Women and multiple board memberships: Social capital and institutional pressure

Abstract

We show unintended consequences of quota regulations to get women on boards. Board members may have diferent characteristics, and even among women, there are variations. We assume that the characteristics of the board members have an infuence on their contributions to boards, to businesses as well as to society. In this paper, we argue that diferent types of societal pressure to get women on boards have an infuence on the social capital characteristics of the women getting multiple board memberships. The paper is drawing on institutional theory and social capital theory, and we distinguish between mimetic, normative, and coercive types of pressure. Through a cluster analysis of 58 Italian “golden skirts”, we show that diferent types of societal pressure may lead to diferences in social capital characteristics. The study has implications for the ongoing international debate about women and diversity on boards, and we propose developing a pressure theory for getting women on boards.