Trickle‐down effect: The impact of female board members on executive gender diversity

Abstract

Female representation at senior organizational levels lags well behind male representation. We investigate whether there is a positive nonlinear relationship between female board representation and female executive representation: the trickle‐down effect. We investigated 1,387 organizations listed on the Australian Securities Exchange between 2003 and 2012 and found the hypothesized nonlinear trickle‐down effect operating between board and executive levels. The trickle‐down effect was strongest after 1 year but still significant after 5 years. We investigated two potential moderators of the effect: organization size and gender diversity recommendations. There was no moderating effect of organization size, but contrary to expectations, gender diversity recommendations slowed the trickle‐down effect. Our findings suggest that organizations can address the paucity of women at senior organizational levels by starting at the top. Specifically, organizations making multiple appointments of female board members should expect improvements in female executive representation. However, the signaling and advocacy opportunities afforded by female board appointments may be less potent in the context of external interventions. Our findings contribute to the ongoing policy debate about the value of regulatory interventions to increase female representation at senior organizational levels and highlight the need for research on the unintended consequences of these interventions across national contexts.

Women's career equality and leadership in organizations: Creating an evidence‐based positive change

“…Despite these challenges in generalizing career processes and goals across contexts, a first theme we identified is that the authors of nearly all of the articles in this special issue explore women's career issues related to issues in accessing or maintaining organizational membership and selection for leadership roles, and positive career‐development experiences across life phases, noting occupational and organizational differences. They do so using a wide array of theoretical perspectives and with attention to hiring riskiness for leader roles (Van Esch, Hopkins, O'Neil, & Bilimoria, ), retention (Ladge, Humberd, & Eddleston, ), turnover (Singh, Zhang, Wan, & Fouad, ), and use of quotas to lessen the impact of gender stereotypes on evaluation of women (Mölders, Brosi, Bekk, Spörrle, & Welp, ) and aspiration and advancement in top positions and spheres of influence (Fritz & van Knippenberg, ; Glass & Cook, ; Gould, Kulik, & Sardeshmukh; Guillén, Mayo, & Karelaia, ). The research is quantitative and qualitative, offering generalizable outcomes for policy considerations as well as depth and breadth.…”

“…Gould et al () examine strategies for the Australian cultural context. In their article, “Gender Diversity from the Top: The Trickle‐Down Effect in the Australian Public Sector,” they found an effect between board representation by women and executive representation by women in Australia.…”

Gender Diversity in Spanish Banks: Trickle-Down and Productivity Effects

“…In this vein, we look to two potentially cascading positive effects of the presence of females at the corporate board: (a) the increase of gender diversity at the level of management (managers that develop executive, coordinating and advisory functions in the bank); (b) the increase of gender diversity in the whole firm workforce. Given the low representation of females at top management, our work can examine if women advocate for other women when they are in the minority [6]. This tendency contradicts the so-called "queen bee" syndrome [18], according to which women in male-dominated positions believe that other women threaten their special status.…”

“…Diversity has been associated with interconnected effects that take place at different levels of analysis [3]. However, few studies measure gender diversity at different hierarchical organizational strata [4][5][6]. Only a small amount of works has emphasized the role of middle managers for achieving firm performance (e.g., references [3,7]).…”

“…Secondly, previous research has detected a positive relation between women presence at senior levels and female representation at the levels below. This relationship is known as the "trickle-down" effect [6]. In the banking sector, women are in a unique position to remove barriers and mentor other women.…”