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Business
a female CEO,” says Yu, which in itself implies that
even with daughters, male bosses still aren’t as socially
minded as their female counterparts.
THE BIGGER PICTURE
Whilst it may be possible to quantify the effect of
daughters on their father’s leadership qualities,
Christopher Journeaux, Partner at Therapy Jersey,
points out that studies like this are useful for
companies looking to ensure diversity; they aren’t
about ‘feminising’ the business world.
“The more you take a myriad approach to people
on a board, the wider the understanding you bring to
that board,” he says. “It’s about real diversity, it’s not
about making a board female-dominated. Diversity
helps boards become more understanding.”
If the performance of business leaders is
substantially affected by the people in their family, it
does create questions for recruiters who tend to look
only at the person in front of them. “If you want to
hire a socially responsible CEO, perhaps you should
look at their whole profile,” says Yu.
Journeaux suggests that recruiters should start by
examining the way they describe the roles they are
seeking to fill rather than looking into the candidate’s
family background.
“Companies should look at the job description
first and ask themselves whether it is focused
on a particular set of traits – for example, male
characteristics. If it is, then they could look at
broadening the description as this will help
diversify the leadership.”
Journeaux’s suggestion that firms revisit their job
descriptions is a common sense place to start for
companies committed to a diversity of thinking around
the boardroom table.
However, Yu and Cronqvist’s study highlights
an important element of leadership that is often
overlooked in the search for the mythological and
self-contained ‘hero-leader’.
Whilst the effect that daughters have on their
fathers’ leadership qualities is interesting, more
than anything else, the study proves that none of us
exists in a vacuum. Leaders, as much as anyone,
soak up the experiences of those around them
and, often subconsciously, use these
experiences to inform their
decision-making.
Many companies are
looking to better reflect
the world around them
and to play a more active
role in the societies in
which they operate. To
achieve this, they could
start by gaining a true
understanding of the
influences and experiences
of their CEO – these
factors may well
affect how they run
the company.
KIRSTEN MOREL
is a freelance business
writer
If the performance of leaders is
affected by the people in their
family, it does create questions for
recruiters who tend to look only
at the person in front of them
THE FAMILY VIEW
With an older brother, a younger sister and a father leading one of
the Channel Islands’ largest private equity and fund administration
companies, Alice Merry, 20, is well placed to comment on the effect
that her family has on her father’s leadership style.
“I studied geography, so the wider environment is important to
me and I’d find it very unfair if my father wasn’t interested in
diversity,” she says.
As Alice looks towards work following graduation, she is both
positive about the issue of gender diversity in today’s workplace and
clear about the kind of influence she’d like to have on the companies
she’ll end up working for.
“I personally have never found that I have been discriminated
against,” she says. “There’s a lot less discrimination these days due
to the pressures that social media can place on companies. I’m
interested in Human Resources because it’s about making
companies better places to work at.”
As a father of two daughters and one son, Chris Merry is keenly
aware of the effect that siblings have on each other and he recognises
this in the findings of Yu’s and Cronqvist’s
study. “If you grow up with sisters, you grow
up with a greater understanding of the female
perspective than if you don’t. If sisters have an
influence, then daughters will too,” he says.
Ultimately, he feels that companies, as
much as their leaders, are products of their
environment and will always reflect this. “The
drivers to being a good place to work are similar
wherever the office is located, but offices
do reflect the populations in which they are
located,” he says.
Unlike ethnic diversity, however, where
location plays a defining role, populations
everywhere are split pretty much 50:50 in
terms of gender. So few companies should
have a problem maintaining equality
between the sexes.
Chris Merry (CEO of Ipes) with his
daughters Alice and Pippa, son Hugh,
and wife Julie
42 January/february 2016 www.blglobal.co.uk