I come across the topic of gender and leadership quite a bit and thought I would share what I found after researching this subject. The questions are always the same and it goes like this,

“Does gender (being male vs. female) affect your leadership styles/abilities at work?”

I want to help in dispelling the myths that are perpetuated throughout both the Internet as well as some (not so well-researched) literature. The following is a piece I researched and wrote about a month ago.

Overview

According to “Work in the 21st Century,” 99.6 percent of all top executives of Fortune 500 companies are men, while just 0.4 percent are women. Interestingly, the book “Leadership in Organizations,” states that there are no consistent findings on gender differences in leadership.

Considerations

The U.S. Department of Labor reports that women comprise 46.5 percent of the total U.S. workforce and are estimated to account for 47 percent of the labor force in 2016.

Leadership Styles

Frank Landy, Ph.D. and Jeffrey Conte, Ph.D., maintain in their book, “Work in the 21st Century,” that women tend to favor a democratic and participative leadership style, while men prefer an autocratic leadership style.

Misconception

Alice Eagly, Mary Johannesen-Schmidt and Marloes van Engen, in the July 2003 issue of “Psychological Bulletin,” argue women have an advantage over men in competing for leadership positions, and even suggested that women would make better executives.

Warning

Gary Yukl, Ph.D., cautions in his book, “Leadership in Organizations,” that research on differences in gender and leadership effectiveness has been inconclusive. For this reason, he contends that gender is not a good predictor of leadership effectiveness and does not impact employees or the workplace.

Expert Advice

According to Gary Powell, Ph.D., in the August 1990 issue of “Academy of Management Executive,” there are no differences between male and female managers. In addition, Dr. Powell says that any “sex differences that have been found are few, found in laboratory studies more than field studies, and tend to cancel each other out. (p. 71)” In short, gender does not affect leadership in business.

References

• “Academy of Management Executive”; One More Time: Do Female and Male Managers Differ?; Gary Powell; August 1990
• “Leadership in Organizations”; Gary Yukl; 2010
• “Psychological Bulletin”; Transformational, Transactional, and Laissez-Faire Leadership Styles: A Meta-Analysis Comparing Women and Men; Alice Eagly, Mary Johannesen-Schmidt and Marloes van Engen; July 2003
• “U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics”; Employment and Earnings, 2008 Annual Averages and the Monthly Labor Review; November 2007
• “Work in the 21st Century: An Introduction to Industrial and Organizational Psychology”; Frank J. Landy and Jefferey M. Conte; 2007

The Institute for Corporate Productivity (i4cp) has a nice article on what separates high performing organizations from low performing ones. i4cp’s research consistently indicates that companies that excel in the following five domains are typically high performers:

Note: Each point starts with i4cp’s research & wording, followed by my comments & analysis in italics.

1. Strategy

High-performing organizations have strategies that are more consistent, clearly communicated and well thought out. They are more likely than other companies to say that their philosophies are consistent with their strategies and their performance measurements mirror their strategies.

I’ve discussed before about John Kotter’s 8-Stage Change Process, one of which is developing a vision and strategy for your organization.

2. Leadership

High-performing organizations have leadership that is clear, fair and talent-oriented. Those leaders are more likely to promote the best people for the job, to make sure performance expectations are well known and consistent with the strategy, and to be committed to developing their people.

Gary Yukl (2010) in “Leadership in Organizations” shares 10 essences of effective leadership. Among these, Dr. Yukl says some effective leadership functions include developing and empowering people, promoting social justice and morality (the idea of fairness & compassion), and creating alignment on objectives and strategies.

3. Talent

There is a commitment to the right talent within the organization, and while employees are treated as unique individuals, the organization takes a holistic approach to managing and making decisions based on data-driven information. This begins with a strategic approach to workforce planning. It entails looking at the organization from an outside-in perspective that identifies the business model components and areas that drive value and then determines what the organization needs.

It’s not surprising research has found that staffing practices are related to organizational performance (Landy & Conte, 2007).

4. Culture

The culture is strong in all the right ways, and employees are more likely to think the organization is a good place to work. Employees not only adapt well to change, they embrace it. High performers also emphasize a readiness to meet new challenges and are committed to innovation.

In “Implementing Change and Overcoming Resistance,” I talked about the culture within an organization. Organizational culture has a strong impact on employees, and in some cases the leaders.

In fact, with older, more established organizations, the organizational culture affects the leadership team rather than the other way around (Yukl, 2010).

5. Market

High-performing organizations have a strong market focus and go above and beyond for their customers. They are organized internally around what’s best for the customer, they think hard about customers’ future and long-term needs, and their strategy is based on customer data. And they are more likely to see customer information as the most important factor for developing new products and services.

In an earlier post titled “3 Tips on Leadership,” I shared sage advice from leadership expert, Warren Bennis. Dr. Bennis says that leaders need to have contextual intelligence. That is, they need to understand their own organization (from the inside out) as well as the larger business industry.

References

Bielaszka-DuVernay, C. (2009, April 13). Avoid mistakes that plague new leaders: An interview with Warren Bennis. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from http://hbr.org

Institute for Corporate Productivity (i4cp). New i4cp Study: The Five Domains of High-Performance Organizations. Retrieved from http://www.pr.com/press-release/206443

Landy, F. J. & Conte, J. M. (2007). Work in the 21st Century: An Introduction to Industrial and Organizational Psychology (2nd Ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.

Oakes, K. (2010, January 29). The Five Domains of High Performance. Retrieved from http://www.totalpicture.com/shows/trendwatcher/kevin-oakes-high-performance.html

Yukl, G. (2010). Leadership in organizations (7th Ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ:
Prentice Hall.

In “Evidence-Based Training Methods: A Guide for Training Professionals,” Ruth Clark (2010) states that one of the biggest myths perpetuated by training professionals is accommodating different learning styles.

“The learning style myth leads to some very unproductive training approaches that are counter to modern evidence of what works…The time and energy spent perpetuating the various learning style myths can be more wisely invested in supporting individual differences that are proven to make a difference—namely, prior knowledge of the learner.” (Clark, 2010, p. 10)

In her book, Dr. Clark cites a research study (by Kratzig and Arbuthnott) conducted with college students about learning styles. A group of college students were asked to do 3 things: (1) Rate their own learning style as visual, auditory, or kinesthetic; (2) Each student took a learning style test that puts them into the visual, auditory, or kinesthetic category; and (3) Each student was administered three tests to measure visual, auditory, or kinesthetic memory.

If the idea about learning style were true, we would expect someone who considers himself a visual learner to score higher on the visual part of the learning style test and have better visual recall.

“However, when all of the measures were compared, there were absolutely no relationships! A person who rated themselves an auditory learner was just as likely to score higher on the kinesthetic scale of the learning style test and show best memory for visual data. The research team concluded that ‘in contrast to learning style theory, it appears that people are able to learn effectively using all three sensory modalities’ (Kratzig & Arbuthnott 2006, 241)” (Clark, 2010, p.11).

Another example she provides is in explaining how something works. We normally think that a video or animated cartoon would be the best way to show how something works, but Dr. Clark says we would be wrong. Instead, according Dr. Clark, evidence shows that “when teaching how things work, a series of still visuals can be as good as or better than animations for learning (Ketter, 2010, p. 56).

Dr. Clark explains that the reason for this is because animation overloads our brains because there’s just too much visual information for us to process. “[But] a series of still visuals…can be reviewed and revisited at the learner’s preferred pace” (Ketter, 2010, p. 56).

Fad or Fact: Individuals with visual learning styles learn best from lessons with graphics.

FAD. There is no evidence for the prevalent myth of learning styles such as visual learners and auditory learners. Perpetuating this myth detracts resources from more productive proven training methods.

Source: “Evidence-Based Training Methods: A Guide for Training Professionals” (Clark, 2010, p. 22)

Wow! I love solid evidence to dispel the misconceptions we sometimes hold onto. As a trainer, I’m thankful for Dr. Clark’s evidence-based research.

References

Clark, R.C. (2010). Evidence-Based Training Methods: A Guide for Training Professionals. Alexandria, VA: ASTD Press.

Ketter, P. (2010). Evidence-Based Training Methods: Toward a Professional Level of Practice. T+D, 64(4), 54-58.