Management research has presented conflicting views on the relationship between gender diversity and business performance, particularly in terms of innovation.
Now, a team from Spain hopes to address the issue and has used social cognitive theory to investigate how innovation in research and development teams can be fostered by a combination of the specific context of R&D tasks and the participation of mixed gender teams. They have data from 3540 manufacturing companies and their findings suggest that gender diversity has a non-linear impact on innovation.
In other words, moderate levels of gender diversity boost innovation, but lower or higher levels lead to less optimal results. However, the data also point to environmental factors having a strong influence.
González-Moreno, Á., Díaz-García, C. and Sáez-Martínez, F.J. (2018) ‘R&D team composition and product innovation: gender diversity makes a difference‘, European J. International Management, Vol. 12, No. 4, pp.423-446.