Final Paper (Please Use the Attached Draft to complete final Paper)

Impact of Female Representation in Top Executive Management on Organizational Performance

Debo A Ogunseinde

Texas A&M Commerce

Professor Brandon Ralph - Seng

June 21, 2018:

DOES FEMALE REPRESENTATION IN TOP EXECUTIVE MANAGEMENT HAVE AN IMPACT ON ORGANIZATIONAL PERFORMANCE?

Abstract

There is an argument that the representation of female in the top-level management of the firm results in social diversity and bring lots of information to the benefits of the senior level management, enriching the kind of behaviors which are exhibited through the managers at levels of the firm. While at the same time women at the middle-level management become increasingly motivated. That should result in better performance by the firm due to the improvement of the tasks performance by the management. In the research, the survey method will be employed for the collection of data and analyze them for making informed decisions. Initially, a sample of 50 to companies that are listed in NASDAQ will be used for the collection of the primary data. The critical information concerning the firm performance for instance finances will be collected from NASDAQ. The financial data that are consistent with the total return and assets of the company will be obtained (Pološki, 2017). Comment by Carrie: You are doing a theory paper not a paper that collects data. See example papers

Background information and Rationale Comment by Carrie: Remember that especially in the first paragraph, you want to focus on how what you are looking at in the paper is important in the broader real-world. Then in the second paragraph you would want to state the specific purpose of your paper and why it is important to advance theory (e.g. gaps that you fill). Look at the way it is done in the example papers we have discussed.

Women have contributed considerably to the domains that were traditionally occupied by men for the past decades. Nevertheless, even if currently in the United States, women are accounting for approximately one-third of the overall managers. They are still not well represented in the top-level corporate hierarchy, from the top-level management and even to the boardroom. For example, in 2006, the companies that were part of standard & poor (S&P) an index of 1,500 that were designed for showcasing the general equity market in the United State, approximately 30% had women in the top-level management of the firm, and that figure of one woman in the high-level management has been stagnating in most of the firms (Post, and Byron, 2015).

According to Post, and Byron, (2015), apart from the ethical and social implication of the matter, the scarcity for the top-level hierarchy for women is suggesting that the representation of females at the corporate senior management could be having a critical impact for the competitiveness of the firms. Not simply a reflection for the gender-neutral mechanism, and therefore meritocratic promotion and recruitment procedure, and even more mainly due to the benefit that diversity of gender has in an organization. The paper is asking the question; what is the impact of female representation in top executive management on the performance of the company? If there is, is the impact confined to a given context or is it general? (Pološki, 2017).

In addressing the questions that have been raised, the papers are making clear or precise contributions that are related. The initial contribution concerns are drawing from a range of literature crafting the model that explains the way representation of females at the top executive management resulting information inflow to the organization and enriching the firm top executive management with social diversity that improves the top-level management behaviors throughout the company (Post, and Byron, 2015). As a result, there is an argument that the female inclusion at the senior management of an organization results in the managerial improvement of tasks performed in the entire firm. Which in return reflect in the general performance of the company (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

Considering the importance of recognizing contextual moderating factors for the practices and researches about the organization theory, gender organization, and the upper echelons. The critical aspect for the model is the theorization concerning the way relevant strategic context of the organizations helps in the moderation of representation of the female impact to the top level executive management. In connections to that, the model for theorization has predicted a positive trend of effects concerning the women representation at the senior management level of the firm, as the company continually increase the intensity of innovativeness (Post, and Byron, 2015). Therefore, improving the decision making concerning the issues that are related to the diversity of gender and the attributes of management for women are more likely important. The findings revealed that the representation of women in the organization does not result in the intensity of the organization innovation, but the firm benefits only when they have laid strategy which focuses towards innovation (Antonakis, and Day, 2017).

The next contribution concerning the women representation impact has empirical and theoretical dimension, which has been pinpointed from a comprehensive and recent survey concerning the practical work that exists concerning the performance of company produces mixed outcome decidedly and is not tackling the problem of endogeneity and causality. The contrary is that hiring a female CEO is related to the creation of negative stock prices. The diversity of gender at the board is related to the better performance of the company (Post, and Byron, 2015).

Literature review Comment by Carrie: You seem to be jumping around a bit by starting with your review below. From the start of the paper you want to explicitly describe why your paper is important in advancing the area you are focusing on.

The literature review elaborates on the way the representation of females at the top executive management could result in the improvement of the firm performance. Comment by Carrie: You are off to a good start with your review of leadership components; however it is not always clear exactly why these were chosen as a focus among the many leadership components that may be relevant. Need to provide justification.

The tasks performed for the top management team,

The behavior of the top executive management team influences the general behavior of the entire firm. That makes the organizations to have crucial organizations strategic decision making, the performance of the firm is improved through any factor that results in the improvement of the task performance of top executive management. Most of the top executive management teams are comprised of men and any time a woman joins the team; the management team becomes diverse regarding information and social categorization (Post, and Byron, 2015). Several distinct reasons are related concerning the improvement of the information process through diversity and the organizational decision making; precisely, women could have extra insights concerning crucial strategic problems, particularly those that are concerning the female employees, trading partners and consumers (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). Generally, the heterogeneous groups have diverse viewpoints and information, which are important while considering some set of solutions that are comprehensive, and debating every perspective vigorously, resulting in highly informed decisions. For instance, when the top executive management is making decisions, they must exhibit high component for information processing (Pološki, 2017).

Furthermore, during social categorization, the gender is usually readily accessible and salient. Such level of surface diversity can trigger the expectations that difference in information could be present legitimizing the expressions for divergent perceptions existing among the majority males even when it is not a fact related with a great diversity of information (Post, and Byron, 2015). The woman present at the top executive management level who has information congruence could stimulate richer and broader alternative discussions which then improves the capacity of making informed decisions at the top executive management. Although excessive diversity might result in the communication problems, leading to some cohesive discomfort, on the other hand, real discomfort does not result in the negative service performance at the organizational level. Most of the researches affirm that effective diversity discomfort relates to the superior making of informed decisions, and most of the organizational dissent, conflict, and the cognitive cost results in the amplification of the alternative solutions or perspective which would result in better decision making in the organization (Pološki, 2017).

Researchers argue that due to the non-routine problems that most of the organizations are experiencing and the corporate boards, the diversity of gender benefits outperform the costs. For instance, there are some leadership behaviors that women at the top-level management are displaying which are critical for the performance of the organizations (Post, and Byron, 2015). Some nine behaviors are related to leadership which increases organizational performance. The leadership behaviors are as follows; the participative making of decisions- which entails building an organizational team atmosphere, whereby every team member feels encouraged to take part in the decision making. Role model, being a role for where women have been able to build respects through the consideration of the ethical decision making (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

According to Abdullah, Ismail, and Nachum, (2016), inspirations; few women that are present in the top executive management always present the organization vision in a more compelling manner concerning the future of the organization optimism about the fulfillment of the decisions that are reflected in the overall organization and directions. The reward and expectations that are defining the organization expectations and rewarding those who have performed excellently, the organizational accountability improves (Post, and Byron, 2015). Next is the development of people through mentoring time teaching and training and listening to the concerns of individuals. Which in return results in the organizational work environment and values and improvement of leadership capability of teams, intellectual stimulations, risk-taking, creativity and assumptions challenging (Antonakis, and Day, 2017).  That result in the organizational innovativeness. Effective communications, communications with the convincing way in a charismatic way, which results in enhancement of the organization directions. Decision making by an individual; decisions making is done alone while and calling for members to execute them, enhancing the external orientation of the organizations (Pološki, 2017). Corrective action and corrective, monitoring people’s performance, such as gaps and errors against objectives, taking corrective action, sanctions, realignment, promoting the organization control and coordination (Luo et al., 2015).

Women are better at promoting the values and work environment, leadership teams, and accountability. That could result in some level of conflicts among the top management, but it should be welcomed since it promotes the sense of accountability and organizational performance even more. Through such problem-solving techniques, more information is acquired by the organizational top executive management which is an essential decision (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). As we have seen the above, women exhibit some leadership oriented behaviors which most of the men at the top executive management doe snot show. Women are good at encouraging the employee’s participants through the solicitation of the worker's inputs, sharing information and power through maintenance of open channels of communications with the staff subordinates, also bolstering the subordinates with a sense of self-worth. Most of the authors have been able to find women less hierarchical compared to their male counterparts, and they are even more collaborative and cooperative than men (Post, and Byron, 2015). Comment by Carrie: Who is we?

On the other hand, the meta-analytic research reveals that most of the setting in the organization women at the top executive management are demonstrating participatory and democratic management manner (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). Such traits are collectively called feminine management styles. Most of the women love power but, they usually share it unlike men, Women are collaborative. Such kinds of behaviors are promoting task sharing relevant information, which is a vital element for positive diversity. There is an expectation by that man at the top executive management be replaced by women to enhance the organizational performance (Pološki, 2017).

Task Performance at the Middle Management Comment by Carrie: More explicitly connect different approaches together, otherwise not exactly clear what you are saying in terms of the big picture.

According to Abdullah, Ismail, and Nachum, (2016), the female representation at the top-level management is expected to result in the reverberations through the hierarchy of management at the firm, which is linked to the competition successions and further influence in the upward mobility of the management. Suitable mentoring relation and social contacts are vital for the procedure. The social relations are affected through social similarity of attributes, such as gender (Post, and Byron, 2015). The women paucity in the high echelons of organization management. Creating substantial barriers to the advancement of the management through women. Which reduces the opportunity for experience acquiring which are crucial for their development or improvement. When women are occupying the top level, management are focusing more on the mentoring and development of junior employees than their male counterparts through encouraging the subordinate to achieve the full potential through rewarding them for the wonderful performance (Pološki, 2017).

Therefore, women have substantial reasons for the belief that women present in the top executive management positions are a vital element, for their success in the firm, adjusting to the motivation and commitment accordingly (Post, and Byron, 2015). Researchers have been arguing that women presence in an organization is an indication that any level of barriers that might be existing in the society. The company culture has a commitment to women for advancing their career at all stages or level (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). Women at the top-level management act as the motivation for the women at the lower level management as they act as their mentor. Most of the women at the sex integrated companies are apt to the enactment of the feminine or masculine behaviors as per the tasks demand and does not conform to the norms of history (Pološki, 2017).

According to Abdullah, Ismail, and Nachum, (2016), the analysis shows that representing women in the organization top executive management results in the improvement of performance tasks of the top executive management and even much is increasing the commitment, and motivation of other women at the subordinate level together with encouraging the subordinate staff to adopt behaviors associated with feminine management styles. They result in the improvement of the task group and performance of the firm (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

Benefits of gender diversity in the strategic context, there is high benefits that are driven by the presence of gender, since diversity results in processing of information that are crucial for considering the different point of view. Such diversity is important in solutions that require creativity. Like innovation process, that relies on the unique and insightful reapplication and recombination for the resources that are existing. Generally, diversity is associated with most of the occasions with the creativity of the highest possible levels. Therefore, the representation of females at the top-level management of the organizations should increase the benefit to the firm whereby innovation is the main strategy (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

Women presence at the top executive management provides contextual benefits such as creativity and innovation which enhance the organization performance of the firm. Women are good at performing motivational work for their employees. Most of the top-level women managers are offering tasks that drives the firm creativity and innovativeness. The behaviors that are related to supervisory work for employees also inspire or motivate workers (Pološki, 2017). For instance, intrinsic inspiration is enhanced through the informational vocal prizes and most of the women have been found to promote such kind of verbal information reward hence increasing workers performance which reflects in general firm improvement of work. Research findings also indicate that intrinsic motivation is increased through autonomy support, which results in healthier abstract learning, which in terns results in creativity contribution. All the behavior described above are contained in the feminine leadership styles. Comment by Carrie: Evidence for these claims? Need citations to support any claims you make throughout your paper.

Therefore, promoting women to such top executive management positions would result in the promotion of such leadership behaviors indirectly like responsiveness through men or directly by the women personally displaying such leadership traits. The representation of women in the organization top management is beneficial if the firm is oriented towards if the innovation is one of the firm strategy (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

Hypothesis Comment by Carrie: Once again, need evidence for these claims from research. You may not be able to find evidence to support your proposition, but you should find evidence to support the logical steps leading up to the extension you are proposing.

The research is focusing on the impact of the women representation at the top executive management level of the organization, on the performance of the organization. There could many females at the middle level which we shall tackle a bit, but the main focus is the top-level management which has great impact in top-level decision making of the organization, hence, the hypothesis is concerning: the female representation in the top executive management improves the organizational performance (Post, and Byron, 2015). Comment by Carrie: Not clear how this supports what you are saying.

Research Methodology

The data collection and Analysis Comment by Carrie: You will not have this because you are doing a theory paper. See example papers I sent.

The sources of data and the size illustrate the gender compositions for the top-level management teams in NASDAQ data; it comprises of the senior management from the proxy statement and other public firms comprising of a total of 50 firms. The United States public companies are made in such a way that they are reflecting broad United States equity market. The sample that we used was covering a period of 10 years from 2008 to 2018 (Pološki, 2017). There has been some change of rules since by then, you were required to submit all the complaints through the CEO, and all necessary information could be forwarded to four other managers who are highly paid. We have been able to collect information concerning five top executive management according to the data for the years. The study obtained the financial data consisting of the total assets and returned from the NASDAQ. Additionally, market capitalization, shareholder equity, and total assets were collected for understanding the performance of the firm for ten years where the women were at the top-level management (Antonakis, and Day, 2017).

We consider the information for the additional number of managers. The mean size management team in the data, who are from the upper-level management, which shows the inner circle of team management numbering between three and seven persons. The database we used was from the NASDAQ as the source of information concerning the firm in the sample (Post, and Byron, 2015).

According to Abdullah, Ismail, and Nachum, (2016), the representation of females; while in principle, women are accounting for a percentage of the top management team for the company. The company fraction is comprising of only single women at the top executive management team. The firms having over one woman at the top management was not even exceeding 8.5%, female representation at the senior executive management through the use of dummy variable, the representation of woman taking the value of (1) One but zero (0) if there is none of the manager reported in NASDAQ (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). The performance of firm in relation to the number of women at the top-level management; the basic measure for the performance of the company in our case has been using Tobin’s Q, which helps in the definition of the market value ratio for the assets to the firm value of replacement (Pološki, 2017). The concept implies that better companies are creating more value economically from specified assets.

The Tobin’s Q measure is a forward measure, in that it captures the economic value of the firm, instead of the amount of some economic parts. Including the future cash flow of the firm. That is capitalized in the firm future value of assets (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). The rate of return is accounted for through the backward-looking, due to calculation biasedness, there could be some divergence substantially from the economic rate of return. Variation in the risks could be responsible for distortions of accounting figures, laws of tax, accounting regulations interpretations, as well as through management of earnings (Post, and Byron, 2015).

The table below is an illustration of the trend in capital value for the company over the years, and the inclusion of women at the top-level management and its impact on the general performance of the organization, the conclusion of the data would be by the data collected below.

From the table above, it is evident that over the ten years, the companies, have been increasing in values since they are embracing the women as part of top-level management, therefore due to the changes in the organizational decisions making, the company has been able to improve in value as illustrated below (Post, and Byron, 2015). It was noted that the investors that are using Tobin’s Q for the determination of the company market value are focusing on the diversity of the top-level management including especially women in the critical decision making. From the table above, we were able to conduct regression analysis. The variables that have been used are the firm financial performance over the years against women representation at the top-level management. The R sq. = 0.2519 (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

Through the use of Tobin’s Q; the book market value of assets and firms together with the firms’ market value for the common equity subtracting the book value of the common equity, and the taxes that are deferred; the value replacement is the firm's book assets value. The skewness was reduced through analysis log Tobin’s Q transformation of logs (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

According to Abdullah, Ismail, and Nachum, (2016), innovation Intensity and controls. The innovation intensity is measured as the R&D ratio of assets expense from the previous year and using the control during the analysis. There was use interaction between the representation of women and the intensity of the innovation for testing the hypothesis 1. The use of a broad set of controlled variables, which could be available at the top-level management teams of the firms (Pološki, 2017). The size is measured through asset book value of the previous year. The company age regarding years is determined through the initial year of operations according to CompuStat, the leverage which is the debt ratio to the company assets, the CapEx degree of intensity which is the asset capital expenditure from the year before, the advertising ratio of an asset in the year before. Capital stock age is indirectly measured as the depreciation to the property net expense, equipment, and plan. Because the book value of the asset about the remaining useful life is supposed to be higher compared to the present depreciation expenditure; most of the managers at the top executive management for is reported to mostly female or woman management team through the size dint (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

According to Post, and Byron, (2015), the innovation intensity, size, Marketing Intensity, and the Capital age is the log-transformed for the reduction of skewness. When the R&D expenditure and the expense advertising is not material. The statistical analysis; hypothesis, was tested through female presentations impact at the top executive management. In controlling the unobservable and idiosyncratic which might simultaneously impact the performance of the company and make the company work environment less congenital to woman management (Pološki, 2017). The longitudinal data nature enables us to use company fixed impacts in all the regression analysis. Through the inclusion of the discrete dummy variable for every firm, the tests implicitly compare the firm with itself. During the time that the company has the woman representative at the top-level management and the time when the firm does not have the women at the top-level management, and the entire industry comprising of firms with women at the top executive management (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

The figure one indicates that women representation at the top executive management has increased tremendously from 2008 to 2018 leading to the overall market capital value of the companies. The economic and social trends over a given period which could simultaneously impact the performance of the company and the firm propensity for promoting and hiring executive women or female management. For instance, since the specific diffusion of human resources practices which accommodates the individual women commitments. Using the longitudinal data nature for controlling the trends through the year impacts in the regressions (Antonakis, and Day, 2017). 

Results and Discussions Comment by Carrie: You don’t have a results section because you are doing a theory paper not a data paper.

According to Post, and Byron, (2015), the descriptive statistics are provided in table one, indicating the variables that have been used in research and the correlation between the variables. The female representation is low as most of the firms lack women at the top-level management, most of the correlations for the variables are have a small magnitude. For instance, the female representation, have little correlation to the interaction between the intensity of innovation and the representation of women in the organizations. The analysis of the figures illustrated that the with women representation at the top executive management results in the improvement of the companies and industry financial performance because of the diversity brought by women who are responsible for making informed business decisions.

From the table 1 above we conducted the regression analysis and from the data with women representation at the top-level management of firm being one of the variables, and on the other hand is the financial performance of firms that had women at the top management for a period of ten years from 2008 to 2018. Approximately ten years. The R squared is revealed to be 0.2519 (Pološki, 2017).

Conclusion Comment by Carrie: Why can this be ascertained? Explain. There are a number of areas in the paper where more detail and elaboration is needed to clearly support point being made.

The paper has been focusing on the positive impact for the representation of women at the top executive management level on the general performance of the firm or company; the results have indicated precisely that currently more women are employed at the top executive management of most of the firm in comparison to five years ago. Even though more women are used now their representation at the top executive management is still insignificant. The evidence that is supporting the hypothesis has been shown through the women leadership styles which encourages participation, collaboration and inclusion in the organizational decision making which further results in the improvement of the organizational financial performance. Comment by Carrie: Make sure to have a future research suggestions were you are explicit at how it ties to the current paper. Final paper will also need some type of implications type section were you integrate together what you are proposing, why it matters, and how it will help advance the area including some practical implications.

References

Abdullah, S. N., Ismail, K. N. I. K., & Nachum, L. (2016). Does having women on boards create value? The impact of societal perceptions and corporate governance in emerging markets. Strategic Management Journal, 37(3), 466-476.

Antonakis, J., & Day, D. V. (Eds.). (2017). the nature of leadership. Sage publications.

Luo, X., Wang, H., Raithel, S., & Zheng, Q. (2015). Corporate social performance, analyst stock recommendations, and firm future returns. Strategic Management Journal, 36(1), 123-136.

Pološki, N. (2017). Basic requirements for the successful implementation of the “feminine leadership” style in Croatian enterprises. Management: Journal of contemporary management issues, 6(1-2), 119-131.

Post, C., & Byron, K. (2015). Women on boards and firm financial performance: A meta-analysis. Academy of Management Journal, 58(5), 1546-1571.