Finance Lab gender dimension (Investigating the impact of female directors on firm performance in turbulent times)

The issue of board gender diversity has gained increasing attention in recent years, among other things, due to its potential implications for corporate performance.

However, the impact of board gender diversity on firm performance during economic downturns remains a relatively unexplored area of research. This project intends to contribute to the literature in several ways. First, it is one the few attempts to investigate the effects of female directors on firm performance over periods of crisis and, to our knowledge, the first one in the context of crisis created by the Covid-19 pandemic. Second, this project analyzes the role of female directors on boards more comprehensively than prior related research by distinguishing between gender diversity in the board and the executive committee.