Mixed-Gender Fund Management Teams

Mint reported this research in page 13 of 15th October 2007

In the paper titled "The Impact of Work Group Diversity on Performance: Large Sample Evidence from the Mutual Fund Industry" authors Stefan Ruenzi, Michaela Baer, and Alexandra Niessen came to the conclusion that mixed gender fund management teams are underperforming single fund managers, and single gender fund management teams. The study covered the period from January 1996 to the end of 2003 and average of 300 funds per year.

The think the relative poor performance can be traced in large part to the poorer communication that often exists in mixed teams.

The Mint's reporter discussed the research results with woman fund managers of india Swatim Kulkarni and Gautami Desai of UTI MF and Jyoti Vaswani of Aviva Life Insurance. They are not agreeing to the views expressed in the study