The Importance of Gender Congruence in Corporate Social Responsibility: Field Experimental Evidence

Labor market scholars have made recent calls for moving beyond demand-side explanations for observed labor market outcomes and for uncovering supply-side processes and the interaction between these. One organizational characteristic that has been posited to influence job seeker preferences is corporate social responsibility (CSR). Mixed empirical results of the effects of CSR on firm performance more broadly, as well as increased inquiry into the contingencies of when CSR may benefit firms through stakeholders such as employees, point to the importance of examining how CSR interacts with other organizational characteristics. In this study, we examine how the gender composition of company leadership making CSR claims contributes to shaping the applicant pool. Specifically, since social responsibility is perceived to be female-typed, we examine whether congruence between an organization’s claims and the gender composition of leadership affect whether prospective employees apply for jobs. Addressing this research question poses a key empirical challenge: it is necessary to observe not only those who do apply to a job, but also the risk pool of those would could have applied. We address this challenge using a unique field experimental design and find that congruence between firm leadership gender composition and social responsibility is a key predictor of whether prospective applicants apply for an otherwise identical job vacancy.