It’s a Man’s World? Gender Spillover Effects on Performance in a Male-Dominated Industry

Getting more women into male-dominated industries has become the nucleus of public debate in many industrialized countries. However, it is still not clear how growing female representation impacts the individual performance of workers in these sectors. The research setting of this study is the Norwegian oil industry as a typically male-dominated sector. Using a fixed-effects regression model, the present paper investigates two different constellations: 1) how growing female representation impacts the individual performance of workers at the same hierarchical level (within-ranks); 2) how growing female representation at the next highest rank impacts the performance of subordinated workers (downward-flowing). Consistent with prevailing theory, the within-ranks analysis reveals that the performance of men in relation to a higher share of female peers follows a cubic pattern. This shows that men’s performance is the highest in gender-balanced teams. For women, this relationship cannot be confirmed. In terms of downward-flowing effects, female supervisors in this particular industry are estimated to have a negative effect on the performance of both, men and women. This result on negative downward-flowing effects requires a deeper analysis on the corporate cultural background.