In my experience in leadership and working with leadership there are several things that have remained constant and they are the amount of women in leadership roles and the level of leadership that they are able to rise to. I have worked for two large corporations in the past 15 years and both of them have been male dominant when it comes to upper level management. While they both have been male dominant they have been equal in terms of percentages with regards to diversity of race and culture.
What I have found more interesting is that even though upper level management is male dominant, middle level management had a larger percentage of women in leadership roles than would be expected. This left me to wonder why has there not been more women promoted to the upper levels management and out of the middle ranks.
I have learned over time what it means to have work-life balance. Work-life balance to women that I have worked with in the past meant that they went to work to find their professional ceiling and the rest of their lives meant taking care of their families and possibly others. This to them meant that their time dedicated to work was limited and often this stopped their progression up the corporate ladder. I think this is best described in terms of women take care and men take charge (Hoyt& Chemers, 2008). Although this is a real stereotype, it was real life for many women that I have worked with.
I think that in order for there to be more diversity in terms of women in leadership the partners in their lives need to readjust their perspective on what it means to be supportive. I have worked with many brilliant women who I have admired their work ethic and overall leadership ability but have always been left wondering why have they not achieved more.
references
Hoyt, C.L. & Chemers, M.M. (2008). Social Stigma and leadership: A long climb up a slippery ladder. In C.L. Hoyt, G.R. Goethals,& D.R. Forsyth (Eds.), Leadership at the crossroads: Leadership and psychology (Vol. 1, pp. 165-180). Westport, CT: Praeger.
Kenneth John Dicob says
Thank you for your post. I also wrote in my blog, a little bit about women in leadership roles. Northouse (2015) explains that emotional intelligence has to do with our emotions and thinking, and the interplay between the two. This type of intelligence is concerned with the ability to understand emotions and apply this understanding to life’s tasks. The premise suggested by this framework is that people who are more sensitive to their emotions and the impact of their emotions on others will be leaders who are more effective. This made me think, then why aren’t women in more leadership roles? Most people say women are not because they are too emotional or lack the ability to separate from a problem they are handling. But if emotional intelligence is trait of a leader, then it seems that women would move right up the ladder.
Angela Starr Darchuk says
In my career I am lucky enough to work with some very educated women. Even though they are very educated and can handle leading a family, career and other outside interests being a leader doesn’t translate to the office. This could be for several reasons. First, they may have a harder time speaking up in a male dominated work force. Second, their personality traits may not transfer over to a business environment; like it does in their personal environment. (Northouse, pp. 19) Third, Upper management may have specific feelings about women in leadership roles.
The women I work with, including myself, have the opportunity to show that we can not only be great managers by producing order and consistency but we can lead by producing change and movement in our companies. (Northouse, pp. 14) It is unfortunate that more women are not in leadership roles.
I completely agree with your assessment that women wonder why they are not achieving more. However, maybe it’s up to us as women to step up and make ourselves more seen and heard. It takes not only good education to be a leader it takes assertiveness and positive energy to make things happen for yourself. This is know as having an extroversion personality trait, which is known as the most important trait of a leader. (Northouse, pp.27)
Northouse, Peter G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and practice. 7th ed. Sage Publications, pp. 1-42
Kevin M Mcbreen says
Women in Leadership:
I have spent most of my career working for a small company in the male dominated field of Engineering / Construction. However, for the past (4) four years I have been working as a consultant for a large company with many women in a middle management role just as you described. Last semester I took a class about work-life-balance and the topic of life support came up. I do think that in some cases it is just a stereotype that women have hit the ceiling with their career, because if they had a more balanced support system they would have been able to achieve a higher level of management in any organization.