Do Public and Political Mandated Boardroom Quotas Construct New Barriers for Women In

Do public and political mandated boardroom quotas construct new barriers for women in leadership?

ABSTRACT

This study examined women’s perspective on the public and political mandated boardroom quotas. Further, this study investigated if such directives construct new barriers for women and if it enforces inequality in the gender realm. Data was collected from 45 women around the globe in order to get a preliminary insight on how boardroom quotas are viewed in various countries and if they created new barriers for women(in the business world).

The findings contributed further evidence to support the argument that boardroom quotas create additional barriers for women. While all results of the study are important, we felt it was noteworthy to mention that the participants viewed boardroom quotas as a way of communicating and affirming women’s inability to handle senior positions within the workplace. Moreover, there appears to be a lack of awareness of mandated boardroom quotas. Furthermore, the study acknowledgesand strongly suggests that there are many more issues to be addressed around boardroom quotas and how they tie to other elements such as social fairness, equality, boardroom criterion, behavioral change, the environment that fosters ‘genderlessness’ leading across an organisationorganization, the notion of capability merit, and awareness creation on the topic as a whole.

The existing literature on women mandated boardroom quotas focused mainly on what is the impact of gender diversity within the organizations. As McLaughlin, C and Deakin (2011) argued organizational performance are seen as a crucial reason for justifying measures to increase the number of female directors in terms of equality is that relying only on economic arguments can limit and depoliticize the issue of women on boards (McLaughlin, C and Deakin, S. 2011).

A strong indication of the importance of this study were all the future research study topics that emerged from the data.

Cultural shifts in organisations…..need to occur……

Introduction

The EU is the frontrunner with officially putting a boardroom quota for women in place. This certainly is an international topic as the low representation of women in key leading positions worldwide has been on the forefront of various dialogues for quite some time now. Although one may think that the boardroom quota would assist women, one may also wonder if it perhaps creates more barriers. It may just be a taboo question to ask if this is a positive for women, or if it creates more reservations and serves as a hindrance.

The latest research on the boardroom quota and its outcomes indicates that even after eight years the effect of the quota has not been all that impactful. There are zero women CEOs in Norway’s largest organizations and the argument is that the quota should be spread throughout the organization in order to truly have an impact on not only the business bottom line, but the representation of women in top positions throughout the company (Lindahl, 2015). Other studies argue that quotas may lead to the perception of “tokenism”, incompetent mandated hires, despite the fact of very capable and qualified women (Paquette, 2014).

Most of the boardroom studies focus mainly on the impact of organizational performance and the change the women bring to the boardrooms, this paper suggests that Boardroom quotas ought to not only focus on organizational performance, but should address social fairness as an outcome when selecting women into Boardroom positions. Moreover, the social fairness aspect of gender quota and gender diversity within the boardroom should aim to foster not only having more women present on boards, but also bring about change in the under-representation of female leaders in leadership positions such as the board chair and as chief executive officers (Ahern & Dittmar 2012; Noon 2007). This study will focus on narrowing the gap in the literature around how women actually feel about the board room quotas, if those mandates could possibly create more barriers for women and how social fairness is discussed.

Women in Boardrooms and Performance

The momentum for increasing the number of women on boards of directors is becoming vital within public and political spaces. Indeed, several countries around the globe have mandated gender quotas through the imposition of quotas, while other countries, such as the United States and Australia, have taken notice of the issue and are working to combat this problem through alternative means, such as voluntary codes, regulation and standards which are set either by the government or by industry bodies (Franceschet and Piscopo 2013; Choudhury 2014). The slow pace of change has not gone unnoticed. Yet, despite the individual organization’s apparent lack of interest in increasing the number of women on boards, countries with mandated boardroom quotas continue to couch their initiatives in this area almost exclusively in “economic-based justifications” {Choudhury, 2014 #96@511;Choudhury, 2014 #96}. Indeed, existing research on boardroom quotas focused mainly on the impact of gender quotas on firm performance and to understand relationship of increasing women on boardroom and firm value. For example, {Ahern, 2012 #100@@author-year} argued that the corporate gender quota in Norway had a negative impact on firm value in the short term. Thus, there is a negative impact of increased female representation on firm value. Furthermore, {Matsa, 2013 #98@@author-year} used difference-in-difference and triple-difference strategies to evaluate a panel of Scandinavian companies over 10 years and provide causal evidence that corporate gender quotas led to a short-term loss of profits, largely driven by increased spending on labour.

Complexity of Gender diversity and boardroom quotas

There is a growing consensus within diversity scholarship, that it provides equal opportunity to groups historically excluded from positions of power. The public, worldwide, has a strong interest in ensuring that opportunities are available to all, and that women and minorities entering the labour market are able to fulfil their potential, and that public and private organizations are making full use of the wealth of talented individuals despite their race and gender. The other claim is that diversity will improve organizational processes and performance {Noon, 2007 #122}. This business case for diversity tends to dominate debates because it appeals to a culture steeped in shareholder value as the way for corporate decision making. The latest research on the boardroom quota and its outcomes indicates that even after several years of the introduction of boardroom quotas, the effect of the quota has not been all that impactful, especially when it came to women in senior management positions in business (Teigen 2012). For example, Norway is known as the frontrunner of boardroom quotas, but, there are still few women CEOs in Norway’s largest organizations and the argument is that the quota should be spread throughout the organization in order to truly have an impact on not only the business bottom line, but the representation of women in top positions throughout the company {Lindahl, 2015 #120}.

Moreover, boardroom quotas draw attention to disruptions and complex oppositions to social change, such as liberation movement, and how this is not only reflective of gender diversity but also of masculine culture of politics. For example, {Patterson, 2013 #103@@author-year} indicate that in Korean, the underrepresentation of women in modern organizations is still based upon cultural norms and practices that may have a negative economic effect on organisations. In addition, scholars such as, {Baldez, 2006 #104@@author-year}, Soklaridis and López (2014), Rutherford (2011) draws attention to how uncertainty about quotas derived from failure to change masculine culture of politics. Thus, quotas are seen to have power to destroy men’s monopoly over candidate positions, and are seen as a tool to reinforce the status quo. It is concluded that the effectiveness in achieving gender quota target is achieved at the expense of maintaining a problematic political status quo {Baldez, 2006 #104}. These cultural norms and beliefs result in insufficient female representation in the public and political spaces {Patterson, 2013 #103;Cho, 2010 #105}. In conclusion, multiple factors have contributed to this situation, including structural and institutional barriers {Norris, 2001 #111}.

Although gender quotas are often seen as a practical solution to women’s underrepresentation, the causes of political gender imbalance are multiple and complex. Much of the gender quotas scholarship has been devoted to the structural and systematic variables restricting women’s access to senior positions and to politics. Researchers argue that cultural values and attitudes do construct barriers for women in leadership and barriers to entry, which makes it difficult to include women’s voice in politics, government and senior positions in organisations {Adams, 2012 #102}. For example, {Norris, 2008 #101@@author-year} document that social norms are related to the representation of women in political leadership across countries. Indeed, elements of the social structure are reasons for the continued existence of the glass ceiling, which keeps women from advancing to top-level leadership positions {Acker, 2009 #123}(Weyer 2007).Therefore, quotas are considered to be compensation for structural barriers that prevent fair competition and construct gender regimes (Dahlerrup, 2003, 2007).

Critique of Gender Quotas

Gender quotas have been introduced as a means of correcting imbalances in representation and have traditionally focused on the underrepresentation of women {Dahlerup, 2006 #112}. Thus, it is assumed that underrepresentation is a problem that affects only women and not men due to the history of gender inequalities. The use of gender neutral language does not conceal the fact that quotas focusing on underrepresentation are effectively quotas for women {Murray, 2014 #110}. However, gender quotas somehow construct stigmatization, tokenism and symbolism and reinforce negative stereotypes about women’s capacity as politicians and leaders {Dahlerup, 2007 #113;Dahlerup, 2006 #112;Franceschet, 2008 #114;Dahlerup, 2010 #115;Franceschet, 2012 #116;Kanter, 1974 #106}. Other studies argue that quotas may lead to the perception of “tokenism”, incompetent mandated hires, despite the fact of very capable and qualified women {Paquette, 2014 #121}.

Researchers argued that gender quotas tend to favour the promotion of inferior women candidates at the expense of more qualified {Dahlerup, 2010 #115;Celis, 2011 #117;Franceschet, 2012 #116}. This argument is based on the system of meritocratic, which in turn construct fear and unworthiness {O'Brien, 2012 #118}. Women have to often prove that there are good enough. This result in women being undermining their talent, because a woman selected via mandated quota might not be the “best man for the job” but merely the best woman and therefore might lack the experience, appropriate background, and ability to fight for political and economic gains {Murray, 2014 #110}. In addition, even if women do possess these qualities, the association with mandated gender quotas might undermine their talents {O'Brien, 2012 #118}.

Moreover, {Acker, 2006 #107@@author-year} and {Kanter, 1977 #119@@author-year}{, #106}path-breaking research, confirmed in multiple subsequent studies, found that token members often encounter social isolation, heightened visibility and pressure to adopt stereotyped roles. In this way, quotas are conceived as creating both opportunities and obstacles to women’s substantive representation, and as a way of perpetuating the status of men as the norm and women as the other {Rhode, 2014 #109;Murray, 2014 #110}. {Dahlerup, 2007 #113@@author-year} ascertains that quotas rule of setting a minimum percentage for women’s representation is seen as a maximum prescription, which tend to construct an informal ‘glass ceiling’ that mostly prevent an increase in women’s representation above the quota level. The glass ceiling constitutes for many {Eagly, 2007 #124;Acker, 2009 #123} an invisible barrier for women, preventing them from moving up the corporate ladder. The inclusion of women at the executive level is seen as a legislative requirement rather than an opportunity for an organisation to capture a competitive advantage.

Participants

Email invitations along with an Informed Consent form were emailed to a total of 120 women, of which 45 women actually participated in the online survey. The industry the participants work in ranged from Healthcare, Technology Sector, Energy & Utilities, Consumer Business, Education, Government, Professional Services, Manufacturing, to Publishing, Media, Hospitality, Construction, Retail, and Graphic Design. The majority of respondents worked Iin the Education, Healthcare, and Professional Services sector.

Respondent positions varied from Department Head, Executive, Freelancer, Consultant, Owner, Sales Manager, PhD Student, Coach, Director, Administrator, to Secretary, Faculty, Council Member, Accounts Administrator, Assistant Registrar, Senior Manager, Engineer, and Project Manager, Office Manager, and Co-Director. Thus, a wide variety of job responsibilities and functions were represented here. Participants have spent an average of 6.7 years in their current positions.

Average age and the country participants worked in are presented in the images below:

Image 1.1: Average Age of Participants

Image 1.2: Country participants work in

Method & Analysis

A qualitative method was applied to this study, as the researchers wanted to explore, learn and understand attitudes and beliefs about the research topic in more detail (Babbie, 1993; Marshall & Rossman, 1999) and capture verbatim statements from the participants. A written open-ended online self-report survey questionnaire was prepared as an instrument and set up via survey monkey in order to reach participations spread around the globe. This also allowed the participants to share responses freely on their own time, in their own context, sharing what and how they feel about the topic, making their contribution to this research of high value.

Given that open-ended responses provided the researchers with large amount of data that needed to be coded in a reasonable time frame, this qualitative study was held on a small scale (with plans to conduct a second large-scale study in the future).

In addition to providing their demographic information, participants were invited to respond to the following questions: (1) What do you think of boardroom quotas for women?; (2) What do you like most about them? (3) What do you like least about them? (4) What do you think the general public thinks of boardroom quotas for women? (5) How do you think men perceive these boardroom quotas? (6) Do you think that boardroom quotas have made a difference for general advancement of women in the corporate world? If yes, how? If not, why not? (7) How do you think the board room quotas are perceived in your country? (8) Do you think boardroom quotas could potentially pose new barriers for women? If so How? If not, why not? (9) Do you think that board room quotas address social fairness as an outcome when selecting women into Boardroom positions? (10) How do you think public and politically mandated quotas should address social fairness? (11) How can the overall under-representation of female leaders throughout an organization be addressed by having boardroom quotas in place? (12) Do you think boardroom quotas perpetuate or solve gender inequality as we know it? If yes, How? If not, why not? (13) How do you define success of boardroom representation of women? Should it be a descriptive change (numbers) or a substantive change (culture)? (14) Do you think public and political measures affect women's roles in corporate business? If so, how? If not, why not?

The actual data analysis began upon the downloading of the participant responses from survey monkey. The volume of the data totaled25 pages. In order to systematically analyze the data, content analysis was applied. This allowed the researchers to condense large amounts of raw data into categories or themes in order to help the researcher better understand and present what the participants were saying. A categorical-content method was applied as explained by Lieblich, Tuval-Mashiach, and Zilber (1998), as it allowed to identify categories or themes that become visible when reviewing or reading data. Basically, all categories or themes are obtained from the respondents contributing answers they shared in the online survey when answering open-ended questions during this study. This also gave the opportunity to uncover common themes among all the participants in regard to their views and beliefs on the topic. Pages containing the data were read 6 times when coding for themes as they emerged from the readings.

Results

This section will discuss and present findings of the data collection and analysis of this study toward answering the question “Do public and political mandated boardroom quotas construct new barriers for women in leadership?” Some of the Key Categories that emerged from the data are represented in image 1.3 below.

Image 1.3: Key Categories

NOTE

(1)What do you think of boardroom quotas for women?

The majority of the women felt that having boardroom quotas in place are positive and good. Some said “it is good mandate for organisations to follow”…”and that they are a good idea to have in place”. The above excerpt suggested that boardroom quotas influence gender balance within the organisations. Indeed, the Norwegian experience reveals that a quota is the key to a successful implementation of change in terms of gender equality. Not only does it create the pressure needed for fundamental change but it also triggers a public debate at the core of which are questions of gender equality in wider society(Storvik and Teigen, 2010; Teigen, 2012).

Another key reply here was that mandates are a ‘must have’. Participants strongly voiced that they are “an absolute must” and “a must have so that we can push more women in higher positions” and that it is “the only way forward…”. Evidence suggests that companies with a strong female representation at board and top management level perform better than those without and that gender-diverse boards have a positive impact on performance. It is clear that boards make better decisions where a range of voices, drawing on different life experiences, can be heard. That mix of voices must include women (Ahern and Dittmar 2012, Pande 2003)