Women as Leaders? Our Brains May Be Wired to Say No

In recent years, notable progress has been made toward achieving gender equality in leadership positions. This is evidenced by a growing representation of women in leadership roles, with appointments such as Sarah Mensah becoming the first female president of Jordan Brand serving as a testament. Job opportunities have also witnessed a trend towards parity, and there's a discernible shift in stereotypes, now recognizing the equal competence of genders. While these developments are promising, they should not overshadow the ingrained and cumulative issues of inequality that persist. Even though 75 percent of companies worldwide have embraced policies of equal opportunity, diversity, and inclusion, gender biases stubbornly linger in leadership selection, leading to instances of discrimination and productivity losses. The reality remains that women are judged more harshly than men, are anticipated to face harsher penalties in case of failure, and are frequently subject to lower potential evaluations. This contributes to a significant gender promotion gap. As a result, the representation of women progressively declines higher up the hierarchy. For instance, in the United States, men are 20 percent more likely to be internally promoted to leadership roles.

Current practices are ineffective

These findings are disconcerting given the enduring presence of certain unsupported leadership practices and theories. On one hand, men tend to underestimate the scale of gender-related discrimination that women experience, consequently restricting even more their advancement opportunities. On the other hand, the qualities that herald the emergence of leaders differ from those that determine their effectiveness. For example, while agreeableness positively correlates with performance, it is inversely related to one's probability of becoming a manager. Gender differences in leadership emergence can be attributed to a bias for traits associated with agency. The stereotypes linked with successful leadership, favoring authoritarianism, strength, charisma, and masculinity, have remained unchanged for two decades. In essence, leaders are often selected based on their assertiveness and resemblance to the traditional perception of a leader, rather than their own proven competence. This predisposition tends to benefit narcissistic, authoritarian, and psychopathic individuals — a pattern that becomes even more pronounced during uncertain times and can have destructive implications for organizations. Furthermore, recent studies reveal that male leaders are more inclined to factor in their affinity with a potential successor during performance evaluations, and men under male managers tend to receive promotions faster. Finally, the initiatives purportedly aimed at improving gender balance prove ineffective: (1) training programs rarely deliver the anticipated results, their impact dwindles within weeks, and they may inadvertently reinforce stereotypes; (2) implementing quotas merely scratches the surface of the issue and exacerbates second-generation biases' (3) 'lean-in' strategies wrongly presume that women should adapt and unjustly lay the responsibility for inequality on them; and (4) equity guidelines can be counterproductive — ironically, in companies promoting meritocracy, managers tend to favor men.

These initiatives, therefore, lack the robustness necessary to confront the cognitive biases inherent in the human brain. Indeed, in decision-making, it's natural to utilize heuristics — mental shortcuts employed by our brains to conserve time, resources, and cognitive effort. Cognitive biases can, therefore, be described as unconscious, systematic, and universally prevalent patterns of thought that deviate from principles of logic and probabilistic reasoning, consequently skewing our decisions. While these biases have previously been ascribed to psychological mechanisms, recent studies posit that they are crucial characteristics of biological neural networks and a part of our evolutionary legacy. This theory proposes that biases originate from neural information processing. Therefore, the belief that superficial actions could effectively mitigate gender discrimination in leadership roles is an unfortunate utopia, especially when most individuals believe themselves less susceptible to biases than others.

What works?

Considering their significant over-representation in leadership positions, it's essential for men to actively participate in the conversation and display a vested interest in achieving gender parity. Nonetheless, a mere 17 percent of men actively engage in gender equality initiatives, and the majority are not equipped to recognize the red flags. Recent studies support that (1) having a male ally diminishes the fear of workplace isolation and hostility while fostering an expectation of support; (2) mixed-gender coalitions outperform their single-gender counterparts in advocating for gender equality; and (3) various behaviors are deemed effective. Challenging a system from which one directly benefits can be an uphill battle. However, it's essential to remember that promotions tend to discriminate primarily against competence rather than gender, disadvantaging numerous capable men; hence, men have no grounds to perceive women as a threat. Thus, it is imperative to identify 'good' allies who are conscious of their biases and privileges and embody authentic ethical values. In this vein, whereas leaders with narcissistic tendencies tend to favor individuals similar to themselves, those with superior self-awareness are more likely to nurture effective leaders within their teams, or even establish an environment that discourages unethical conduct. Furthermore, instead of exclusively focusing on mentorship activities with limited impact, corporations would do well to emphasize sponsorship. In such an arrangement, a manager advocates for a woman's advancement and ensures her accomplishments gain visibility.

Moreover, improving the structure of the evaluation and selection procedure can help minimize discrimination and advance the right individuals. Given that skills, potential, and performance assessments are often biased and influenced by the rating scale itself, incorporating a structured approach allows candidates to be evaluated based on identical and standardized criteria. With this in mind, structured interviews have consistently proven to be effective, and less swayed by gender biases, especially during the selection for roles typically dominated by men, such as leadership positions. Furthermore, structured interviews neutralize impression management and self-promotion tactics, which are more frequently employed by men, thereby facilitating their progression. Women, on the other hand, tend to understate their capabilities and achievements. Similarly, incorporating psychometric assessments in leader selection enables (1) more efficient and valid decisions, considering that half of a leader's performance is attributable to their personality and reasoning capabilities; and (2) more equitable decisions, since psychological and cognitive attributes are generally consistent across genders, although some minor differences may exist. Companies adhering to the recommendations of personality and reasoning tests thus realize more successful recruitments. Overall, these two methodologies prove relevant and effectively complement each other.

Finally, leveraging recruitment algorithms also helps to go beyond our inherent biases and intuition by bringing standardization to decision-making. Recently, researchers have suggested the use of such algorithms to mitigate implicit biases and improve diversity. These systems can not only counteract gender biases but also other discrimination, given that they can be trained to filter necessary attributes and disregard irrelevant ones. This is corroborated by recent studies indicating that algorithms generally provide fairer and more valid outcomes. Certain algorithms, for example, the Upper Confidence Bounds (UCB) algorithms, or those based on personality, could increase the share of women selected up to a balance of 50 percent. Furthermore, these algorithms could also be beneficial in enhancing the perceived fairness of the recruitment process: women indeed prefer to be evaluated by a recruitment algorithm due to their anticipated objectivity as compared to a human evaluator, while people seem less affronted by algorithm-driven discrimination.

Scientific evidence demonstrates that women hold a slight advantage in leadership due to slightly higher scores in key characteristics such as agreeableness, humility, and emotional intelligence. This makes them more inclined to adopt democratic or transformational leadership styles, which are positively associated with employee engagement and performance. However, this doesn't imply that all women are effective leaders, or that all men are less effective leaders. Instead, when considering the potential to be good leaders, both genders are almost on par. Then, why are women not more represented in leadership roles? The reality is, meritocracy is often a mirage. Leaders are not chosen based on their potential and skills, but due to an unconscious cognitive need to align with our implicit theories and appease our intuition. In this context, narcissistic men often have an edge, even with the typically employed strategies. Instead of insisting on addressing inherent biases in our brain's functioning through training or actions that prompt women to emulate incompetent models to fit in, there is an urgent need to select leaders based on their actual skills through structured processes. Achieving this goal will address two of the principal modern needs of businesses and our society: to advance effective leaders and to reach a nearly natural parity in leadership roles.