Organizational Demographics

The term organizational demographics has two meanings and research traditions. The first meaning and use concerns the demographic characteristics of individuals in organizational settings, whether within teams, subunits, or firms. Commonly examined characteristics include age, national origin, race, sex, and tenure in the job, team, or organization. The second use concerns the examination of the specific characteristics of organizations within societies, such as organizational age, industry sector, and organizational size. This use of organizational demographics emerged from the extension of the principles of population demography, which ordinarily relate to individuals, to the study of organizations. This entry focuses on the second use of organizational demographics and its relationship to corporate reputation. In particular, the organizational demographics of size, age, strategy, industry, and geographic origin are ...