A Bonus If Even Just One Woman Is On The Board of Directors

Here's some boardroom math: Adding a single woman director equals fewer accounting do-overs.

New research shows that firms with at least one woman director are significantly less likely to restate quarterly or annual earnings than are companies with an all-male slate of directors—40% less likely, researchers say.

Restatements aren't just an issue of faulty calculations and extra charges in the next quarter. They can undermine a company's credibility, with shareholders second-guessing future earnings and questioning the abilities of a board's audit committee.

The study doesn't get into why the presence of a single woman correlates with fewer accounting restatements. Co-author Susan Parker, an accounting professor and associate dean at Santa Clara University's Leavey School of Business, cites other research showing that heterogeneous groups are less susceptible to "group-think" and allow members to ask tough questions.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324784404578145550410951498.html

Women doing well in math? That is not news, is it?! Full study to be published in Accounting Horizons soon.