A new study argues that small and medium enterprises in emerging markets can address grand challenges by leveraging strategic agility and gender diversity, with the latter significantly augmenting the effect of strategic agility on value creation.
Research conducted by the University of Surrey reveals that senior management teams comprising individuals from diverse gender backgrounds play a crucial role in fostering responsible and collaborative innovation.
A study of small and medium-sized firms from emerging markets (ESMEs) found that having a gender-diverse senior management team is associated with increased value and innovation that aligns with the United Nation’s Grand Challenges. This conclusion was based on an analysis of 228 survey responses from ESMEs in the United Arab Emirates.
Professor Taz Rajwani, co-author of the study and Head of the Department of Strategy and International Business at the University of Surrey, said: “We found that firms that valued gender diversity by employing women in some of their most senior roles were more able to respond to the ever-changing economic environment and made valuable contributions to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. This is yet more evidence that having women as part of a company’s senior management team is not only morally the right thing to do, but it is good for business and wider communities.”
Reference: “Grand challenges and emerging market small and medium enterprises: The role of strategic agility and gender diversity” by Nadia Zahoor, Huda Khan, Francis Donbesuur, Zaheer Khan and Tazeeb Rajwani, 27 January 2023, Journal of Product Innovation Management.
DOI: 10.1111/jpim.12661
“Grand Challenges” focus on the ways in which cross-disciplinary research can address the objectives laid out in the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The Grand Challenges strands include Global Health, Sustainable Cities, Cultural Understanding, Human Wellbeing, Transformative Technology and Justice and Equality.
It should depend on the business and the qualifications of the lady for that business, I guess. Or does it have to do with unicorn powder and conspiring multiverses?
Anheiser Bush and Target beg to differ LOLOLOLOL
That’s what happens when you let women think they can do a real study. Great progressivist news from that beacon of feminism, the United Arab Emirates.
“We found that firms that valued gender diversity by employing women in some of their most senior roles were more able to respond to the ever-changing economic environment and made valuable contributions to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.”
Are “contributions to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals” the companies’ charters and reason for forming? If, not, then what was the reason? Is that what investors in publicly traded companies expect when they purchase the companies’ stocks?
I think that most investors are looking to make a profit on their money, with an acceptable risk. Does the study quantify the “contributions” with growth in profit or other measures of the value of the company? Or, are the claims based on unsubstantiated, subjective evaluations that the ‘researchers’ approve of?
The linked article is infused with jargon and buzz words that do little to answer my question. I’m left with the impression that the authors confuse the responsibilities of business with what most people expect from government.
The article mentions the Blau Index, wherein, “… where P(sub)i is the percentage of senior management members in each category (specifically, male and female).”
I have a critical question: are the male and female categories based on biological discriminators, or how the members of the two categories self-identify. What if they self-identify in some category other than those two? If the basic hypothesis is that binary gender diversity provides tangible advantages to small and medium enterprises, wouldn’t multiple genders be even more advantageous? It would also argue that if gender is more important than other attributes, such as education and experience, that management should be composed of at least one of all 81 claimed genders.
Agreed. Would be easier to find lady friends in business then.