From the workforce to the boardroom: firm feminisation and corporate renewable energy use

Purpose Drawing on similarity attraction, gender socialisation, homophily and upper echelon theories, this study aims to investigate the firm feminisation’s role in firms’ renewable energy use by examining the interactions among women employees, women executives and women directors in firms. Design/methodology/approach The authors study an international set of firms between 2007 and 2023 and run fixed-effects regression analysis. The endogeneity threat is mitigated through using a one-year lag model, two-stage least squares regression, propensity score matching and entropy balancing techniques. Findings The authors observe that women employees, executives and directors per se reinforce renewable energy use. More importantly, interactions between women employees and directors, women executives and directors and women employees and executives enhance firms’ renewable energy use. Further analysis shows that energy efficiency policies, environmental management teams and executive ESG compensation policies reinforce the positive effect of firm feminisation on renewable energy use. Finally, they find that this effect is stronger in countries with higher-quality institutions, particularly those with stronger public governance and greater economic development. Originality/value For the first time, by drawing on similarity attraction, gender socialisation, homophily and upper echelon theories, the authors investigate how interactions among women at different hierarchical levels within firms promote firms’ renewable energy use. Hence, this study makes an original contribution to diversity and sustainability literature.