Gender and firm innovation - A systematic literature review and future research agenda
International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research
ISSN: 1355-2554
Article publication date: 12 December 2020
Issue publication date: 12 February 2021
Abstract
Purpose
This paper presents a systematic review of 94 research articles in the domain of gender and firm innovation to map the area and infer future research avenues. The literature captured in this review includes seven theoretical, 16 qualitative and 71 quantitative studies from over 50 journals, examining the role of gender in firm innovation in over 100 countries.
Design/methodology/approach
This research utilises a reproducible systematic literature review process to identify prominent theoretical and empirical studies.
Findings
The findings suggest that the area is growing and presents interesting opportunities. However, it is observed that empirical investigations are primarily influenced by literature from the Anglo-Saxon areas and give little attention to contextual intricacies of emerging market countries. Among quantitative studies, three main themes of gender are addressed unevenly. They are Top Management Team (TMT) diversity level, R&D team diversity level and individual entrepreneur level studies. Six interesting research avenues are proposed as a major outcome of the review.
Originality/value
This review is one of the first of its kind to extensively review the literature of gender and firm-level innovation. The review consolidates and widens the understanding of the relationship between gender variables and firm innovation-related variables to advance the discussion in the domain by presenting research gaps and questions gleaned from the articles. To this end, the review presents six promising research avenues in the area of gender and firm innovation.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the anonymous referees for their useful suggestions. We would also like to thank Shaili Singh, Manzoor Ul Akram and Chetna Chauhan from Indian Institute of Management Rohtak for their feedback on the manuscript.
Citation
TM, A. and Joseph, R.P. (2021), "Gender and firm innovation - A systematic literature review and future research agenda", International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, Vol. 27 No. 2, pp. 301-333. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEBR-08-2019-0480
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2020, Emerald Publishing Limited