Gender Factor in Enterprise Management: Prerequisites for the Appointment of Women to the Position of CEO and its Economic Consequences (Empirical Analysis on the Example of Russian Manufacturing Enterprises)

This paper analyzes the relationship between the gender of the CEO and the performance of companies, as well as the dependence of the probability of appointing a woman to the position of CEO on institutional, cultural factors, as well as the characteristics of the enterprise itself. The analysis was carried out on the example of manufacturing enterprises in Russia on the data of 2017-2018. The analysis revealed a strong influence of the company's characteristics (belonging to certain industries, age and size of the company) on the likelihood of a female candidate being appointed to the position. Women as CEO are most often found in the light and food industries, as well as in smaller companies. Institutional and cultural factors also have some influence. The influence of the social selection effect due to the non-random selection of candidates of one or another gender was found for the indicator of the effectiveness of the use of human resources. There is no direct effect of the influence of the gender of the general director of the enterprise on the effectiveness of the companies ' activities, but there is an indirect influence in terms of the level of concentration of firms in the industry, the level of corruption in the region of the firm's activity, and some effects associated with the ownership of the general director. The results obtained are the first results of research in this area for Russian manufacturing enterprises. The paper also provides suggestions for improving and expanding the analysis.