Exploring the influence of an entrepreneur’s gender on the quality of jobs they create

Job quality, and more explicitly the development of high-quality jobs, has been a priority on European policy-making agendas over the past decade. Consequently, entrepreneurship as a job creation strategy has received substantial attention. In particular, policy has prioritised increasing the number of female entrepreneurs, yet, concurrently there has been concern regarding declining job quality, particularly in feminised sectors. Despite the importance placed on these policies, there are cautions in the literature that a strategy focused on improving the number of jobs in the labour market does not necessarily create high quality jobs. While the number of jobs in the labour market have been increasing in Europe, so too have non standard work arrangements. These arrangements are considered to be characteristics of low quality jobs. The three aforementioned policies; job quality, entrepreneurship as a job creation strategy and female entrepreneurship, each have the potential to impact the quality of jobs being created in the labour market. Despite the interrelationship between entrepreneurship, female entrepreneurship, and job quality, not only do such policies appear to be operating largely independently, but there is a dearth of literature linking these issues explicitly. This study seeks to begin to address this issue by examining the relationship between an entrepreneur’s gender and the quality of jobs they create. A two phased mixed method approach to addressing the identified research gap was undertaken. Phase one, a quantitative phase, comprises of a survey of Irish entrepreneurs who are employers. Having identified differences in job quality between male and female owned businesses, a second phase, comprising of semi-structured interviews, identified factors that account for such differences. The findings of this study contribute to the literature on job quality in a number of ways. The primary contribution of this study is involving entrepreneurs as employers in the conversation on job quality. Furthermore, while finding that objectively job quality is poorer in female owned businesses, this study highlights that gender is not a primary issue in influencing job quality. Business context, namely whether a firm is considered high or low potential, emerged as having a greater influence on the quality of jobs business owners created. Additionally, this study has identified the absence of a comprehensive definition and approach to job quality in Irish policy. Having identified this weakness, this study argues that a modified version of the Eurofound (2012) Job Quality framework, which allows for different business contexts and employee needs, should be used. Such a framework will provide important descriptors that can signal, to business owners, important job quality dimensions to be considered when designing jobs in their organisations.