Women may have a difficult path ahead of them if their dream is to find leadership success within a male dominated industry such as the technology industry. Eagly & Karau (2002) found that women in power are viewed in a negative way whether they have more masculine or feminine leadership styles. A woman who adopts a feminine leadership style will be seen as less effective and less qualified than masculine leaders. If she adopts a masculine style of leadership, it’s likely she will be disliked by many because they are not acting within their gender role.
Many of the tech companies we know today were started by men and nearly the entire executive teams are male. It’s not been in managerial positions long enough, they lack experience (Ragins, Townsend, & Mattis, 1998), and are less suitable, qualified, and less confident (Heilman, 1997; Morrison, 1992; Morris, 1998).
The following statistics shared on Business Insider (2013) and Time (2015) provide evidence to the three explanations offered by Northouse (2013) as to why mostly men populate the leadership world. Recently Google has been in the spotlight for a recent report showing a major lack of diversity within the company. Only 30% of Google’s 56,000 employees were women in January 2015. Less than 30% of employees are women at LinkedIn and Reddit. Less than 25% of managers and officers at Dell, eBay, Intel, Cisco, and Ingram Micro are women. According to Eagly, Karau, & Makhijani (1995), women and men do not differ in leadership effectiveness. So why, then, the major gender gap?
References
Dickey, M. (2013, July 15). 23 Statistics That Prove Men Dominate The Tech World. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
Eagly, A., & Karau, S. (2002). Role Congruity theory of prejudice toward female leaders. Psychological Review, 109(3), 573-598.
Eagly, A., Karau, S., & Makhijani, M. (1995). Gender and the effectiveness of leaders: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 111, 3-22.
Heilman, M. (1997). Sex discrimination and the affirmative action remedy: The role of sex stereotypes. Journal of Business ethics, 16, 877-889.
Kokalitcheva, K. (2015, June 1). Google’s Workplace Diversity Still has a Long Way to Go. Retrieved August 3, 2015.
Northouse, P.G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Los Angeles: Sage Publications.
Ragins, B., Townsend, B., & Mattis, M. (1998). Gender gap in the executive suite: CEOs and female executives report on breaking the glass ceiling. Academy of Management Executive, 12(1), 28-42.
Justin Sardis
Psych 485
August 4th, 2015
Leadership & Diversity Blog Comment
After reading this post, I absolutely agree with much of the material you’ve
mentioned. You’ve definitely supported your perspective since you’ve used empirical
evidence from multiple references, which demonstrates to the reader that your thoughts
on the subject are valid, reliable, and are not just from personal experiences you’ve
encountered. I also agree with your perspective on this topic because an author by the
name of Peter Northouse has mentioned how frequently the “masculinity-femininity”
issue arises, in addition to how some people are prejudice against people of the opposite
gender, and prejudice against others who aren’t the same gender, race or ethnicity as them
(Northouse, 2013, p. 420). Furthermore, another reason why I agree with your perspective
is that an immediate family member of mine has been in the technology industry for 30
years and on numerous occasions, the lack of diversity is a topic that comes up when him
and I have spoken about the industry. Even though the references you’ve provided have
displayed that it is quite challenging for females to move up the ladder in the technology
industry, females have definitely been able to do so in various other industries.
Since you’ve used Business Insider as one of your references, I’ve read various articles
on Business Insider, which have presented that there are women that have started up a
technology-related company or a company in general, and they’ve made a fortune.
Therefore, I’m certain that there are references out there that provide contradicting
information about this subject, but the lack of diversity does exist to some extent. In
addition, you’ve also mentioned information from a reference about how there isn’t a
difference in how effective male leaders are from female leaders, but I’ve learned in
numerous courses that I’ve taken that there are differences. Hence, I do agree with most of
the material you’ve expressed in your post, but there are a couple of topics that I disagree
with to a certain extent.
Reference
1. Northouse, P. (2013). Leadership: Theory and practice (6th ed.). Los Angeles: Sage
Publications.
It is very interesting to see the lack of women in the tech world. But it could it be the lack of interest of women that are into tech stuff? It’s interesting to see the portrayal of people that are into tech material in the media. The media portrays constantly those who are tech capable as those with bad hygiene, males, long hair, obese and socially awkward. Could this be a deterrent to women to get into the tech fields? As stated above by Alexys, women are GREAT at handling multiple things at once, and I believe in a statistics that I read are much more capable then men are at doing so. This topic is very interesting and can bring up many ethical concerns in these tech companies with why their are such few women in the tech world. As, I stated before this stem from the media portraying only men at being good with technical stuff and see women as inferior to the tech world. This is a very good topic and concern that you bring up with women in the work force! Keep up the good work and hope to see more about this topic!
Shocking trend especially in the tech world…generally speaking it is easier to accept if it the military, construction, hard labor and politics, but in the tech world?? Your post really surprised me as I blindly thought, without doing any research, that women would have a better opportunity at leveling the “playing field” in an industry that does not require “physical labor or a strong appearance” and mostly “brain power.” I suppose that this is a good analysis regarding the imbalance of women across the board and provides proof that even in 2015, women continue to be viewed as second rate when it comes to taking the reins of “Leadership.” Ironically in my job (Military diplomacy) there are two female Colonels who “blow the doors off” of any male officer I have had in this career field. I am not sure what it is, but in my experience, in this career field, in my 10 years of doing Security Cooperation and Assistance, it has been the women that have been the shining light for leadership – It just may be that women generally think in broad terms and men think inline and up/down fashion. In this line of work there are multiple challenges that happen at the same time….women are good at handling multiple things at one time…….just my observation and opinion!
Alexys Scott