Legibilidade dos relatórios de administração: implicações da participação feminina na alta gestão e sua expertise financeira

Abstract

The readability of narrative disclosures provides financial reports with credibility to effectively convey vital information to market participants. There are several elements advocated in the literature that may affect readability, such as indebtedness, liquidity, firm size, and managerial opportunistic behavior. The implementation of strategies aimed at enhancing the quality of financial information is considered a positive aspect in evaluating companies. One such strategy is the presence of women in top management, which has been associated with improvements in ansparency, contributing to the quality of corporate disclosures, considering that the business impacts of female presence may vary according to individual attributes of women. Focusing on women's financial expertise in top management, supported by the argumentation put forth by upper echelon theory. In this context, the general objective of this study was to investigate the effect of financial expertise on the relationship between female participation in top management and the readability of management reports of companies listed on B3. To this end, 1,008 observations of companies listed on B3 from 2019 to 2022 were examined. Readability data were collected from management reports of companies using the ALT® software to calculate the Gunning Fog Index, and data on female participation and financial-economic variables were obtained from the Comdinheiro® database. Descriptive statistics, tests of differences between means and medians, correlation tests, and multiple linear regressions with panel data were used to achieve the study's objective. Findings indicate that the presence of women in top management of sample companies is still lower compared to male presence, highlighting the challenge of including women in senior positions. Furthermore, they also show that the level of readability of management reports supports the hypothesis raised in the study, as the presence of women in top management influences lower readability of reports, contrary to the results of Sahar et al. (2023). No moderating potential was found with the inclusion of financial expertise in the relationship. Findings in the Brazilian context are still preliminary, as Brazil exhibits a distinct relationship between readability and female participation in organizations compared to Anglo-Saxon countries. These findings contribute to advancing the discussion in the literature on the importance of gender diversity in leadership positions for transparent and effective communication with stakeholders. By promoting an inclusive and clear approach to corporate information disclosure, the research contributes to promoting gender equality and improving corporate governance.