If yours is a business striving to become more sustainable, one of the systems worth review is the strength and resiliency of your human capital. That more women at executive and Board levels will help make an organization more adaptable through challenging times should be common sense. This is perhaps even more true in tending to corporate social responsibility, because there’s more to ponder than the profit bottom line. Decision-making teams need thinkers from a wide range on the linear to relational continuum. And, while adding women doesn’t automatically increase the relational emphasis, it will likely shift the conversation toward a broader range of input and new ideas.
My latest SustainableBusinessForum column introduces recently released Catalyst research that should get us all thinking about some different questions about gender inclusivity (which I’ll cover in Part 2). Here’s an excerpt:
New research from Catalyst and Harvard Business School (HBS) shows the strong connection between having more women on boards and in executive management and “greater corporate social responsibility.” While these findings focus on philanthropy or corporate giving as the key indicator of corporate social responsibility, this information should be considered just the beginning of the ways corporations will benefit from having more women, and in all ranks.