Gender Leadership

20 December 2011

Introduction

There is a lot of ambivalence on women’s leadership. If a woman is successful in

a male-dominated organization, she is considered competent, but is less liked than

equally successful men. On the other hand, if a woman is nice, she is liked but not

respected.

I have had the rare and unique privilege of commanding soldiers for nearly 38

years, and now leading schools where nearly 85 percent of the teachers are women. So

you can see I have a lot of experience on gender-related issues in leadership. For

starters, men and women are different and their styles of leadership are equally

different. Men are from Mars and women are from Venus!

Nearly all the literature on leadership is male-dominated. The Alpha male is

considered to be the dominant leadership model. Despite a quantum increase in female

employees in all work places, there has been no change in our approach to leadership

development. There have been two major impediments in development of female

leadership. Male egos find it difficult to accept female leaders; but paradoxically, women

largely favour male bosses. Moreover, women see themselves essentially as home-

makers and not leaders.

The Female Brain

The vast majority of discussions on female leadership is misinformed and lacks

neuro-scientific and genetic basis. It is, therefore, not surprising that several myths and

half-truths are making the rounds to the detriment of women leaders.

Male and female brains are not the same. I will briefly describe the uniqueness of

the female brain.

a. The female brain is deeply affected by massive hormones that change a

woman’s reality often from week to week. The three most important hormones

are estrogen or the mother of all hormones, its sister progesterone, and

oxytocin, which makes women more empathic than men.

b. As estrogen floods the female brain, women focus intensely on their

emotions, communication and relationships.

c. Women have 11 percent more neurons in their brain centres for hearing and

language. Moreover, the hippocampus which controls memory and emotions

is larger in the female brain. This means that women are better than men in

expressing their emotions and remembering details of past emotional details.

Consequently, women place greater reliance on relationships, possess greater

empathy, can read body language and faces with psychic efficiency, and have the

ability to defuse conflict.

Gender Leadership Characteristics

The hormonal differences between men and women impacts upon their

leadership preferences as under:

Transactional Leadership

Transformational

Hierarchical

Networking

Ends justify the means

Means are more important

Reason

Emotions

Rules

Relationship

Competition

Cooperation

Self interest

Group interest

Less empathic

More empathic

Withhold information

Share information

Ego Slows down unlearning

Unlearning is easier

Challenges in Workplace

Of all the challenges women face at the workplace, managing work-life balance

is the toughest - child care, domestic chores, single parenting, running the home, and

family responsibilities can be daunting. In turn these affect efficiency and commitment at

work. These challenges are often put forward as reasons for not engaging in self-

development.

Everyone faces problems of one kind or the other. An individual is born in

suffering, some more, some less. Suffering is a part of human reality. If life has

meaning, suffering too must have meaning. Suffering makes us stronger, more

determined and better. It takes us to greater heights of human existence and is,

therefore, not necessarily a bad thing.

I will argue that there is an urgent need to break out of this trap. The answer at

the workplace is not more professional development; the answer is more self-

development. Self-development leads to positivity, resilience, heightened self-esteem,

and awareness of one’s signature strengths. These emotional qualities are the

foundation for wellbeing and happiness. Empowered women are able to deal with their

personal problems better; they become better mothers, spouses, and great teachers in

school.

Self-development is the golden key. Self-development first, professional

development later.

The second challenge for women is to look upon themselves as leaders,

individuals, and persons having an identity. Over the millennium, women have

considered themselves as home-makers with the man of the house as the chief bread

earner. This changed long back. Female managers like to work in functional specialties

like HR rather than line management. They also prefer not to travel much. It is,

therefore, not surprising that women make up only 3 % CEOs and 18 % senior

managers in Fortune 500 companies.

A spinoff from the leadership factor is that many women managers look upon

their workplace position as another job to be done. There is no quest for higher learning

and greater professionalism.

The third challenge. A leader must be visionary regardless of gender.

Leadership is about transformation, about change. That comes from vision. No vision

means no leadership. Surveys reveal that women score low on envisioning - the ability

to recognize new opportunities and emerging market trends, and thereafter, developing

appropriate direction strategies. This appears to be a stumbling block in their journey to

the top.

There are three possible explanations for women being judged less visionary

than men. First, having nurtured their families for centuries, safety and security has

become paramount in a woman’s life. So it is natural for women to avoid taking risks,

and being less entrepreneurial than men. Second, since women get into detailing and

peripherals, they are not big picture thinkers. And thirdly, women are not comfortable

with envisioning the future. Leaders are required to present an inspiring narrative to

their followers about the future. On their part, women have the natural habit of

mastering details, and achieving quantifiable objectives. They are more comfortable

being known as no-nonsense persons, competent, and in control rather than being

visionary.

The fourth challenge is the glass-ceiling effect - unseen barriers that prevent

women from reaching the top rung of the corporate ladder. Undoubtedly, male egos,

male advocacy, and sexual discrimination are responsible for this. To make matters

difficult, high performing women do not receive sponsorship. They underestimate the

value of sponsorship and place their future in the hands of hard work. Sponsorship has

to be managed carefully as it can be mistaken for sexual interest.

There is another discriminatory factor that contributes to the glass-ceiling in a

subtle way. Men get promoted on their potential, whereas women are assessed on their

performance, thus slowing down their progress. In India, 45 % women believe that they

are treated unfairly in their workplace because of their gender. See Figure 1 below.

Figure 1: Perceived Gender Discrimination

Mentoring

Of all the strategies to develop high-potential women leaders, mentoring is

undoubtedly the best. Mentors are not sponsors; they do not play an advocacy role in

favour of their protégé. The aim of mentoring is more of self-actualization, level 5 in

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, and developing leadership competencies for the 21^st

century. I do not favour mentors coaching their mentees for professional development;

because there is a danger that mentoring can turn into sponsorship. I believe that is the

role of the CEO and other senior executives.

The selection of the mentor is the key to success. The mentor must possess a

balance of feminine and masculine traits - an integrated person. Women respond more

positively and proactively to such persons, and, therefore, there are greater chances of

the programme being successful.

The functions of a mentor would be:

a. Serve as a role model.

b. Focus on personal development and self-actualization including feedback.

c. Familiarize their mentees with the attributes of the female brain and the

role of hormones, and how they can be leveraged as leaders.

d. Create cognitive dissonance, to enable unlearning.

e. Increase mentee’s sense of competence and self-worth.

f. Assist in identifying “blind spots.”

g. Advise on how to overcome gender related obstacles.

The Way Ahead

There is no such thing as a unisex brain. Men and women are wired differently.

So let us not pretend that they are the same. To do so is doing disservice to women.

This I believe is the start point, to understand and cope with the challenges of

female leadership. I would say that several women would not have in-depth knowledge

about the effects of their various hormones. Ignoring the biological differences between

men and women and the pivotal role hormones play in female chemistry, also overlooks

the way women process thoughts and play out their emotions.

When women are asked what wishes they would like a fairy god mother to grant

them, the common answer is: “Joy in my life, a fulfilling relationship, and less stress with

more personal time.” Modern life makes these objectives difficult to achieve. This is a

pipe dream and women must gear themselves to face the hard realities of the 21^st

century. Likewise, men need to acquire many of the leadership traits of the 21^st century

that are predominantly feminine, like relationships, networking and collaboration. By

intensive training and mentoring it is possible to narrow the gap between the male

and female brain. The human brain is plastic and will respond to re-wiring.

Gender leadership should be placed high on the agenda of leadership

development. Issues that require brainstorming and debating are many, for example,

how to nurture women who display clear leadership potential? How to deal with

male biases against women leaders? The leadership track we have introduced is one

giant step in this direction; but we are looking for more ideas.

Conclusion

Man is bisexual. Unfortunately, men go through their lives suppressing their

feminity and women go through their lives suppressing their masculinity. When the two

merge into one the true leader is born - the unisex leader. Can we at least make a

move towards this direction?

Leadership is an art and a science like any other subject or aspect of life. In fact,

there are more intangibles in this domain, and this is why leadership training is exacting.

It places heavy demands and is not for the faint-hearted. The pace and competition in

life is awesome, leaders are expected to be accessible

24x7 and that blurs the

boundaries between home and work. There are intense demands on time too. Leaders

need thinking time, leaders realize that excessive hours at work eat into their personal

and social time, and leaders are required to make personal and family sacrifices.

Leadership generates great mental pressures and literally drains one’s emotional

energy at times.

Are you ready to become leaders?