Abstract

Natural disasters pose significant challenges to all businesses and firms, disrupting operations, profitability, and overall performance. Many researchers and business professionals link a firm's ability to recover and maintain stability in these events to its governance structures including the gender diversity of its leadership positions. While numerous studies have examined the relationship between governance structure and Corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosures, our research extends the existing literature by investigating the moderating role of gender diversification within governance structures and CSR disclosures on firm performance. Specifically, we focus on the resilience management demonstrated by female leaders in response to external shocks caused by natural disasters. Our analysis is based on a dataset of 5,185 U.S. firms spanning the period from 2000 to 2021. We draw firm-level data from Compustat and Boardex accessed through Wharton Research Data Services (WRDS) and obtain information on natural disaster damages from the Spatial Hazard Events and Losses Database for the United States (SHELDUS). We adopt a dual-method approach, combining the fixed effects model with the period seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) method to address heteroskedasticity. Our findings reveal that while gender diversification is not a primary determinant in mitigating the economic impact of natural disasters on operational performance, firms with greater gender diversity exhibit improved performance, particularly in response to human-centric shocks. We conclude that gender-diverse firms are better equipped to manage risks, demonstrate stronger resilience, and sustain a positive reputation, all of which contribute to enhanced firm performance and value.