Gender differences in speed of advancement: An empirical examination of top executives in the Fortune 100 firms

• Author: Peter Cappelli,Monika Hamori,Rocio Bonet
• Published date: 01 April 2020
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/smj.3125
• Date: 01 April 2020

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Gender differences in speed of advancement:

An empirical examination of top executives

in the Fortune 100 firms

Rocio Bonet

1

| Peter Cappelli

2

| Monika Hamori

1

1

IE Business School, IE University, Madrid, Spain

2

Center for Human Resources, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Correspondence

Rocio Bonet, IE Business School, IE

University, Alvarez de Baena 4, Madrid

28006, Spain.

Email: rocio.bonet@ie.edu

Abstract

Research summary: We examine the advancement of

women in executive roles in the ranks of the 10 highest

executive positions in the Fortune 100 companies in

2001 and 2011. We find that women executives secured

top executive positions faster than men, controlling for

relevant individual attributes, and that the advantage of

women with respect to men grew with the number of

years they spent in the organization. The female advan-

tage disappeared once companies had more than one

high-ranking female executive. We make use of several

tests to assess possible unobserved differences between

men and women executives, including the case–control

technique from epidemiology. Our results are consis-

tent with institutional pressures accelerating women's

advancement to top executive positions, but they also

reveal the limited effectiveness of such pressures.

Managerial summary: Employers interested in

increasing the diversity of their executive ranks should

pay attention not only to who is in those jobs but also

how long it took them to get there. In our study,

women in top jobs got there faster not just because they

were better but because they moved through previous

positions faster and skipped steps in job ladders. This

The authors are listed alphabetically.

Received: 21 May 2018 Revised: 12 October 2019 Accepted: 14 November 2019 Published on: 13 January 2020

DOI: 10.1002/smj.3125

708 © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Strat Mgmt J. 2020;41:708–737.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/smj

suggests how diversity at the top can be enhanced with-

out having to wait for more diverse cohorts in lower-

level jobs to slowly advance. The fact that faster

advancement slowed once there were a few women in

top jobs suggests that support for advancement was

indeed a company choice, unfortunately one driven by

public appearances.

KEYWORDS

career advancement, gender, institutionalism, promotions,

top executives

1|INTRODUCTION

Within the general topic of career success, an important question has been why the experiences

of women have been so different from those of men. Voluminous research across different disci-

plines has documented that women fare worse than men in various aspects of career attain-

ment. The biggest gaps—certainly the most visible—may be in leadership roles, especially in

corporations, where women continue to be underrepresented (Mitchell, 2016). Women hold

about 9% of the top management positions in the S&P 1500 firms (Dezső, Ross, & Uribe, 2016).

Our data below show that they occupy 15% of the 10 highest-ranking executive positions in For-

tune 100 companies despite holding 47% of jobs in the United States overall (Bureau of Labor

Statistics, 2017a). Arguably, the most common explanation for the low numbers of women in

top executive roles remains the notion of a “glass ceiling,”that the process of appointments to

senior positions is more discriminatory than that for lower-level positions. Women would there-

fore have more difficulty getting to the top jobs even when they get to the mid-level jobs (see,

for example, Baxter & Wright, 2000, p. 276; Boyd, 2008; Petersen & Saporta, 2004, p. 855). As

we note below, however, the evidence for this view is inconclusive.

In spite of women's underrepresentation in leadership positions, there is also emerging evi-

dence of a “female premium”at the top of organizations (Leslie, Manchester, & Dahm, 2017,

p. 402). Recent studies have shown that the typical gender gap may indeed reverse under cer-

tain circumstances, leading a small group of women to enjoy more favorable outcomes than

their male counterparts: a pay premium (Gayle, Golan, & Miller, 2012; Hill, Upadhyay, &

Beekun, 2015; Leslie et al., 2017) and a higher likelihood of promotion to certain top executive

positions (Gayle et al., 2012; Petersen & Saporta, 2004; Powell & Butterfield, 1994; Spilerman &

Petersen, 1999). These findings are contrary to the prevailing view that women always do worse

than men in the workplace and call for researchers to gain a better understanding of the cir-

cumstances under which a female premium may emerge.

One explanation for the unexpected female premium is the pressures faced by organizations

to achieve diversity goals. Companies may be willing to favor women over men in visible posi-

tions to ensure they comply with pressures to improve their diversity from different stake-

holders such as the media, politicians, customers, and suppliers (Dobbin, Kim, & Kalev, 2011;

Leslie et al., 2017; Robinson & Dechant, 1997; Spilerman & Petersen, 1999). At the same time,

researchers have also warned that these pressures may have limited effects, affecting only a few

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