Tag: Leadership

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Highlights

• Female-founded ventures receive less work from employees for equal pay. Employees are more likely to decline requests for additional labour from female founders than from male founders, giving rise to what the researchers term employee labour imbalance.
• These findings document a previously overlooked source of founder disadvantage and challenge the assumption that workplace bias primarily originates from leaders. Instead, employees’ gendered stereotypes about female leaders can lead their requests to be perceived as more unfair and difficult.
• Since employee labour bias is rooted in ingrained norms and stereotypes, addressing it likely requires a combination of interventions, including awareness and training, broader cultural change, and increased representation of women in leadership roles.

Existing research on gender inequality in entrepreneurship has long focused on the barriers women face at the point of entry, particularly when seeking early-stage funding and investor support. Far less attention has been paid to what happens next. This gap is striking given that even after successfully launching their ventures, many female-founded firms continue to struggle to scale and achieve long-term performance.

Researchers Olenka Kacperczyk, Peter Younkin, and Vera Rocha set out to investigate why female founders experience persistent hardship after entry. They examined how a founder’s gender influences employee labour by using an approach that combined a large-scale dataset of all new ventures with employees in Portugal (2002–2012) and online experiments in which participants completed paid tasks for a fictional startup.

Imbalances in employee labour

Evidence from the data shows that full-time employees in female-founded ventures work fewer regular hours and less overtime than those in male-founded firms. Subsequent online experiments replicated this pattern: participants were less willing to offer extra labour to a female founder than to a male founder.

Follow-up experiments suggest that these differences are partly driven by employees’ expectations about work demands. Specifically, employees perceive requests for additional labour from female founders as less fair and the work itself as more difficult than expected, which in turn reduces the amount of work they are willing to do.

…employees perceive requests for additional labour from female founders as less fair and the work itself as more difficult than expected, which in turn reduces the amount of work they are willing to do.

Taken together, these findings shed light on a previously overlooked source of bias – termed employee labor imbalance – whereby employees vary the amount of work they do depending on a founder’s gender.

Rethinking the direction of workplace bias

This research  shows that bias does not flow only from supervisors to employees. Under certain conditions, employees may hold gendered stereotypes about female leaders that make them less responsive to their requests. As a result, the challenges faced by female founders do not end once a firm is created. Instead, gender-based disadvantages can continue to shape everyday workplace interactions in ways that undermine long-term organizational outcomes. Recognizing this bottom-up dynamic of bias also complicates efforts to address it, highlighting that there is no immediate or straightforward remedy.

Accordingly, Kacperczyk emphasizes that while the research documents a clear  barrier to female entrepreneurs’ success, addressing this imbalance requires more than a single intervention. Instead, several broader implications emerge:

• Awareness and training may help – but are not sufficient
  Raising awareness of this bias and training workers to recognize it may be a useful starting point. However, given the deeply ingrained and largely unconscious nature of gender stereotypes, such efforts are unlikely to fully eliminate the problem on their own.
• Cultural change matters more than narrow policy fixes
  Because the bias reflects broad cultural perceptions of women as leaders, Kacperczyk notes that it is difficult to address through isolated organizational policies. Meaningful progress is more likely to require longer-term shifts in cultural norms and leadership stereotypes.
• Increasing representation may be a key lever
  One implication highlighted by Kacperczyk is the importance of increasing the visibility and prevalence of women in leadership roles. Greater representation, both within organizations and in public life (e.g., politics), may help weaken stereotypes that portray women as demanding leaders.
• The issue extends beyond entrepreneurship
  Although the study focuses on entrepreneurial settings, the underlying dynamics are likely to operate across a wide range of leadership contexts, including established organizations, politics, and public life. The findings speak to gender inequality in leadership more broadly, not only within startup environments.

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Research brief prepared by:

Kuan Su

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Title

Do Employees Work Less for Female Leaders? A Multi-Method Study of Entrepreneurial Firms

Author

Olenka Kacperczyk, Peter Younkin, Vera Rocha

Source

Organization Science

Published

2023

Link

https://pubsonline.informs.org/doi/10.1287/orsc.2022.1611

Research brief prepared by

Kuan Su

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Highlights

• In this study, women received just as much positive feedback as men in performance evaluations—but evaluators relied on only a handful of descriptors for them, while men’s praise spread across a much wider variety of words.
• Women were tagged with significantly more negative traits than men, and over two-thirds of those negatives were feminine stereotypes (e.g., “panicky,” “temperamental,” and “passive”).
• When women don’t match the “tough” and “decisive” leader image, evaluators default to gendered clichés to explain their shortcomings, quietly reinforcing barriers to women’s leadership.

In today’s organizations, performance evaluations are meant to spotlight talent and potential. Yet a 2019 study by researcher David G. Smith and colleagues reveals that the very words chosen to describe leaders can reinforce gender hierarchies rather than dismantle them.

Drawing on 4,344 anonymous leadership assessments of U.S. Naval Academy students, the researchers provided evaluators with a fixed menu of 44 positive and 45 negative traits—each pre‐classified as masculine, feminine, or neutral—to isolate how language choices vary by the target’s gender. By holding the pool of possible descriptors constant, the researchers were able to focus on evaluators’ implicit biases rather than differences in performance itself.

Skewed feedback: Narrow praise and gendered criticism

Despite receiving an equal total number of positive descriptors, women leaders were funneled into a much narrower set of praises. Evaluators repeatedly used only a handful of positive terms—such as “enthusiastic”, “compassionate”, and “organized”—when describing women, whereas men’s evaluations covered a richer variety of attributes—such as “analytical”, “competent”, and “practical”. In effect, although women demonstrated equivalent leadership qualities, the limited range of praise implied their successes only “counted” when described in those few, pre-approved ways.

More striking still, women attracted a greater share of negative descriptors than men did. Of the 14 negative leadership traits that showed a significant gender gap, women were tagged more often with 12 of them: selfish, opportunistic, vain, inept, frivolous, passive, scattered, gossip, excitable, panicky, temperamental, and indecisive. On the other hand, men were labeled more often on only two traits: arrogant and irresponsible.

It is especially telling that almost all of the traits applied more to women draw on classic feminine stereotypes—for example, emotional volatility (“panicky,” “temperamental”), passivity (“passive,” “indecisive”), and triviality (“frivolous,” “gossip”). This suggests that evaluators default to gendered tropes rather than objective performance standards when evaluating women leaders.

…almost all of the traits applied more to women draw on classic feminine stereotypes—for example, emotional volatility, passivity, and triviality.

In short, women received fewer varieties of praise and tougher, stereotype-based criticism. Evaluators didn’t hold them to the same neutral benchmarks applied to men; instead, they leaned on gendered clichés—using words like “excitable,” “emotional,” and “indecisive”—to explain any shortcomings. This double standard in language reinforces barriers that keep women from being seen as fully capable leaders.

When language reflects bias

These findings align with status characteristics theory, which can be thought of as a “fit test” between who we are and the role we occupy. We all carry a mental image of a leader: confident, decisive, maybe a bit tough. When someone doesn’t match that mould—for example, a woman stereotyped as warm or emotional—evaluators experience a mismatch and instinctively reach for familiar explanations. Instead of judging her by the same neutral standards they apply to men, they choose negative descriptors rooted in feminine stereotypes, using words like “panicky” and “temperamental.”

Instead of judging her by the same neutral standards they apply to men, they choose negative descriptors rooted in feminine stereotypes, using words like “panicky” and “temperamental.”

By both narrowing the range of positive praise for women and labeling them with these stereotype-driven critiques, evaluators, even if unwittingly, send the message that women don’t quite “fit” the leader role. This linguistic double bind erodes perceptions of women’s competence and agency.

Minimizing language bias in evaluations

Even well‐intentioned feedback systems can perpetuate bias through word choice. To rewrite this narrative, the researchers urge organizations to:

• Anchor evaluations in objective metrics. Replace vague descriptors with behavior‐based criteria (e.g., “delivered 90% of team milestones” rather than “dependable”).
• Audit and refine your lexicon. Regularly review evaluation forms to eliminate gendered descriptors and expand the pool of neutral performance terms.
• Train evaluators on bias in language. Equip evaluators to spot gendered or stereotype-laden words, and instead use concrete, performance-based terms that accurate reflect a person’s leadership skills.

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Research brief prepared by:

Alice Choe

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Title

The Power of Language: Gender, Status, and Agency in Performance Evaluations

Author

David G. Smith, Judith E. Rosenstein, Margaret C. Nikolov & Darby A. Chaney

Source

Sex Roles

Published

2019

Link

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-018-0923-7

Research brief prepared by

Alice Choe

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Highlights

• Women remain vastly underrepresented in high-ranking executive positions. Those who become top executives in Fortune 100 companies reach these positions approximately 2.14 years faster than their male counterparts, largely due to their superior qualifications and effective internal promotion practices.
• The rapid advancement in women’s talent disappears after a second woman executive has been appointed, indicating that institutional pressures work but do not ensure sustained gender parity.
• Achieving gender equality requires robust organizational processes and cultural reforms to address underlying biases about leadership potential and overcome organizational backlash.

The path to executive leadership has traditionally been marked by significant gender disparities, with women underrepresented in top corporate positions. In 1980, a single woman was counted to be holding a high-ranking executive position at a Fortune 100 company. In 2011, women held 18 % of executive positions despite comprising 47% of the overall workforce. This disparity has prompted organizations to implement various diversity initiatives and face increasing institutional pressure to improve gender representation at the executive level. However, the effectiveness and sustainability of these efforts, as well as their impact on women’s career trajectories, have remained largely unexplored.

Examining speed of advancement

At the heart of this research is speed of advancement—how quickly executives reach top positions from their career start. This metric offers a unique lens through which to understand gender diversity in organizations, moving beyond traditional focuses on representation percentages or compensation differences. Speed of advancement captures both individual career progression and organizational decision-making or talent programs, providing insights into how companies respond to diversity pressures and how career paths may differ between men and women who ultimately reach executive positions.

Professors Rocío Bonet, Peter Cappelli, and Monika Hamori investigated whether women who reached top executive positions in Fortune 100 companies experienced different speeds of advancement compared to men executives. Their study examined the career histories of top executives in Fortune 100 companies during 2001 and 2011, analyzing factors such as education, work experience, and internal versus external mobility. Unlike previous research that focused primarily on executive compensation or representation statistics, this study delved into company records and appointment patterns to understand the evolution of executive careers.

The “one and done” effect for women

The research revealed several striking patterns in executive advancement. First, women executives reached their positions approximately 2.14 years faster than men executives, even after controlling for education, experience, and other relevant factors. This advantage was particularly pronounced in internal promotions, where companies have more direct control over talent development. The speed difference was evident from early career stages, with women’s first promotions occurring notably faster (6.6 years versus 8+ years for men).

These women seemed uniquely poised for high-level positions, as they tended to be better qualified than men when starting the job. But this advantage persisted even when controlling for such initial qualifications and performance quality, suggesting that the difference wasn’t solely attributable to superior qualifications.

These findings contradict the well-known “glass cliff” hypothesis, which suggests that women are primarily promoted during periods of financial challenge. As Professor Bonet puts it: “Internal career mobility is really where the action is happening. This suggests that firms can create an environment where talent—especially underrepresented talent—can flourish.”

However, a crucial secondary finding emerged: the advancement advantage for women disappeared once companies had more than one woman in top executive positions, and in some cases, the pattern reversed. This “one and done” effect suggests that institutional pressures may drive initial appointments but fail to create sustained change.

…the advancement advantage for women disappeared once companies had more than one woman in top executive positions, and in some cases, the pattern reversed.

The findings suggest a complex interplay between institutional pressures, organizational responses, and career outcomes. While accelerated advancement for some women demonstrates that organizations can effectively fast-track diverse talent when motivated, the disappearance of this advantage after initial appointments raises concerns about the sustainability of diversity efforts.

For Bonet, this research is proof that firms can contribute to meaningful progress in gender equality if they are motivated to do so. While the results suggest that firms without sufficient representation of women at the top did well at identifying and supporting high-ability women, Bonet emphasizes the significant downsides: firms may be returning to operational practices through which women are less likely to progress than their equally or lesser-qualified counterparts. This disheartening reality leads Bonet to conclude that addressing gender biases remains a crucial societal challenge.

Positive change should not be short-lived

Bonet and colleagues’ work shows that firms have agency in the extent to which they can support their women employees. Women employed at firms facing institutional pressures were able to advance faster than their equally or lesser-qualified men. This is particularly important in a context of under-representation, where without any fast-tracking, the path to gender parity would take over a hundred years.

The key takeaways for organizations are:

• First, women remain vastly underrepresented in high-ranking executive positions. The research strongly suggests that an effective way for firms to change is to fast-track qualified women internally. The data shows that firms are good at identifying and advancing qualified and often over-qualified women.
• Second, firms should ensure this positive change is not short-lived and navigate possible organizational backlash. For example, doubts about fast-tracked women’s merits can weaken their effectiveness and should be actively counteracted.

The findings suggest that while mandating diversity outcomes may create short-term progress, sustainable change requires deeper cultural and structural changes, including addressing underlying assumptions and biases about leadership potential.

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Research brief prepared by:

Manuela R. Collis

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Title

Gender differences in speed of advancement: An empirical examination of top executives in the Fortune 100 firms

Author

Rocío Bonet, Peter Capelli, and Monika Hamori

Source

Strategic Management Journal

Published

2020

Link

https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.3125

Research brief prepared by

Manuela R. Collis

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Picture this: you’re a rising star in your company, juggling multiple projects and a growing team. The key to success? Learning to delegate. But what if the simple act of handing off tasks feels like walking a tightrope? For many women leaders, this scenario isn’t just imagination—it’s reality. Research by professors Modupe Akinola, Ashley E. Martin, and Katherine W. Phillips reveals a surprising gender gap in delegation, one that could be holding women back from reaching their full potential as leaders. Across five studies, the authors demonstrate that women have more negative associations with delegation compared to men, leading women to delegate less frequently and have lower quality interactions when they do delegate.

Delegation is both a communal (i.e., relational) and agentic (i.e., assertive) behaviour. The authors argue that although delegation helps subordinates develop (a communal act), women still see assigning tasks as a largely agentic behaviour. Since the assertive nature of delegation looms larger than the communal aspects, this triggers concerns about violating feminine gender role expectations. That is, women leaders may find it more difficult to delegate because they perceive that it conflicts with the expectation for women to act in a way that shows communality.

Not only did this study find that women delegate less, but they delegate differently as well. When women do delegate, they spend less time with subordinates and have lower quality interactions: women who delegated spent an average of 33 seconds interacting with subordinates, compared to 54 seconds for men. Subordinates also rated women as less considerate and supportive during delegation interactions. The study also found that women report more guilt about overburdening subordinates and greater fear of backlash when delegating compared to men.

Women leaders may find it more difficult to delegate because they perceive that it conflicts with the expectation for women to act in a way that shows communality.

As Akinola says, “Delegation is a tricky thing because on one hand, you are passing something on to somebody else and you feel like you are bossing them around. On the other hand, you are helping them learn, develop, and grow. This could be harder for women because they are expected to not boss people around and be more communal. Some of the emotions associated with delegation for women revolve around guilt and anxiety for overburdening their subordinates…if you flip it to make delegation as more a communal part of the job, women will be more likely to do it.”

The authors were able to mitigate women’s negative association with delegating by reminding them of the communal aspects of delegating, that is, reminding them that it helps subordinates to learn and grow. While successful, the intervention plays on existing stereotypes and Akinola would like to explore alternate avenues: “I would like to see other interventions that do not rely on just letting women know that it’s good to be communal. Maybe it’s something like telling them that it does help them get more work done. I want more tools to teach women how to delegate.”

Indeed, the success of their intervention is underscored by their finding that participants who chose to delegate tasks outperformed those who did not delegate. This suggests that women’s reluctance to delegate may hinder their effectiveness and productivity as leaders, and interventions like those the authors tested may be critical for women.

This research has important implications for organizations seeking to develop women leaders and create more equitable workplaces. Leadership development programs can address women’s potential reluctance to delegate and provide strategies to overcome negative associations. For instance, these programs could include role-playing exercises that allow women to practice delegation in a safe environment, helping them build confidence and overcome anxiety. Organizational cultures and performance management systems could recognize and reward the communal, developmental aspects of delegation. This could include setting delegation goals for managers or creating cross-functional projects that necessitate task-sharing. Managers could be encouraged to frame delegation in communal terms, emphasizing how it benefits and develops subordinates.

Organizational cultures and performance management systems could recognize and reward the communal, developmental aspects of delegation.

The authors are excited about the new avenues this opens for future investigation. Further research is needed to identify other critical leadership behaviors that may be misaligned with gendered expectations of women. Additionally, longitudinal studies could examine whether the performance implications of gender differences in delegation compound over time. Importantly, Akinola also wants to explore this phenomenon beyond just gender: “There are a lot of other identities in an organization that would lead one to feeling guilt and anxiety when being agentic. So, I am curious that if you looked at race, sexual orientation, or other marginalized identities, would we see similar effects. And would a similar intervention or a different one [as the one we used in this research] be more effective?”

______

Research brief prepared by:

Grusha Agarwal

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Title

The Delegation Dilemma: Why Women Leaders Hesitate to Hand Off Tasks

Author

Modupe Akinola, Ashley E. Martin, Katherine W. Phillips

Source

Academy of Management Journal

Published

2018

Link

https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2016.0662

Research brief prepared by

Grusha Agarwal

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