Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal

Abstract

The literature on the strategic role of ownership in creating firm value suggests that owners' ultimate decision-making authority allows them to align their firms' strategic orientations with their idiosyncratic judgment.By integrating the strategic ownership literature with social role theory, we theorize how women owners' genderbased judgment influences owner teams' strategic choices depending on the level of ownership (i.e., decision-making authority) collectively held by women owners.Our empirical evidence, based on 42,667 European firms, suggests that greater ownership among women is associated with less risky strategic choices and a stronger social value-creation orientation among owner teams.These relationships are partly contingent on whether or not women hold a block majority.Our findings contribute to the strategic ownership literature and advance research on women's entrepreneurship. Managerial Summary: In this study, based on 42,667European private firms led by owner teams, we investigate how women's ownership affects owner teams' strategic choices.Consistent with established behavioral differences between men and women, we find that greater decisionmaking authority held by women owners is associated with less risky strategic choices and a stronger social value-

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