 Female-friendly boards in family firmsJoyce C. Wang, Yiyi Zhao, Sunny L. Sun and Jigao Zhu Journal of Business Research, 2023, vol. 157, issue C Abstract: How do female directors fare in family firms? Can women gain influence on family boards? Research on board informal hierarchy indicates that female directors, due to perceived role incongruity, may wield less influence than male directors. We posit that the gender-induced informal hierarchy is less salient on family boards. That is because family firms, characterized by their socioemotional wealth—a non-economic goal centered on compassion and relationships, redefine directorship roles to become more congruent with the gender role prescribed for women. In turn, female directors gain influence on family boards. We additionally explore contingencies that further mitigate the gender-induced informal hierarchy, nurturing female-friendly boards. We hypothesize that such boards can unlock the potential of gender diversity by improving firm performance. The analysis of 43,947 directors in publicly listed Chinese firms supports our hypotheses. Overall, we contribute to the literature at the intersection of family business, female leadership, and corporate governance. Keywords: Board informal hierarchy; Director influence; Family firms; Female directors; Female-friendly boards; Socioemotional wealth (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:157:y:2023:i:c:s0148296322010177 DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusres.2022.113552 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Business Research is currently edited by A. G. Woodside More articles in Journal of Business Research from Elsevier |
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