Female representation at senior organizational levels lags well behind male representation. We investigate whether there is a positive nonlinear relationship between female board representation and female executive representation: the trickle‐down effect. We investigated 1,387 organizations listed on the Australian Securities Exchange between 2003 and 2012 and found the hypothesized nonlinear trickle‐down effect operating between board and executive levels. The trickle‐down effect was strongest after 1 year but still significant after 5 years. We investigated two potential moderators of the effect: organization size and gender diversity recommendations. There was no moderating effect of organization size, but contrary to expectations, gender diversity recommendations slowed the trickle‐down effect. Our findings suggest that organizations can address the paucity of women at senior organizational levels by starting at the top. Specifically, organizations making multiple appointments of female board members should expect improvements in female executive representation. However, the signaling and advocacy opportunities afforded by female board appointments may be less potent in the context of external interventions. Our findings contribute to the ongoing policy debate about the value of regulatory interventions to increase female representation at senior organizational levels and highlight the need for research on the unintended consequences of these interventions across national contexts.

Organisational strategies to achieve gender diversity have tended to focus on ‘bottom‐up’ approaches such as mentoring or leadership training. We investigate an alternative ‘top‐down’ approach: the trickle‐down effect. We integrate theories from the psychology and management literatures to hypothesise a positive relationship between female representation at two levels. Data from 20 departments in an Australian public service were collected for the period 2002–2012. Female executive representation in 1 year had a positive impact on female representation in the executive feeder group in the following year. The trickle‐down effect was strongest in the first 2 years, but still significant after 5 years. We investigated two moderators, department size and gender diversity target. The effect was stronger in large departments. Surprisingly, the gender diversity target strengthened the trickle‐down effect only when female executive representation was under 15%. Our finding of a trickle‐down effect suggests public sector departments should consider appointing women to senior roles as a top‐down strategy for increasing organisational gender diversity.

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