on corporate boards, and it is believed that such a regulation would prove to be a boon in terms of strategic decision making. The Board Capital Theory advocates that the appointment of women directors on board shall enhance various dimensions of the board capital breadth and help in better decision making. With growing consciousness for sustainable practices throughout the globe, it is pertinent to see whether the gender diverse boards can promote corporate social responsibility and create a business case for their upsurge, as it would give room for policy implications. This study investigates the impact of gender diverse boards on promoting corporate social responsibility, using multivariate regression with a sample of NIFTY 50 Index for the period 2014-2019. The study found insignificant positive relation among gender-diverse boards and sustainability. To check for the robustness of the study, we have used two diversity indices, Blau & Shannon index, to supplement our results.

The objective of this paper is to study whether the presence of women on boards affects the financial performance of firms. This study builds upon other studies that have earlier tried to determine the impact of number of women directors in Indian corporates on their financial performances, in terms of market performance index, i.e. Tobin's Q. The new Companies Act, 2013 has mandated the appointment of at least one woman director in certain classes of listed companies in India as described in Section 149(1)(b), which could possibly bring about a change in the governance and thus the financial performance of firms. The focus of this study is on finding and analysing the impact of compliance with this provision on the financial performance of IPO firms. In order to test our hypotheses, we selected 41 Indian Companies that have made an Initial Public Offer (IPO) in the recent past and have been listed on Bombay Stock Exchange during the period 2012-2016. The performance of each of these firms has been measured in terms of Tobin's Q for 3 successive years after their listing (IPO) as well as by using two gender diversity index values-Blau Index and Shannon index. The study concluded that the proportion of women on board is insignificant and that it could not impact the financial performance of the firms. Neither has it caused any adverse impact on the performance of these firms.

Purpose This study aims to evaluate the impact of gender diversity on corporate boards on firms’ financial performance in the context of the Indian information and technology (IT) sector. The Companies Act 2013 brought forth mandatory provisions for the appointment of women directors for a certain class of companies. This study explores the case of board gender diversity in the Indian IT sector’s unique setting. Design/methodology/approach The study uses a fixed effect panel data regression model to achieve its objectives. Two widely used diversity measures, Blau Index and Shannon Index, have been used to enhance the robustness of the results. Findings The results of the study indicate an insignificant relationship between gender diversity and firms’ financial performance. Even the diversity indices portray insignificant results confirming the outcomes of the study. The study indicates that IT sector firms have not been able to leverage the benefits of board gender diversity. Research limitations/implications The results of the study have important policy implications for the government, regulatory bodies and corporates. The outcomes point out that the benefits that could have accrued based on the diversity aspect could not be harnessed, as the women’s representation on corporate boards is extremely low. Policymakers and government shall focus on devising stringent laws so that better representation of women directors can be used for the interests of the firms. Originality/value The study is an attempt to fill the gap in the extant literature which has a scarce number of studies conducted in the unique setting of the IT sector (both in developed and developing economies). To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study on the influence of board gender diversity in the IT sector of a developing economy, backed by socio-cultural reasons.

With growing regulatory changes with respect to the composition of the board of directors, the regulation for the appointment of women directors on the corporate boards has seen an upsurge in recent times. It is quite evident to believe that with so many countries mandating the appointment of women, the reasons are not just social but also economic in nature. The extant literature provides enough evidence based on various social and psychological theories that support the diversity element for better decision-making. This study is an attempt to analyze the scientific articles to understand the growth of this concept under various dimensions. The search, undertaken over the Scopus database, led to the retrieval of a total of 547 articles published during the period 1989–2021 which, after final filtration, brought the total number of results to 352 articles. VOSviewer software was employed for the purpose of analyzing these articles which helped in the formulation of bibliometric citation, co-citation, and co-word maps. The findings suggest the prominent countries, significant authors, major studies, and top journals in this domain. In addition, the study also identifies the various dimensions such as financial performance, social performance, environmental performance, sustainability disclosures being impacted due to the presence of gender diversity. The study is significant and unique based on the pretext that it uses the Scopus database for the purpose of bibliometric mapping whereas past studies have used the Web of Science database, thus the study’s outcome made a strong corroboration in identifying emerging paradigms in the gender diversity literature.

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