ABSTRACT
In recent years, there has been increasing pressure from both society and investors to appoint women directors on corporate boards. As a result, the number of women in top management and board positions has increased significantly over the last decade (Burke and Mattis, 2005; Daily, Certo and Dalton, 1999). At the same time, management scholars argue the business case for diversity (Bilimoria and Huse 1997, Daily and Dalton, 2003; Robinson and Dechant, 1997). However, no empirical evidence exists to prove whether boards including women are better in performing their tasks than boards composed entirely with male directors. In addition, only a few empirical works investigate whether, and if yes, how boards with female directors differ from boards composed entirely of male directors (e.g. Pearce and Zahra, 1991).
