The influence of digital transformation on business performance: Evidence of the women-owned companies

Abstract

Taking into account that female-owned companies are an emerging economic force, this paper is discussing the phenomena of digital transformation from the gender perspective. In the first part, we present the definition of digital transformation and overview of literature that was used. In addition to this, the stages of the digital transformation process are highlighted, as well as potential biases which companies could face, but also the benefits arising from the process of digital transformation and the tools used to identify the existing digital gap in companies. Furthermore, certain key characteristics of women-led businesses that we consider, at the same time, to be factors that enable faster digitization are presented. The third part is a discussion of the results obtained by statistical analysis. The paper uses a simple OLS regression analysis to test the impact of digital transformation on women-owned companies’ performance, as well as a T-test of independent samples to identify potential differences in business indicators, depending on the number of years a company has been undergoing digital transformation. Research indicates that there is a positive impact of digital transformation on the performance of women-owned businesses. Also, it was confirmed that there is a significant difference in the level of product and service quality, product and service development capacity, productivity, and overall performance levels between enterprises undergoing digital transformation for less than two years and those who have been in the process for more than two years in favor of the latter. Finally, we summarize the findings of the research, concluding that digital transformation is a chance to improve the business performance of a group of businesses that are considered to have limited access to markets and sources of funding, such as women-owned businesses.