Women leaders in no-win bind
By Andrea Kay
Many of the boldest and brightest women leaders walk around on eggshells. If you're assertive, people say you're too tough. If you're too collaborative, you're not tough enough. What's a woman leader to do?
This gender stereotyping not only puts women leaders in a daily no-win bind, but it's likely one reason only 15.6 percent of Fortune 500 corporate officers and 14.6 percent of their board directors are women.
That's one conclusion from the recent study, "The Double-Bind Dilemma for Women in Leadership: Damned if You Do, Doomed if You Don't," recently released by Catalyst, a research organization.
Companies don't realize how this gender stereotype bias affects leadership choice, with findings strongly suggesting that companies often underestimate and underutilize women's leadership talent, says Catalyst.
The study looked at perceptions from over 1,200 male and female senior executives in the U.S. and Europe and identified three "double-bind" dilemmas women leaders face:
If women leaders act consistent with gender stereotypes, they are seen as too soft. If they go against those stereotypes, they are seen as too tough.
They often must work twice as hard to achieve the same level of recognition as men for the same level of work and to prove they can lead.
One woman interviewed said that it seems as if she needs to show she can do something over and over before others believe she's really capable.
When women demonstrate traditionally valued leadership behaviors such as assertiveness, they tend to be seen as competent, but not as personable or well-liked, say the survey results. However, those who adopt a more stereotypically feminine style are liked, but they're not seen as having valued leadership skills.
It can be reassuring to know you are not the only one who may experience such "damned if you do, doomed if you don't" dilemmas. As a result, though, many of these women who want to be key leaders in their companies get fed up and leave. Some go off to start their own companies.
If you stay and strive for senior roles in your company, there's only so much an individual can do. Companies, though, can influence such negative effects of gender stereotypes, first by understanding that this phenomenon is not a "paranoid over-reaction," as one of my clients was told by her boss.
These biases exist and they play out ever so subtly in offices everywhere — including performance reviews where you may get ambiguous evaluation criteria and feedback like this that my female clients receive: "Needs to work on style and be less direct."
Companies can also train managers and employees about the origin and consequences of bias and inconsistencies between values and actual behavior, suggests Catalyst. Becoming aware is half the battle and helping others understand this phenomenon is a good place to begin.
E-mail Andrea Kay at andrea@andreakay.com.
