Business & Entrepreneurship

OECD projections suggest that in just eleven years, seven out of ten graduates will be women in many countries across the world. It is crucial that men recognize that gender balance and the encouragement of women is a business imperative in today’s tough times.

Doing Business has been tracking regulatory reforms aimed at improving the ease of doing business. Despite the challenges presented by the financial crisis, the number of reforms hit a record level this year. Between June 2008 and May 2009, 287 reforms were recorded in 131 economies, 20% more than the year before. Reformers focused on making it easier to start and operate a business, strengthening property rights and improving the efficiency of commercial dispute resolution and bankruptcy procedures.

The Global Private Sector Leaders Forum is a group of influencial businesspeople and companies committed to promoting women’s economic empowerment. These leaders understand the importance of women’s contributions to business profitability and to the communities in which they operate. They are creating economic opportunities for women as an integral part of core business, community engagement and corporate diversity and inclusion.
 

Moderated by Barbara Adachi, National Managing Principal of the Initiative for the Retention and Advancement of Women at Deloitte LLP, the blog is an ongoing community conversation about life, work and everything else in between.
 

This special report from DDI’s Global Leadership Forecast 2008/2009 is a bi-annual study that measures the impact of leadership development initiatives around the world. The study included data from more than 12,000 leaders from 76 countries. Research revealed the following: female leaders are under-represented in accelerated development programs (like high potential programs and one-on-one mentorship) are secret or happen behind closed doors, organizations aren’t held accountable for gender balance; and, having women represent in significant numbers at every leadership level doesn’t mean that will carry to the executive level– in fact, there is a backlash again women at the top when they are dominant in leadership roles at every other level.
 

We show that female directors have a significant impact on board inputs and firm outcomes. In a sample of US firms, we find that female directors have better attendance records than male directors, male directors have fewer attendance problems the more gender-diverse the board is, and women are more likely to join monitoring committees. These results suggest that gender-diverse boards allocate more effort to monitoring. Accordingly, we find that CEO turnover is more sensitive to stock performance and directors receive more equity-based compensation in firms with more gender-diverse boards. However, the average effect of gender diversity on firm performance is negative. This negative effect is driven by companies with fewer takeover defenses. Our results suggest that mandating gender quotas for directors can reduce firm value for well-governed firms.

A new approach to leadership can help women become more self-confident and effective business leaders. Women start careers in business and other professions with the same level of intelligence, education and commitment as men. Yet comparatively few reach the top echelons. With this in mind, the McKinsey Leadership Project, an initiative to help professional women at McKinsey and elsewhere, set our four years ago to learn what drives and sustains successful female leaders

Calvert’s recent Diversity Survey, Examining Cracks in the Ceiling, demonstrates that even the best companies have much to accomplish in developing a comprehensive diversity strategy.
 

A surprising number of highly-educated MBAs are dropping out of the labor force. Associate Professor Catherine Wolfram, a member of the Haas Economic Analysis and Policy Group found MBAs are more likely than MDs and JDs to be stay-at-home mothers.