The business case for women leaders: Meta-analysis, research critique, and path forward

Since the 1990s, a growing body of research has sought to quantify the relationship between women’s representation in leadership positions and organizational financial performance. Commonly known as the “business case” for women’s leadership, the idea is that having more women leaders is good for business. Through meta-analysis ( k = 78, n = 117,639 organizations) of the direct effects of women’s representation in leadership (as CEOs, on top management teams, and on boards of directors) on financial performance, and tests that proxy theoretical arguments for moderated relationships, we call attention to equivocal findings. Our results suggest women’s leadership may affect firm performance in general and sales performance in particular. And women’s leadership—overall and, specifically, the presence of a female CEO—is more likely to positively relate to firms’ financial performance in more gender egalitarian cultures. Yet taking our findings as a whole, we argue that commonly used methods of testing the business case for women leaders may limit our ability as scholars to understand the value that women bring to leadership positions. We do not advocate that the business case be abandoned altogether but, rather, improved and refined. We name exemplary research studies to show how different perspectives on gender, alternative conceptualizations of value, and the specification of underlying mechanisms linking leadership to performance can generate changes in both the dominant ontology and the epistemology underlying this body of research.</jats:p

Women's managerial aspirations : an organizational development perspective

Some authors have explained the dearth of women leaders as an “opt-out revolution”—that women today are making a choice not to aspire to leadership positions. The authors of this article present a model that tests managers’ biased evaluations of women as less career motivated as an explanation for why women have lower managerial aspirations than men. Specifically, they hypothesize that day-to-day managerial decisions involving allocating challenging work, training and development, and career encouragement mean women accrue less organizational development, and this is one explanation for their lower managerial aspirations. The authors’ model is based on social role theory and is examined in a sample of 112 supervisor– subordinate dyads at a U.S. Fortune 500 firm.http://jom.sagepub.com/hb201

Gender differences in pay levels : an examination of the compensation of university presidents

Our paper studies how gender and organizational status affect a university president’s compensation. Similar to previous findings, we hypothesize that women will receive less pay than men. However, we go beyond a dyadic view of individual differences to examine gender’s impact on compensation, and we explicate the importance of institutional forces in understanding the gender pay gap. In doing so, we rely on organizational status and hypothesize that the gender pay gap will be less pronounced as a university’s status rises. Although we find that the gender pay gap persists within the university president context, we also find that as a university’s status rises, the pay gap declines. Moreover, our findings show that the gender pay gap disappears at higher-status universities. Hence, accounting for where the glass ceiling is broken is an important consideration in understanding the gender pay gap. In sum, by integrating a broader institutional perspective to explain gender differences in pay levels, our paper demonstrates the importance of contextualizing gender to better understand its effects on compensation.https://pubsonline.informs.org/journal/orschj2019Human Resource Managemen

Synthesis, Characterization, and Crystal Structure of the (η5-C5Ph5)Cr(CO)3 Radical

The reaction between Cr(CO)6 and Na(C5Ph5 ) in refluxing diglyme yields [Na(diglyme)3/2][(C5Ph5)Cr(CO)3], 1. Metathesis of 1 with [Ph3P=N=PPh3 ]Cl in CH2Cl2 yields [Ph3P=N=PPh3][(C5Ph5)Cr(CO)3], 2. Oxidation of 1 by AgBF4 in cold THF under an argon atmosphere produces (C5Ph5)Cr(CO)3, 3. Complexes 2 and 3 form a redox pair connected by a quasireversible one-electron process, E0 = -0.69 V vs ferrocene in CH2Cl2, E0 = -0.50 V in CH3CN, ks = 0.12 cm/s. ESR spectra of (C5Ph5)Cr(CO)3 in toluene at 90 K gave a rhombic g-tensor with components 2.1366, 2.0224, and 1.9953, consistent with the expected low-spin d5 electronic configuration. The largest g-tensor component was significantly temperature dependent, suggesting an equilibrium between conformations with 2A´ and 2A˝ ground states. Crystal structures of [Ph3P=N=PPh3][(C5Ph5)Cr(CO)3] and (C5Ph5)Cr(CO)3 were obtained

On the pp-supports of a holonomic D\mathcal{D}-module

For a smooth variety $Y$ over a perfect field of positive characteristic, the sheaf $D_Y$ of crystalline differential operators on $Y$ (also called the sheaf of $PD$-differential operators) is known to be an Azumaya algebra over $T^*_{Y'},$ the cotangent space of the Frobenius twist $Y'$ of $Y.$ Thus to a sheaf of modules $M$ over $D_Y$ one can assign a closed subvariety of $T^*_{Y'},$ called the $p$-support, namely the support of $M$ seen as a sheaf on $T^*_{Y'}.$ We study here the family of $p$-supports assigned to the reductions modulo primes $p$ of a holonomic $\mathcal{D}$-module. We prove that the Azumaya algebra of differential operators splits on the regular locus of the $p$-support and that the $p$-support is a Lagrangian subvariety of the cotangent space, for $p$ large enough. The latter was conjectured by Kontsevich. Our approach also provides a new proof of the involutivity of the singular support of a holonomic $\mathcal{D}$-module, by reduction modulo $p.$Comment: The article has been rewritten with much improved exposition as well as some additional results, e.g. Corollary 6.3.1. This is the final version, accepted for publication in Inventiones Mathematica

Duality in the flat cohomology of curves

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/46600/1/222_2005_Article_BF01390135.pd

Work-life balance in the police: the development of a self-management competency framework

Purpose Addressing a gap in the current work–life balance (WLB) literature regarding individual-focused approaches to inform interventions, we elicited behaviors used to self-manage WLB to draw up a competency-based WLB framework for relevant learnable knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs; Hoffmann, Eur J Ind Train 23:275–285, 1999) and mapping this against extant WLB frameworks. Design/Methodology/Approach Our participants were from a major UK police force, which faces particular challenges to the work–life interface through job demands and organizational cutbacks, covering a range of operational job roles, including uniformed officers and civilian staff. We took a mixed methods approach starting with semi-structured interviews to elicit 134 distinct behaviors (n = 20) and used a subsequent card sort task (n = 10) to group these into categories into 12 behavioral themes; and finally undertook an online survey (n = 356) for an initial validation. Findings Item and content analysis reduced the behaviors to 58, which we analyzed further. A framework of eight competencies fits the data best; covering a range of strategies, including Boundary Management, Managing Flexibility, and Managing Expectations. Implications The WLB self-management KSAs elicited consist of a range of solution-focused behaviors and strategies, which could inform future WLB-focused interventions, showing how individuals may negotiate borders effectively in a specific environment. Originality/Value A competence-based approach to WLB self-management is new, and may extend existing frameworks such as Border Theory, highlighting a proactive and solution-focused element of effective behaviors

How does ethical leadership trickle down? Test of an integrative dual-process model

Although the trickle-down effect of ethical leadership has been documented in the literature, its underlying mechanism still remains largely unclear. To address this gap, we develop a cross-level dual-process model to explain how the effect occurs. Drawing on social learning theory, we hypothesize that the ethical leadership of high-level managers could cascade to middle-level supervisors via its impact on middle-level supervisors’ two ethical expectations. Using a sample of 69 middle-level supervisors and 381 subordinates across 69 sub-branches from a large banking firm in China, we found that middle-level supervisors’ ethical efficacy expectation and unethical behavior–punishment expectation (as one form of ethical outcome expectations) accounted for the trickle-down effect. The explanatory role of middle-level supervisors’ ethical behavior–reward expectation (as the other form of ethical outcome expectations), however, was not supported. The theoretical and practical implications are discussed

The business case for women leaders : meta-analysis, research critique, and path forward

Since the 1990s, a growing body of research has sought to quantify the relationship between women’s representation in leadership positions and organizational financial performance. Commonly known as the “business case” for women’s leadership, the idea is that having more women leaders is good for business. Through meta-analysis (k = 78, n = 117,639 organizations) of the direct effects of women’s representation in leadership (as CEOs, on top management teams, and on boards of directors) on financial performance, and tests that proxy theoretical arguments for moderated relationships, we call attention to equivocal findings. Our results suggest women’s leadership may affect firm performance in general and sales performance in particular. And women’s leadership—overall and, specifically, the presence of a female CEO—is more likely to positively relate to firms’ financial performance in more gender egalitarian cultures. Yet taking our findings as a whole, we argue that commonly used methods of testing the business case for women leaders may limit our ability as scholars to understand the value that women bring to leadership positions. We do not advocate that the business case be abandoned altogether but, rather, improved and refined. We name exemplary research studies to show how different perspectives on gender, alternative conceptualizations of value, and the specification of underlying mechanisms linking leadership to performance can generate changes in both the dominant ontology and the epistemology underlying this body of research.A grant (No. 80588) provided by the National Research Foundation of South Africa.https://journals.sagepub.com/home/jomhj2019Human Resource Managemen