Research has been done and it has been “determined that both men and women can be leaders.” (Gender and Leadership) Which can been seen in some leadership roles but when we look at large corporations we would see that many of the people holding leadership positions are male. (Gender and Leadership) When seeing that I can’t help but think what I was told as a young girl that I could grow up and be anything I wanted. Could I be the leader of a large corporation, while it is possible it hasn’t happened as often. Men are still holding many of those leadership positions.
What makes men so successful in these roles and why aren’t we seeing more women starting to fill these roles? If I look back on my working life many of my managers were men, which is probably because “a manager was defined by attributes thought of as masculine.” (Gender and Leadership) I believe a leader gives off a sense of power, they are the ones that are making the decisions and when I think about that power I think about a male. This is from years for working my first job was at a big box store where almost all the way up was dominated by men. They held the power and they were the leaders. After that though I had a whole different experience. I was recruited to work at another big box store and the store manager and district manager were women. This was a change for me but but was something that I embraced, having a women in a leadership role is what I felt like we needed. Though after just a short amount of time I could tell that some other people did not feel the same. The District managers name was Katie and she was strict and like things done by the book. When she approached you she was direct about what she wanted and why. She was different than any other women leader I had in the past. Women leaders tend to use participative style of leadership but Katie took a more male approach with a directive style. Which this was something that some people did not like because she “led in stereotypically masculine styles.” (Gender and Leadership) Many of the people had worked under men with a similar style but Katie was seen in a negative light because of the way she lead her team. Watching her lead a team just made me think more about women and how they fit into leadership roles.
“Female and male leaders do not differ in actual effectiveness.” (Gender and Leadership) Meaning that women such as Katie are in every way as capable as men of leading a team to success. Since women are capable of being good leaders I had to wonder why they are missing in many leadership roles. It was mentioned that maybe women have had time to make to the tops of these large corporations but I can’t think that is true because “26% of students in the Harvard MBA program have been women since 1986,” (Gender and Leadership) with that being said these women would have had time to reach their career goals and obtain a job in these larger corporations leadership teams. There are barriers that women face and that could be part of the reason that women are not at the top of these large companies.
These barriers are broken down into three categories. The first one is organizational barriers; such as that women have to put in more effort. For example when Katie was trying to move up in the company she had to put more effort into the job. The reason is because women need to be able “to overcome stereotypes.” (Gender and Leadership) If these women are able to face these stereotypes and overcome them they still have many other challenges. One other challenges would be knowing who to look up too. When you think about business one might see a leader that is helping build people up. Showing them what needs to be done. In these situations these are mentors; “those that have male mentors usually achieve more than those with female mentors and females are less likely to have male mentors.” (Gender and Leadership) Which means that companies are not even giving women the chance to learn from somebody that had done the job and females are not able to actually get that first hand information. One of the final things that women have to worry about when in he workforce which is the work-home conflict. When thinking about women working we realize that many more women work today than in the past. Women like Katie that are determined to achieve her goals and make sure that she is also showing the people following her what they need to do. She also had to do more; raise her family. She had three kids at home and she needed to make sure that she was able to be with them and work. I once talked her about her children; when a lady that worked there said she was going to be out in maternity leave; Katie talked to me about how she was a stay at home mom before she came back to work. This is where some women are not able to balance home life and work life which creates another barrier that a women has to go through in order to do well.
Katie is an example of a women that she been able to raise up and achieve the goals that have been put into place. She knows that she wants to keep moving up that district manager is not enough for her and she try’s to do of that while keeping her home life straight and worrying about her kids. She is a perfect example of somebody that is working hard to get what she wants, raising her kids and overcome all of the obstacles put in her way.
Gender and Leadership. Retrieved from Pennsylvania State University website:
https://psu.instructure.com/courses/192533
Matt Murray says
Good evening,
I really enjoyed reading your blog post. You were able to apply some of the concepts we’ve learned in class to your very relevant personal experiences with gender in the workforce. I found it interesting how you described the leadership style of your former manager, Katie, as male leadership (meaning straightforward and task-focused). Though this seems to be a common misconception, there is not much actual evidence to show that women tend to lead from a relationship rather than mission focus (Northouse, 2016). As you alluded to, though, woman do tend to be more participatory in their leadership than men (Northouse, 2016). Though I do wonder how much the particulars of a the situation play a role in this leadership style decision. Maybe because of the store environment, Katie found a more direct approach was the most effective and it had nothing to do with gender roles.
I think another major issue that you hit on is representation regarding woman in positions of power. Regardless of how many studies are conducted, the perception of the majority plays the biggest role in how leadership effectiveness is judged. If more men are in positions of power (as they are), then they are the ones that are setting the bar for success. In a real Catch-22 situation, a masculine leadership style was thought of as most effective, but a woman leading in that manner was considered less effective by male subordinates (Northouse, 2016). I can’t imagine the mental struggles a woman must go through if she is determined to develop as a leader, especially in the world of business. Not only is she fighting against the biases and stereotypes of her coworkers, she must combat her own biases and try to find what leadership style fits her the best and is viewed by others as effective and appropriate. As the representation of women in these positions becomes more commonplace, hopefully the public perception hurdle will become more manageable.
Ironically, the transformational leadership approach has become more and more popular, even though it focuses on relationship-building and acknowledging emotions, two areas that are most commonly thought of as feminine (Northouse, 2016). Do you think the popularity of this leadership theory will assist woman into gaining a foothold in leadership positions? Or do you still think there are certain fields that are going to remain a “boy’s club”, at least for the foreseeable future?
Have a great week,
Matt Murray
References
Northouse, P.G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications.