A law professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, in an interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, said the fact that relatively few women serve on the boards of directors for gaming operator poses a strong risk to operators an their shareholders.
Responding to the fact that Las Vegas’ six largest gaming employers have a total of only eight women among 57 directors—with only two with female board representation above 21.2 percent—Benjamin Edwards, associate professor at UNLV’s Boyd Law School said the paucity of women in board positions makes the kinds of sexual misconduct allegations that brought down Wynn Resorts Chairman Steve Wynn more likely, and makes the public less likely to spend money at their casinos.
“Not having enough women sitting on your board is a material risk to shareholders,” said Edwards. “It’s a particularly strong risk in a corporation where the brand and ability to motivate the public to spend money at their business may be tied to their reputation.”
Hilary Sale, a law and management professor at Washington University in St. Louis, added that more female representation on boards is a way of managing risk of sexual misconduct allegations.
“In today’s world, every board of directors should be asking in the boardroom, ‘Do we have risk around sexual harassment?’” said Sale.
“In light of what’s been happening in this country over the last 4 and a half months in a very rapidly unfolding manner, one would expect either the full board or an appropriate committee of the board to ask, ‘How are we managing this? Do we have issues?’”
