Women and Leadership

Women and Leadership

 

o    Gender refers to way in which meaning and evaluations are associated with sex by members of a culture.

o    The degree with which Males and Females are expected to behave differently, treated differently, and are valued differently has little to do with sex (biology) and everything to do with gender (learned beliefs)

o    Learned beliefs can easily be misleading when there are only two categories in a set (female/male or masculine/feminine). There are three cognitive distortions with bi-polar categories.

·         People's thinking become simplified because of the belief  that everyone must fit into a specific category.

·         The categories also seem to imply that everyone within a category is identical.

·         Many people erroneously tend to value one category as more superior than the other.

o    Although many executives and managers refer to believe that organizations are objective about merit and gender neutral, the data from research shows that most work places use gender as the basis for many decisions (Hale, 1996).

o    Ongoing research has indicated continued dilemmas for women leaders who seek to balance work demands with personal life (Ensher, Murphy, Sullivan, 2002)

o    The application of this section has three benefits

·         Can help organizations that have experienced difficulties in retaining women.

·         It can inform women of what they need to do to develop as leaders.

·         It can inform men of the subtle patterns enacted everyday in the work place that impedes progress.

o    A study found that males did well under cooperative conditions while females did well under competitive conditions. The female participants were more concerned with the feelings of other participants than the males were. The females spent more time and effort to get to know the others in their groups and perhaps felt that those interpersonal relationships were more important than the game and its outcomes. But why, you might ask, did this make them less able to cooperate with each other. The answer lies in the nature of the game. Winning may be more important to males than to females, whether it is as a group over other groups or as an individual over others in the group. In order for the group to effectively cooperate it was necessary that uncooperative behavior be stopped quickly. When working together to solve a problem under time pressure, males are pretty good at suspending concern for feelings and focusing on the task. Females on the average are less willing or able to do that. There is a general belief that women are more likely than men to adopt a participative or democratic style of leadership. Women seem to prefer working in cooperative situations rather than competitive ones.

 

Overview of research trends

Researchers over the past 20 years, have focused on three main questions:

a.       Can women be leaders?

                     i.            The answer of course is, Yes. Some interesting demographics.

1.       135 Million people employed in the US. 46.6% are women (2001).

2.       Women  earned .76 cents for every dollar earned by men in 2001.

3.       Women filled `5.7% of corporate officer including 7.1% of CFO, 16.1 of general counsels.

4.       5.2% of top-earning corporate officers were filled by women.

5.       12.4% of seats held in Fortune 500 corporate directors.

6.       6 Female CEO for Fortune 500 companies and 11 female CEOs of Fortune 500 & 1000.

7.       44% of small businesses in US (20.4 million) are owned by women.

8.       5% of venture capitalist and 3% of government contracts are awarded to women owned businesses.

9.       12% of state governorship. 13% in US Senate. 14% of US House of representatives.

10.   In 1998, Fortune profiled 50 women leaders.

11.   African American women currently represent the largest group of color in management positions and are surpassing African American Men in Executive/Managerial positions.

12.   Women inclusion in leadership has increased over the last few decades, but does not reflect their overall proportion of labor force.

13.   Enhanced Productivity, competitive advantage, and financial performance, are three of the reasons why developing and promoting women leaders are in the best interest of employers. (Barney, 1997) - Capacity to optimize the use of the internal resources.

14.   Underutilized women and people of color are major sources of untapped value that can enhance organization's creativity, change efforts, team work, and financial performance (Appold, Siengthai & Kasarda, 1998)

b.      Do male and females differ in their behavior and effectiveness in organizations?

                     i.            The purpose of this question shifted many times. Sometimes to research equality, other times is to understand impact of gender on leadership.

                   ii.            Recent research has used meta-analysis (set of statistical procedures that for analyzing all studies to determine the overall trends)

                  iii.            Meta-Analyses in the last 15 years indicate that assuming differences in behavior, cognition could lead to erroneous conclusions. A Meta-Analyses of 160 studies concluded that there is only one difference (Women used a more participative or democratic style and less autocratic or directive style than men did.)

                 iv.            Both Men and Women emphasized task accomplishment when the setting was numerically dominated by leaders of their own sex.

                   v.            82 studies did not found that females and males did not differ in effectiveness. (Dobbins & Platz, 1986; Donnell & Hall, 1980; Powel, 1993)

                 vi.            Another meta-analysis found that female and make leaders are evaluated differently (Eagly, Makhijani, & Klonsky, 1992) which affect the impact of management training.

1.       Both Female and Male leaders were evaluated equally favorably when they used a stereotypically feminine style (democratic )

2.       Only female leaders were evaluated unfavorably when they used a masculine leadership style (Autocratic or directive)

3.       Women were particularly devalued when they worked in a male dominated setting.

                vii.            Another study found that females and males leaders differ in:

1.       The length of time they need to go to get promoted

2.       The need to adapt their behavior at work

3.       Amount of support they tend to receive at work

4.       The impact of family variables on career development.

              viii.            A theory based on sex differences in social behavior (Eagly, 1987) proposes that people are generally expected to engage in activities and actions congruent with their culturally defined gender roles.

                 ix.            Comparison of leader roles favored men over women when three conditions were true:

1.       When the setting was male dominated (especially military)

2.       When a high percentage of subordinates were male.

3.       When the role was seen as more congenial to men in terms of self assessed competence, interest, low requirement for cooperation, high requirement for control.

                   x.            Comparison of leader roles favored women over men when these three conditions were reversed. In addition, women leaders were favored in middle management in business, education, and government or social services. Men were favored in entry level or supervisory positions especially in the military.

                 xi.            Eagly (1992) concluded that leadership roles maybe defined in a more masculine or feminine fashion depending on the organizational context of management. Across most sectors of the economy other than the military, women's effectiveness increased as they moved up the hierarchy and as cooperation rather than control was required.

                xii.            Three recent studies by Advanced Teamware, inc. conducted a study where 6000 people completed a questionnaire about 915 middle-upper managers. Of the 31 areas examines, women outperformed men in 28 including conflict resolution, work quality, adaptation to change, productivity, idea generation, and motivation of others. Men handled pressure and coped with frustration better than women did. Both groups scored equally on delegating authority.

              xiii.            Another study by (Saville & Holdsworth in New Zealand) conducted a study of 3000 managers. They found no differences on 30 attributes analyzed. However, they found that women emphasized planning and organizing work and an empathic approach.  They placed less emphasis on the need to win at all costs.

              xiv.            Generally speaking, women leaders tend to be more participative and less autocratic, more effective in middle management, and in situations requiring cooperation.

c.       Why do so few women leaders reach the top?

There are three common explanations.

1.       "Women absence from executive positions is a function of not having been in managerial positions long enough for natural career progression to occur.". There is data to support this.

2.       "Women lack general management or line experience" (Ragins et al, 1998). There is data to support this explanation. However, there are other studies that shows that top executives were not distinguished from middle management by their line experience, but by the breadth of positions and departments they worked in. The study also found that the longer managers served in line positions, the less likely they move into top management.

3.       "Women leaders are themselves the problem. They are either less suited for executive demands rather than men, unavailable because so few are sufficiently qualified, or lacking in self confidence. (Morris, 1998). This has been refuted by a large number of published research.

 

Recent studies have found that women's  slow progress to the top have been the focus of a "Glass Ceiling".  (Federal Glass Ceiling Commission, 1995). There are three broad categories:

 

1.       Organizational barriers

1. Higher standards of Performance and efforts for women have been reported in many studies (Mainiero, 1994; Morris, 1998)

2. Inhospitable corporate culture (Ragins et al, 1998). The culture,

1. Discourages balancing high career aspirations wit non work obligations

2. Communicate that women don't belong in executive positions.

3. Require that women accomplish major tasks without sufficient resources.

A study found that a males only organizational hierarchy hindered women's promotions into lower and middle management while having female leaders fostered women's promotions.

3.       Homophily - The tendency to prefer to work and interact with people who are similar demographically and attitudinally. Homophily can ease the initial interactions in a group, but can restrict creative thinking and balanced decision making (Cox, 1993). Since women of color differ in two demographic from European American men, they are more likely to experience marginalization at work (Bell et al, 1993).

4.       Organizations have limited the challenge of assignments given to women . In a study of 507 managers, both men and women were given opportunities to start new ventures and turn around businesses n trouble, but men were given higher levels of responsibilities. This reduced the potential of promotions for women.

5.       Another study of 2431 white collar employees, showed that both men and women promotions to middle management were fostered by enhancing human capital variables (education, training, and challenging work). Women's promotions were fostered by the presence of a woman in the hierarchy and hindered by the lack of one.  Their promotions to upper management were fostered by career encouragement. Men's promotions were unaffected by these variables.

2.       Interpersonal barriers

1. Refer to the obstacles that occur primarily in the context of a working relationship. Supportive relationships are especially important in women's leadership advancement.

2. Gender prejudice can take many forms and usually not conscious. The most basic preconceptions is that a good manager is inherently masculine.

3. Preconceptions that women are less competent means that women have to prove themselves repeatedly in each new situations.

4. Women must identify ad explicitly ask for challenging assignments rather than simply having such assignments offered to them.

5. Women perceived that a need to adapt their behavioral style so that men could avoid feeling intimidated. (Ragin et al, 1998)

6. Male leaders were positively evaluated when they behaved either cooperatively or autocratically. Women leaders were evaluated positively only when they behaved cooperatively. (Eagly et al. 1992).

7. Several studies documented that women experienced lower support in their careers than similarly employed men.

8. Informal networks are very important and yet studies shown that women leaders have either tended to be excluded or had to work harder to be included.

9. A critical relationship is mentoring. Studies in mentoring had pointed out that there is  dramatic impact on salaries of employees and that European American men were most likely to be the protégé.

10.   Women and men were likely to be mentors, but women were more likely to have same sex protégés.

11.   Bad mentoring can be worse than none at all (Ragins, Cotton, & Miller, 2000)

3.       Personal

1. Women leaders themselves have reported naïveté and lower political savvy as a barrier.

2. To mature organizationally, black women have adopted perseverance, willingness to change employers, and self generated developmental opportunities.

3. The most serious challenge for women leaders are the non-work obligations that they remain primarily responsible for in a household. Some studies found that the multiple roles that women play in work and non-work actually enhances their leadership skills.

4. The ability to balance the "have it all" need has been a frequent theme in women leaders. Some women have coped by purchasing domestic services, supportive or non-employed husband, or scaling back their families.

 

Strengths

o    Research on gender dynamics have made a roader impact on leadership. Improvements in the work places and in society occur only when unconscious patterns and beliefs are uncovered and recognized.

o    Considering the sex of leaders and employees can yield insights within the major theoretical traditions. There are many examples of this discussed in the various theories about situations and acceptable/non-acceptable behaviors.

o    Research in this area has contributed to the broader conversation in the US society about values and questions like this:

·         Do we prefer a work place that rewards talents or demographic characteristics?

·         Does profit matter more than people's well being?

·         Does work matter more than personal relationships?

·         Is merit consistently applied if one sex have to consistently work harder and received less pay and recognition?

 

Weaknesses 

o    The disadvantage of focusing on the individual's sex can become the only or the primary attribute identifying them rather than  one of the many attributes.

o    A serious issue in the research on sex and gender is the assumption that members of each category are identical in race, sexual orientation, age, etc. In fact most of the respondents to the surveys were European American Women.

 

Leadership instrument

The BSRI developed by Bem in 1974 has often been used to measure the self perceptions of gender role.   Another instrument that was developed by  Yost & Herbert in 1985 measures the attitudes toward women as managers (ATWAM)