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Appointing Female CEOS in Risky and Precarious Firm Circumstances. A Review of the Glass Cliff Phenomenon

Following thirty years of discussion of the “glass ceiling,” recent empirical research has focused on the relatively new phenomenon of women on the board of directors — the so-called “glass cliff.” This refers to a form of gender discrimination in which women are more often appointed to leadership positions in risky and precarious business circumstances than their male counterparts. Highlighting the key findings of current quantitative and qualitative research, this literature review assesses existing support for the glass cliff hypothesis and the limitations of empirical research and recommendations. Most of the included studies find support for the glass cliff, in which “think crisis, think female” stereotypes complement the traditional “think leadership, think male” approach. As archival and other studies have been conducted predominantly in Anglo-American countries, future research should extend to other methods and settings. In contrast to the recent literature, the present review draws a clear distinction between archival, experimental and qualitative research, so increasing interest and relevance for practitioners, regulators and researchers.


INTRODUCTION
Empirical research on gender discrimination in the entry to leadership positions (the "glass ceiling") has been on-going for more than 30 years. In certain circumstances, however, the glass ceiling gives way to the "glass cliff," where women are appointed to risky and precarious leadership positions with a great probability of failure (Ryan et al., 2016). The two phenomena must be discussed together in order to analyse the specific conditions in which women may break through the glass ceiling (Bruckmüller et al., 2014). In contrast to the prevailing gender stereotype ("think leadership, think male"), women may have a "leadership advantage" at times of poor company performance ("think crisis, think female") (Eagly & Carli, 2003). This may, for instance, explain why women were appointed to top management positions in the wake of the financial crisis of 2008/09.
There are two possible motives for glass cliff appointments. On the one hand, they may be a signal to the market, indicating a commitment to innovative strategies by selecting a female top manager with crisis management experience (Ryan et al., 2016). As compared to men, female leaders possess different skills and traits that may increase the probability of successful crisis management (Eagly & Carli, 2003). The strategic need for organizational change and a departure from standard leadership practices in times of crisis (Kaplan & Minton, 1994; Lee & James, 2007) can, therefore, lead to glass cliff appointments. Since the financial crisis of 2008/09, there has been a widespread international discussion of the economic implications of appointing female board members.
The assumption is that women on boards enhance corporate governance, especially with regard to innovation challenges (digitalization, industry 4.0) and increased stakeholder management through non-financial reporting (e.g., CSR reporting, integrated reporting). Current meta-analyses stress the positive impact of gender diversity on financial and CSR performance (Byron & Post, 2016;Post & Byron, 2015), and literature reviews (e.g., Velte, 2017; Cabrera-Fernandez et al., 2016) analyse and highlight these performance effects. Beyond innovation management, male-dominated boards may choose to appoint a woman because of the high risk of failure and shortboard tenure in risky business situations. If a firm's crisis persists or worsens, the huge stakeholder awareness and media pressure associated with poor performance or crisis status (e.g., Boin et al., 2010) make a female leader highly visible.
The present review examines the empirical literature on the glass cliff phenomenon from an international perspective, which is likely to be of value to researchers, regulators and practitioners alike. The evaluation corresponds to vote counting of significances (Light & Smith, 1971). In distinguishing clearly between different research methods and their results, this review makes a number of important contributions to the existing literature, synthesizing new insights from rich empirical findings and offering recommendations for further research. In contrast to earlier reviews of the glass cliff, we analyse the results of empirical studies by research method (archival, experimental or qualitative), offering a starting point for future research by analysing the determinants and consequences of glass cliff positions while also raising practitioner awareness of the need for gender diversity and resources. Our findings also offer useful insights from a regulatory perspective (e.g., fixed gender quotas in European member states).
The paper is structured as follows. Section 2 describes possible input factors, moderators and output factors of glass cliff appointments as a basis for theoretical argumentation. Section 3 details the research method, especially with regard to data selection and structure. Major findings are presented in section 4, distinguishing between archival, experimental and qualitative research. Finally, in section 5, we consider the limitations of existing empirical research and make recommendations for future research, regulation and practice.

DETERMINANTS, CONSEQUENCES AND MODERATORS OF THE GLASS CLIFF
To gain a deeper understanding of the glass cliff phenomenon, it is useful to differentiate between certain determinants (input factors), moderators and consequences (output factors). In contrast to the reviews by Bruckmüller et al. (2014) and Ryan et al. (2016), we cluster studies in terms of research methods (archival, experimental, empiricalqualitative) and their results. In developing this conceptual framework, we first consider possible input factors, which have been the main focus of the cited studies. According to traditional gendered beliefs about female and male leadership ("stereotypes"), women tend to be perceived as communal while men are more likely to be perceived as agentic (Koenig et al., 2011). Stereotypical beliefs about "good leadership" tend to correspond to stereotypically masculine traits ("think manager, think male") (Schein, 1973;Schein et al., 1996). In general, men tend to be judged as better suited to top management positions, and women who take on these positions are judged less favourably than men (Eagly & Karau, 2002). However, in crisis situations, the link between masculinity and effective leadership is attenuated. Women's perceived communality may contribute to the glass cliff effect, as this attribute is considered relevant mostly at times of crisis ("think crisis, think female") (Ryan et al., 2011). Research on the glass cliff tends to concentrate on experimental studies of these gender stereotypes in business life.
Second, we discuss possible moderating effects of glass cliff appointments, assuming that the relevant factors include the nature of the crisis (Ryan et al., 2011), the availability of support to handle the crisis (Rink et al., 2013) and decision makers' individual differences, especially in terms of the desire to maintain the status quo (Brown et al., 2011). Finally, possible output factors of glass cliff positions seem important, as gender reactions to the glass cliff may be heterogeneous. When women acknowledge the existence of a glass cliff and accept these positions , what happens next? Is it true that top females are more likely to be replaced than their white male counterparts (Cook and Glass, 2014a)? Current studies rely on the tenure of female board members.

RESEARCH METHOD
The method adopted here is the structured literature review, which aims to develop new insights, critical reflections, future research recommendations and research questions. Literature reviews are common in current corporate governance, management and diversity research. Their quality has increased in recent years, with the emergence of dedicated software and online research tools and databases (e.g., Google Scholar) linking to journal articles (Velte, 2017). Massaro et al. (2016) specified ten steps for developing a structured literature review: review protocol, research questions, types of studies, article impact, analytical framework, review reliability and validity, coding the data, developing insights and critique and developing future research and questions. The present study draws on this proposed structure. As stated above, the research question addresses the empirical existence of glass cliff positions, differentiating clearly between archival, experimental and empirical-qualitative research and results.
The empirical studies included in this literature review were identified by comparing international databases (Web of Science, Google Scholar, SSRN, EBSCO, ScienceDirect) and libraries. As a first step, we used the keywords "gender diversity", "women on boards", and "women on boards of directors" in combination with "glass cliff" or "glass ceiling" as search items. In parallel, the search was either widened by the addition of the broader terms "corporate governance" and "firm performance" or narrowed by the addition of specific variables (e.g., "CEO gender", "CFO gender"). In the next step, contributions were examined for suitability of empirical research design. Given that discussion of glass cliff effects is international, it was not considered useful to focus on a particular country or regime. Additionally, as this is a young research discipline, a temporal restriction was not considered useful. The final sample included 32 studies.
The overview of current empirical research facilitates systematic mapping and analysis of the current state of international research. A quantitative literature analysis in the form of vote counting (Light and Smith, 1971) concentrates on significant findings and their respective signs but ignores specific coefficient values. Vote counting is widely used in corporate governance and management research but has not yet been applied in the present context. We are aware that vote counting is of limited use for synthesizing evidence from multiple evaluations, which involves comparing the number of significances. However, these limitations are mitigated by a quantitative metaanalysis. Glass cliff studies to date are too heterogeneous and too low in their amount to support a full meta-analysis yet. Table 1 provides an overview of the included studies by year of publication, region, journal and research method. More than half of the included studies used empirical-quantitative methods such as archival research (18). Experimental designs (9) and qualitative methods (e.g., interviews or surveys) (5) have to date been less widely used. The time range of reviewed studies extends from 2005 (when the first study was published by Ryan and Haslam in the UK) to 2017. Studies of the Anglo-American capital market (USA: 11; UK: 9) predominate, with few studies of other countries (e.g., The Netherlands (3); Germany, China, Switzerland, Spain, Canada (1 each)). Cross-country studies are also rare up to now. The wide range of journals encompasses such disciplines as psychology, management, gender, human resources, ethics, culture and law; in contrast to other research on gender diversity, finance and accounting journals have not featured research on the glass cliff. The British Journal of Management was frequently used (5), reflecting the considerable contribution of UK researchers. In contrast to the glass ceiling, empirical research on the glass cliff is relatively recent, and this is reflected in the total number of cited studies (32), which is also small in relation to the much greater number examining the link between gender diversity and firm performance (Velte, 2017). It is interesting that no glass cliff research has yet been conducted in Scandinavia, as this region has been very active in recent years in developing gender diversity regulations.

Archival studies
Most archival studies concentrate on glass cliff effects in business, although some also analyse public or regulatory organizations. Most of these studies find empirical evidence for the existence of the glass cliff, including Elsaid and Ursel (2017)

Empirical-qualitative research
Empirical-qualitative research on glass cliffs, which has been very rare up to now, commonly employs interview techniques. Full support for glass cliff was stated by all cited studies: Glass Table 2 provides an overview of the included studies. -Chinese boards are more likely to accept female directorships during an economic crisis than during an economic prosperity stage -Boards with greater gender diversity are more likely to make tough, countercyclical investments to improve firm performance during a crisis Transition of an occupational minority (white women; men and women of colour) to CEO (1; 0) Transition of a traditional white male replacing a minority CEO -Occupational minorities (white women; men and women of colour) are more likely than white men to be promoted CEO of weakly performing firms -No significant differences in tenure length between minorities and white men -When firm performance declines during the tenure of minority CEO, these leaders are likely to be replaced by white men Electoral success Winnability of seat -Conservative black and minority ethic (BME) candidates were less successful than their white counterparts -Mediation analyses demonstrate that this lack of success can be explained by the lower winnability of BME candidates' seats, such that the opposition candidate held a seat with a significantly larger majority compared with white candidates' opponents   During a period of overall stock-market decline, those companies who appointed women to their boards were more likely to have experienced consistently bad performance in the preceding five months than those who appointed men Anticipated acceptance Anticipated influence -Women and men evaluate glass cliff positions differently depending on the social and financial resources available -Women evaluated the position without social resources most negatively, whereas men evaluated the position without financial resources most negatively.
-Women's evaluations and expected levels of influence as leaders depend on the degree to which they expected to be accepted by subordinates -Men's evaluations and expected levels of acceptance by subordinates depend on the degree to which they expected to be influential in the position 2011 Brown et al.

Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin
The USA 107 (116, 88) psychology students, 53 individuals from Amazon's Mechanical Turk n.a. Experiment Threat Leader sex (male/female) Leadership orientation (change or stability) Implicit preferences for change (flexibility and stability) Beliefs about change and stabilityoriented leadership Support and vote for the candidate -Threat evokes an implicit preference for change over stability and gender stereotypes align women with change but men with stability -The typical preferences for male leaders is diminished, or even reserved, under threat -The shift away from typical gender-based leadership preferences occurs especially among individuals who highly legitimize the socio-political system, suggesting that these preferences shifts might serve to protect the underlying system. 2010 Ryan et al.

Psychology of Women Quarterly
The UK 2005 1,258 candidates for general election/80 undergraduate students Experiment/archival Candidate gender and political party (conservative versus labour) Seat winnability and participant gender Seat winnability Electoral success (percentage of votes won) Ranking of the focal candidates -In the conservative party, women contested harder to win seats than did men -A male candidate was more likely than a woman to be selected to contest a safe seat, but there was a strong preference for a female rather than a male appointment when the seat was described as hard to win 2010

Bruckmüller and Branscombe
The British Psychological Society The USA 119 Psychology students n.a. Experiment Gender History of leadership (male/female) Company performance Choice as a new CEO -Participants who read about a company with a male history of leadership selected a male future leader for a successful organization but chose a female future leader in times of crisis -This interaction -between company performance and gender of the preferred future leader -was eliminated for a counter-stereotypic history of female leadership -Stereotypically male attributes were most predictive of leader selection in a successful organization, while stereotypically female attributes were most predictive in times of crisis 2008 Haslam and Ryan The Leadership Quarterly The UK Management 95 graduate students, 85 high-school students and 83 business leaders n.a. experiment

Company performance
Perceived suitability of candidates for female and male leadership positions Perceived leadership ability Perceived quality of opportunity Stressfulness of position -The likelihood of a female candidate for leadership selection in comparison to a male leader increased when the firm performance was declining rather than improving -These glass cliff appointments are associated with beliefs that they suit the distinctive leadership abilities of women; provide women with good leadership opportunities; are particularly stressful for women 2007 Ashby et al.

William & Mary Journal of Women and the Law
The UK 114 law students n.a. Experiment Riskiness of case (high risk; low risk) Selection of a female or male candidate as lead counsel -A male candidate was as likely as a female to be selected as lead counsel for a lowrisk case but that was a strong preference for a female rather than a male appointment for a high-risk case -The existence of a glass cliff is supported -Male recruiters showed no gender preference in the failing company context but favoured the male candidate for the low-risk position.
-Female recruiters consistently favoured a female candidate, with this preference being more marked for a high-risk role 2010 Ryan et al.

Journal of Applied Psychology
Mostly from the USA 72 (109, 147) people with workplace experience) n.a. Questionnaire ---Study 1 reproduces "think manager -think male" (TMTM) associations for descriptions of managers of successful companies, but demonstrates a reversal for managers of unsuccessful companies -Study 2 examines the prescriptive nature of these stereotypes. No TMTM relationship was found for ideal managers of successful companies, but ideal managers of unsuccessful companies were associated with female stereotypes -Study 3 suggests that women may be favoured in times of poor performance, not because they are expected to improve the situation, but because they are seen to be good people managers and can take blame for organization failure 2007 Ryan et al.

Journal of Organizational
Change Management Mostly from the UK 164 self-selected individuals the questionnaire ---While women were more likely to acknowledge the existence of glass cliff and recognize its danger, unfairness, and prevalence for women, men were more likely to question the validity of research into the glass cliff, downplaying the dangers 2006 Wilson-Kovacs et al.

Equal Opportunities International
The UK 40 women in the private IT sector 2005 interview --Evidence that top-ranking positions can often hide non-anticipated obstacles and precarious situations that may prove damaging for women's careers.

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION
Although many studies have analysed the impact of gender diversity on firm performance in relation to the glass ceiling phenomenon, glass cliff effects have been the subject of empirical research only since 2005 and principally only in the USA and the UK, using archival methods. From research, regulatory and practical perspectives, women who break through the glass ceiling to occupy a glass cliff position are an important group for corporate governance research because of the high risk of gender discrimination. On the one hand, female appointments to leadership may serve as a positive market signal of innovative management strategies in successfully fighting a crisis, as in the stereotype "think crisis, think female." On the other hand, female management appointments can also be linked to increased risk of failure and increased probability of short tenure, representing a case of gender discrimination. While many regimes around the world have regulated gender diversity (e.g., fixed quotas for non-executive or supervisory board members), incorporating diversity reporting in corporate governance reporting, the quality of gender diversity management tools seems to remain a "black box." Reflecting this growing current interest, the present structured literature review includes 32 empirical studies of the glass cliff phenomenon from an international perspective. Our analysis differentiates empirical research methods (archival, empirical and empirical-qualitative studies). As archival and Anglo-American studies predominate, most find strong evidence for the existence of a glass cliff for female management positions in all research strands.
In this context, it is important to note some key limitations of earlier studies. One limitation (found mainly in the psychology literature) is the assumption that accounting-based performance measures (e.g. ROA, ROE) are "objective" while market-based measures (e.g., stock return, Tobin's Q) are "subjective" (Bruckmüller et al., 2014). While the differentiation between accounting-and marketbased performance is also "state of the art" in the finance, accounting and corporate governance literature, accounting-based measures are influenced mainly by earnings management in practice and are not as "objective" as many glass cliff researchers assume. This distinction between "objective" and "subjective" performance is critical, as other determinants of glass cliff effects included in recent experimental designs are associated with decreased objectivity and quantification. Aside from performance measures, other determinants of glass cliffs have been rarely included. We would encourage future researchers to build on the rich finance and accounting literature and their range of variables for describing a company's risk profile. In addition, both financial and CSR performance must be assessed in the context of gender diversity and glass cliff effects. As recent research indicates, regulatory interventions assume a positive link between women on boards and CSR performance (Byron and Post, 2016), this should be explored in future studies. In terms of methodology, most of the included studies employ empirical-quantitative models (archival and experiments), with relatively little use of qualitative methods. We would encourage future researchers to make greater use of interviews, surveys and case studies. In this context, a mix of qualitative and quantitative designs is also relevant. Moreover, the assumption of a linear relationship between performance and glass cliff positions by archival researchers is questionable; in fact, a non-linear (Ushaped) negative link seems more realistic. Archival studies must also continue to take account of endogeneity problems by using instrumental variables or dynamic generalized methods of the moment (GMM), as these issues are extremely important in increasing the validity of archival studies. The use of interactors and moderators should also be extended in future research because of their considerable relevance in explaining glass cliff appointments. As multinational studies have been very rare to date, we would encourage future research that incorporates country-specific variables (e.g., code versus law systems, level of shareholder rights, cultural issues). It is important to ask how different environments may contribute to the incentives for implementing glass cliff positions, as well as to issues of tenure and market reaction.
The implications of the glass cliff phenomenon for policy and practice have been widely examined and discussed in many countries. The present literature review also has regulatory implications. In contrast to the US capital market, European legislators and national regimes (such as Norway) have finalized several gender diversity reform initiatives since the financial crisis of 2008/09. The regulators' intention is to incentivize broader stakeholder management that should result in a decision-useful gender diversity management. This is an important challenge, and it remains unclear to date whether these regulations contribute positively to board effectiveness and firm performance. Finally, we note some practical implications. In general, the descriptive statistics for studies included in our literature review found quite low female CEO scores, and there are many possibilities for improving gender diversity activities from a practical standpoint. Looking beyond implementation costs, management should be aware of positive impacts on firm reputation and stakeholder trust, which may lead in the long run to better CSR and financial performance. Transparency around the representation of women on boards of directors (gender diversity reporting) and implementation of gender quotas in the boardroom are the two best-known measures for restricting glass cliff and glass ceiling effects. However, regulations on gender diversity reporting and gender quotas must not lead to significant change in diversity management strategies that would reduce the prevalence of risky glass cliffs in the coming years. In light of the risk of "pinkwashing," a diversity management system must be implemented as a first step. Subsequently, sound internal and external gender diversity reporting may contribute positively to stakeholder needs and firm reputation.