مقاله انگلیسی رایگان در مورد مدیران زن و افشای اطلاعات سرمایه فکری – الزویر 2017

We respond to a call to generate “knowledge and insights that can compel positive change in the representation and status of women on corporate boards” (Bilimoria, 2000, p. 25). We explore whether representation of women on boards increases the level of voluntary disclosure of intellectual capital [IC] information, including disclosures of knowledge-based intangibles (Erickson & Rothberg, 2015). This study is timely because of the recent profusion of regulatory recommendations regarding gender balance on corporate boards (Masselot & Maymont, 2015). Increasing the representation of women on company boards has fast become a policy goal for many national governments (Senden & Visser, 2013). This study is important too because of the strong influence IC now has on longtermcorporate value.If stakeholders are informedfully abouthow a company manages IC, they can better assess its capacity to sustain, and increase, long-term value. However, because access to information regarding IC generally has been asymmetric, stakeholders rely strongly on voluntary disclosures of IC to inform their decision making (Tejedo-Romero, 2016). The first regulatory initiatives seeking gender balance on company boards were instituted in 2003 in Norway. Public companies were required to have at least 40 percent of either gender as board members by 2008. Such initiatives have spread throughout the world. For example, the Indian Companies Bill 2012 recommended that company boards include at least one woman director (Kamalnaath & Peddada, 2012). In Malaysia, the Code of Corporate Governance (2012) required public companies to have at least 30 per cent of women on their boards by 2016. In 2012, the European Union [EU] required publicly listed companies in member countries to voluntarily increase women on boards to 30% by 2015, and 40% by 2020 (EU, 2012). In Spain, the Equality Law (Law 3/2007) pressed companies to increase the proportion of women on boards to 40% by 2015.1 The empirical data we draw on are sourced in the voluntary disclosures regarding IC that were made in 125 sustainability reports of major Spanish companies, 2007–2011. The decision to study Spain is motivated by the historically low level of representation of women on boards in that country. In 2013, the European Commission (EC) reported that women represented 12.3% of board members of Spain’s largest listed companies (IBEX 35 index), well below the EU average of 15.8%. The rate of increase of women on boards in Spain between 2003 and 2012 was 1% per annum. The EC observed that “at this rate of change, boards with at least 40% of eachgender are 30 oddyears away andthe 2015deadline stipulated in the quota law of 2007 will pass unmet” (EC, 2013).