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Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

bloomberg.com

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Re: Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

#21

Post by einhverfr »

dinkumthinkum wrote: post #7

Wow, I think anyone with any basic logic course under their belt can see many cause and effect fallacies going on here. I'd expect a little more from Bloomberg. Is it that they perform better because there are women on the board, that women make better decision, or that companies that perform better are more likely to also have women on the board? It could be any number of things and any reasonable person wouldn't ev…

Indeed not only that could be that mixing genders means mixing perspectives and this leads to better decision-making.

Additionally if a business is seen as a riskier investment does this mean that women would be less interested in investing time/money in it?

Re: Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

#22

Post by einhverfr »

kolinko wrote: post #18
slurgfest wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't speak to the application in business. It's a well established idea in biology. Females invest more biologically in eggs and pregnancy. Men may have many more children than women but also have greater risk of having none. Similar patterns show up in lots of areas. At human conception there are significantly more males than females, at birth they are close to 50/50 - males are more fragile. Even after that poin…

Any scientific research to support that? Just because you can put a nice story behind a theory doesn't make it true.

Some if it ties in with this:

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/105013.php at least regarding sex at conception. I am not entirely sure about whether we really have hard direct data regarding sex at conception but that's one possibility regarding that data. On the other hand, it's possible that there are biological differences between sperm carrying X and Y chromosomes and that these might be selected for one way or another.

However, trans-historically (closer to my field of expertise) it is generally true that men take on riskier endeavors than women do, and that women follow as areas develop. Frontiers generally tend to be nearly exclusively male (at one point the Wild West had a gender ratio of 50 men per woman, and this is not isolated. Consider the early classical practice of having the men march off in search of fortune, for example.

The thing to keep in mind here is that women have a narrower window of opportunity to start a family than men do. If you are 40 and male, and you are not married, you could still get married to a younger woman and have kids, but if you are 40 and female, you are less likely to be able to have kids. Therefore men can generally better afford to move into immature markets and riskier endeavors than women can.

Re: Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

#23

Post by SkyMarshal »

ChrisNorstrom wrote: post #5

" So is it because they're women or just exceptionally good at what they do? " Both. Women are biologically known to diversify their risks much more than men. Both in life and in business. Companies started by women have a much smaller chance of failing and reach profitability much sooner. Female business owners are more steady and less risky. Male business owners tend to take more risk, thus getting ahead faster but…

I've read studies that corroborate your assertions, but it would really behoove you when making such specific assertions to link citations if at all possible, and not assume your audience is on the same page.

Re: Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

#25

Post by JanezStupar »

kolinko wrote: post #19
JanezStupar wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>(I personally think women in director positions are a good thing because an all-men board obviously can't consist of the best people available) Does that mean that education, social sciences, social care and healthcare suck because they obviously don't consist of the best people available?

Well, not necessarily suck, but aren't using the full potential of the population. There are plenty of men who could be perfect social workers, or stay-at-home dads, but instead waste their potential, because "it's a woman's job" and "the man should bring money home".

I just can't subscribe to the notion that "god" is walking around with a measuring instrument and carefully distributing talents in a 50% manner.

Or that solely due to one's talents a person is obliged to "serve the society" in hers designated role.

Do I believe that diversity is good? Hell yeah!

Do I believe that enforcing mandatory quotas is the way to improve overall quality? Hell no.

If anything we should spend more resources on overall quality. And I am really afraid that this focus on females will cost us dearly. There is a lot of evidence that we are losing whole generations of boys. How is (not intentionally, mind you) making men feebler going to help society is beyond my comprehension.

Re: Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

#26

Post by kolinko »

einhverfr wrote: post #21
dinkumthinkum wrote: post #7

Wow, I think anyone with any basic logic course under their belt can see many cause and effect fallacies going on here. I'd expect a little more from Bloomberg. Is it that they perform better because there are women on the board, that women make better decision, or that companies that perform better are more likely to also have women on the board? It could be any number of things and any reasonable person wouldn't ev…

Indeed not only that could be that mixing genders means mixing perspectives and this leads to better decision-making. Additionally if a business is seen as a riskier investment does this mean that women would be less interested in investing time/money in it?

If mixing perspectives is better for boards, does it mean they would benefit from putting more anarchists, Inuits and children on board? They also deliver other perspectives.

Re: Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

#27

Post by einhverfr »

kolinko wrote: post #26
einhverfr wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed not only that could be that mixing genders means mixing perspectives and this leads to better decision-making. Additionally if a business is seen as a riskier investment does this mean that women would be less interested in investing time/money in it?

If mixing perspectives is better for boards, does it mean they would benefit from putting more anarchists, Inuits and children on board? They also deliver other perspectives.

You know, Quakers still give children over a certain age (depending on meeting, maybe 7) full veto power over meeting business. And anarchists might have some helpful insights. I don't know what you have against Inuits though.

Re: Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

#28

Post by kolinko »

JanezStupar wrote: post #25
kolinko wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, not necessarily suck, but aren't using the full potential of the population. There are plenty of men who could be perfect social workers, or stay-at-home dads, but instead waste their potential, because "it's a woman's job" and "the man should bring money home".

I just can't subscribe to the notion that "god" is walking around with a measuring instrument and carefully distributing talents in a 50% manner. Or that solely due to one's talents a person is obliged to "serve the society" in hers designated role. Do I believe that diversity is good? Hell yeah! Do I believe that enforcing mandatory quotas is the way to improve overall quality? Hell no. If anything we should spend m…

Why did you assume I'm for mandatory quotas?

The only thing I'm saying is that a plenty of people get pushed by society into suboptimal life choices.

Mutiple research from various countries says that girls are as good at math/computer skills as boys, up to the graduation from high schools. After high school they don't choose science in universities though. Why could that be? If the distribution of talent is exactly the same in high school within boys & girls, I'd expect that they'd pick similar directions at universities.

If they don't, it means that some of them waste their talents.

I don't believe mandatory quotas are the solutions, I'm all against it. But I think we've got a problem, because we could have twice as many great programmers, and great scientists.

Re: Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

#29

Post by nagrom »

vacri wrote: post #13
dinkumthinkum wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand your last statement. Why is it obvious that an all-men board can't consist of the best people?

A merit-based company doesn't care about genitals, whereas a boys' club company cuts out 50% of potentially meritorious workers (though I agree the idea was poorly worded)

A board that must necessarily select only men may not be composed of the best people available, but a board that happens to consist only of men may, in fact, have the best people available...looking a posteriori at a group's gender composition is not very helpful.

Re: Stocks Perform Better if Women Are on Company Boards

#30

Post by kolinko »

einhverfr wrote: post #27
kolinko wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If mixing perspectives is better for boards, does it mean they would benefit from putting more anarchists, Inuits and children on board? They also deliver other perspectives.

You know, Quakers still give children over a certain age (depending on meeting, maybe 7) full veto power over meeting business. And anarchists might have some helpful insights. I don't know what you have against Inuits though.

I'd say that if you'd bring in an average Inuit into a board meeting, you'd have some language problems, and you'd have to explain a lot of things to him.

My argument is that there is such a thing as "too much diversity" - if a group that has to make some kind of a decision is too diverse, it will have communication problems. Therefore it's not as simple as saying "oh, anything that brings in more diversity is better for a board".

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