Gender of firm leadership, audit committee gender diversity and audit quality through the lens of audit fee: a Ghanaian insight

Purpose This study aims to examine how woman leadership (i.e., woman board chairperson, woman chief executive officer (CEO) and board gender diversity) affects audit fee and also ascertained the interactive effect of woman leadership and gender diversity on audit committee on audit fee. Design/methodology/approach The study applied ordinary least square and fixed-effect estimators on the data of 21 universal banks in Ghana for the period 2010–2021 to estimate the empirical results. Findings It is revealed that under the leadership of women (woman CEO and board gender diversity), higher external audit quality is ensured as higher audit fee is paid. Interestingly, it was found that with the presence of women on the audit committee, the integrity of internal controls and internal audit procedures are enhanced, which leads to quality financial reporting, calls for lower audit effort, hence lower audit fee. Practical implications The result indicates that firms can rely on the leadership of women in ensuring quality external audit and quality financial reporting, which ultimately helps to minimize the information risk to all stakeholders. Originality/value The paper contributes to extant literature by establishing that, under the leadership of women in banking entities from a developing country context, external audit quality and financial reporting are achieved.