Women’s leadership and sustainable business performance in Moroccan SMEs

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) drive economic development in emerging economies, where women’s entrepreneurial leadership contributes to sustainable business growth aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In Morocco’s unique socioeconomic context, where traditional business practices coexist with modernization efforts, examining women’s leadership provides critical insights into gender-inclusive development pathways for North African emerging markets. This study examines how women’s leadership influences SME performance in Morocco’s private sector, contributing to economic sustainability and gender equality objectives. Using data from 598 micro-, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) in the 2023 World Bank Enterprise Surveys, we employ propensity score matching (PSM) methodology to establish causal relationships between women’s leadership and firm performance. Our findings reveal that women-led MSMEs achieve significantly higher annual sales, with performance improvements of 9.3 percent to 12.7 percent across different matching approaches. Women-led SMEs exhibit superior performance through investments in research and development and formal employee training programs. SMEs with international quality certifications show higher propensity for women’s leadership, indicating correlation between global competitiveness and gender-inclusive management practices. While PSM addresses observable selection bias, potential limitations include unmeasured confounders and reverse causality, which we discuss in detail. Promoting women’s entrepreneurial leadership can simultaneously advance gender equality and sustainable economic growth (SDGs 5 and 8).