Founders, Females, and the Covid-19 Pandemic: Crisis Responses of Business Leaders(CEIBS Working Paper, No. 024/2020/OBM/ENT, 2020)

Prior research has claimed that founders and managers differ in managing organizational crisis. Based on the entrepreneurship and psychology literature, this study investigates leaders’ distinct responses to the Covid-19 pandemic. Specifically, we explore potential differences between founders and managers’ perception of business challenges and opportunities during a crisis, whether they differ in their crisis response actions, and whether gender plays a moderating role. Based on a unique empirical dataset analyzing 331 crisis response strategies across founders and business leaders in China, our results identify (a) that founders do respond to crises differently than managers and (b) that gender plays a critical role. These insights contribute to the literature
on crisis management and extend prior literature exploring how individual characteristics can shape decision-making in organizations.