Gender is much more than biological differences between male and female.

 

Gender is much more than biological differences between male and female. It is socially constructed characteristics of men and women, such as norms, behaviors, and roles that a society considers appropriate for men and women. It varies from society to society and can be changed. Today, LGBTQIA+ people are more accepted than ever. This is also true in the business world. Many companies around the world have started to create LGBTQIA+ friendly parental policy. Recently, several academic studies have also focused on LGBT-supportive policies. Prior studies find that LGBT-friendly policies provide both human-resources-related benefit and financial benefit (for example, see Chintrakarn et al., 2020; Ellis & Riggle, 1996; Johnston & Malina, 2008; Metcalf & Rolfe, 2011; Patel & Feng, 2020; Pichler et al., 2018; Wang & Schwarz, 2010). However, there is some evidence suggesting opportunity-seeking mangers may use this policy for their self-benefit, particularly their compensation(Kyaw et al., 2021).

thailand university Most stakeholders recognize the importance of different kinds of educational backgrounds and functional expertise, but they tend to underestimate the benefits of gender diversity. Thus, further steps are needed to improve gender equality in the workforce. Achieving board gender diversity is likely to generate positive externality. The implementation of gender equality supportive policies, such as appointing females in senior management roles and implementing LGBT hiring campaigns, can give a positive signal to both employees and investors. Ethical postures of this kind have proved to be contributory in building relationships with other stakeholders, which in turn help build the firms’ reputation and value creation. Furthermore, from agency perspective, the board gender diversity could lead to higher independence of directors, resulting in a better board monitoring function on behalf of the shareholders. In other words, board gender diversity could reduce agency cost of the company and again, potentially lead to better firm performance. Firms with gender equality supportive policies tend to provide a less stressful work environment and have lower employee turnover, which in turn enhances human and social capital of the company. Nevertheless, these benefits also come with costs. In some cases, managers may adopt gender equality friendly policy for their own benefit. This leads to several interesting avenues for future research.