Assessing Italian B-Corps Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion and its Linkage with Financial Performance

Past studies have investigated the relationship between CSR aspects and financial performance, without a deep exploration of Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) impacts on performance. Despite the growing attention of academic literature on D&I, a lack of standards and practices regarding managerial and measurement tools for this dimension still exists. This hinders the understanding of how D&I policies may lead to organizational features that ultimately enhance business profitability. Given these premises, this study explores a specific typology of organization (B-Corps) because of their engagement with social issues, D&I included. This study contributes to the current debate on D&I and draws regulators’ attention to such aspects by providing evidence of the relationship between D&I policies and financial performance. It also aims to take part into the scientific debate by discussing how the B Lab approaches D&I measurement and scoring.