By: Lynnette
Lockwood
Dr. Back
Principles of
Leadership
May 2nd,
2014
Table of Contents
I. Introduction
II. 50 Reasons
Societal Reasons:
p.1-6
- Historical
Aspects
- Socialization
- Social
Labels
- Media
- Discrimination
- Sexism
- Male
Dominance
- Inequality
- Social
Penalty
- Sexual
Harassment
- Hostile
Work Environment
- Victimization
- Resistance
from Others
- Child
Rearing Responsibilities
- Multiple
Family Roles
- Multiple
Home Responsibilities
- Marriage
Not Career
Self-Reasons: p.6-9
- Lack of
Self-confidence
- Internalized
Negative Thinking
- Underestimating
Potential
- Aggressiveness
- Overachieve
- Lonely at
the Top
- Internal
Barriers
- Lack of
Determination
- Living Life
- Taking
Risks
- Expectations
- Passivity
- Fear of
Failure
- Blocks to
Success
External Reasons:
p.9-14
- Insufficient
Paid Maternity Leave
- Single
Parent Homes
- Lack of
Child Care
- Lack of
Parental Care
- Personal
Life
- Unequal Pay
- College
Degrees
- Lack of
Mentors/Sponsors
- Hesitant of
Change
- Lack of
Opportunities
- Sandbagging
- New Boss
Phenomenon
- Glass Ceiling
- Glass Cliff
- Low Social
Economic Status
- Lack of
Institutions’ Support
- Making
Excuses
- Women
Buying Into the Future
- Women’s
Responsibility
III. Conclusion
p.14
IV. Works Cited p.15
Due to societal, self and external
factors, there can be as many as 50 reasons why women do not strive for, or obtained
leadership positions. Leadership is the process of influencing a group to
accomplish goals. Leadership includes decisions and actions that are based on
reason and passion. Leaders innovate, develop, inspire, have long-term goals,
ask what and why, originate, and challenge the status quo (Hughes, Ginnett,
& Curphy, 2012). Women’s power in leadership stems from perfection. Women
are constantly bombarded with thousands of messages telling them how to be
perfect, from beauty products, clothes, and even their body shape. There is a
misconception that the more perfect they are the more power they hold (Bushell,
1987).
The historical power of women’s leadership
started with the Equal Pay Act proposed in 1963, making it illegal for a
business to pay a woman lower wages than a man. The Civil Rights Act of 1964
granted equal rights to women in employment and then added an amendment known
as the Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978 to prohibit sex discrimination
based on pregnancy (Godbole, 2011). In 1991 the Civil Rights Act was updated by
adding awareness of sexual harassment (Lister, 2011).
Socialization draws gender lines early and
exclusions for women continue up to adulthood. Culture teaches girls to be
liked and accommodate others (Saujani, 2013), and they are encouraged to
participate and are pressured into stereotypical female-oriented professions
and roles (Wolfe, 2008). Women are labeled as emotional, gentle, understanding,
devoted, caring, supportive (Denmark, & Paludi, 2008), cooperative, and
focused on pleasing others (Sandberg, 2013) which decreases the emphasis on
their abilities to be leaders. Women are frequently known to use interactive
leadership. This involves encouraging participation, enhancing other’s
self-worth; and the best performance occurs when workers are excited about work
and feel good about their job. This interactive leadership style develops out
of years of socialization (Hughes, Ginnett, & Curphy, 2012).
These social labels continue with men who
are labeled to be active, competitive, independent, self-confident, and have
strong abstract thinking and critical thinking skills. Males are supposed to be
the breadwinners and women are supposed to be the homemakers (Valerio, 2011). Women
are labeled as passive, non-competitive, dependent, lacking in self-confidence
and poses lower abstract and critical thinking skills. Women are not expected
to fulfill leadership roles (Sandberg, 2013).
The media sends strong cultural messages
about what is appropriate for each sex role, traits and behaviors, and women are
punished if they fail to meet the cultural expectations. Media messages are strong
and influential and central to how women define themselves (Rhode, 1997). If
women break the traditions of these roles, it can make them feel guilty. The media
set barriers that limit women’s ability to reach their full potential, own
their own destiny and have the confidence to develop and pursue goals (Hadary,
& Henderson, 2013). Few people realize how much these media messages affect
women’s opportunities for making their own decisions about what is fulfilling
for them (Rhode, 1997).
A barrier that often occurs in the workplace
is discrimination against women. Workplace discrimination is an unfair or
unfavorable treatment based on gender (Godbole, 2011). Gender bias occurs
because of personal values, perceptions, and outdated traditional values about
women. Women are often placed into low paying, clerical, and administrative
assistant jobs while men are placed into jobs that promote upward mobility and
career advancement (Mayhew). Women who feel discriminated against may feel
strong resentment, loss of self-worth, loss of motivation and morale to perform
their jobs effectively (Gluck). This discrimination can be serious enough that
a company that has a low number of females in executive positions can be sued
for discrimination even if they have a large percentage of lower-level female
employees (Bennett, 2014)
Sexism
enters into the equation of lack of support for women leadership. Men often
ignore women because they see them as sex objects and not as competent associates
(Bushell, 1987) and do not believe that women have what it takes to be at the
top management level (White, 1992). Men believe that women are not suited for
upper management because they have mood swings, lack achievement orientation,
and have low self-esteem. Males are of the opinion that women are too
emotional, indecisive, deficient in qualitative skills, and career commitment,
lazy, passive, ineffective, and lacking in interpersonal communication
abilities (Rhode, 1997). Males fear female power, their talent, energy,
sexuality, and competence is threatening. (Karsten, 1994).
Historically men have been dominant
over women. Men have been and continue to be on top when it comes to holding leadership
positions. Those who do not climb the social ladder are viewed as “wimps” by
others (Karsten, 1994). Men are viewed as natural born leaders, while women
have to prove over and over that they can lead (Valerio, 2011). Women can be
competent to lead, but are many times disliked by their male counterparts as
well as other females (Whelan, 2009).
According to Branson in 2007, women communicate differently and because
of this difference, women are viewed as lacking confidence and the assertiveness
necessary to lead or be in senior management positions.
It is clearly evident that today there
is inequality in leadership positions. Of the 195 independent countries around
the world, there are only 17 countries led by a woman. According to the Fortune
500 in 2011 in the United States, 15.4% were corporate officers, 14.8% served
on boards, 6.7% were top earners, and 18% were elected as congressional
officials (Sandberg, 2013). These low numbers of success is due to many traits
that women possess perpetrating their inequality (Rhode, 1997).
Social penalties occur to women who are
leaders. Being professional, powerful, successful, and ambitious is a positive expectation
from men, but is viewed negatively for women (Sandberg, 2013). What is considered
assertive in men is viewed as being abrasive in women (Rhode, 1997). If a woman
tries to be a leader she is oftentimes viewed as bossy, (Sandberg, 2013) power
hungry, egotistical, selfish, and manipulative (Saujani, 2013).
Sexual
harassment is unwelcomed sexual advances, requests for sexual behaviors, and
other verbal or physical contact of a sexual nature. Sexual harassment includes
performing sex favors to be hired, being promoted, receiving a pay raise, being
dismissed from a job and experiencing unwelcoming and intimidating working conditions.
Sexual harassment violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. Women that
experience this may be angry because they are exploited as sex objects, but may
be afraid to speak up because they do not want to be labeled as troublemakers (Kleiman,
2007).
A hostile work environment focused towards
a woman is unwelcomed and abusive (Sandberg, 2013) and many times they are
afraid to speak up due to retributions. They do have the option to file a
hostile environment claim if they can document the frequency, the total number
of incidents, and that they told the harasser to stop. The employer will be
liable if the female employee suffered a loss, are required to pay attorney
fees, and remedy the situation through awarding back pay and reinstatement to a
position if she lost her job.
However, this does not insure that she will
not be victimized and be able to remain working in the environment, regardless
of the level of employment she has achieved (Kleiman, 2007).
Resistance from other workers prevents women
from going into leadership positions. A survey was conducted and found that 17%
of employees prefer female bosses and 23% prefer male bosses and resistance is
due to the fact that women can go overboard to exhibit their superiority (New
Poll, 2013). There is resistance to female bosses because older women feel
stigmatized by younger female leaders (Karsten, 1994). Both genders dislike
women bosses more when they are successful (Sandberg, 2013). Females in
leadership roles received fewer positive responses and more non-positive
responses from employees than from males that offered the same input (Karsten,
1994).
Child rearing responsibilities are primarily
considered the female’s role and women will often sacrifice anything for their
family. Being the main caregiver of children can lower workforce participation
due to children’s illnesses, physical care needs and social activities. Some
women will postpone their upper management positions because they may depart
from their jobs to bear children and the percentage of women over 40 who do not
have children has nearly doubled in recent years (Branson, 2007). Child rearing has no economic value; part-
time work is highly stigmatized and the woman can experience loss of status at
work and feelings of isolation which can result in workforce shunning (Branson,
2007).
Fulfilling multiple family roles by women is
a societal expectation. There is an assumption that women can have it all. The
time and effort required for success in work compete with time and effort for
satisfaction in the home (Rhode, 1997). Being in multiple family roles has been
linked to better psychological well-being, life satisfaction, and
self-acceptance, but the demands of the business world and the insensitivity of
women to their own needs makes this difficult to achieve (Valerio, 2011).
Multiple home responsibilities can be
overwhelming and distracting. A manager may not hire a perfectly good candidate
for a job if she is torn between her home and job responsibilities (Gluck).
Marriage, not a career, is a choice that
many women feel they must agree with. There
are great levels of social pressure to get married. Therefore there is the
viewpoint that minimal jobs and fewer responsibilities in a job situation can
enhance the marriage. Women are constantly convinced of the belief that they
cannot be committed to family and have a career (Sandberg, 2013).
The lack of confidence is feelings
within one’s self that can be due to socialization and restrictive to success. Women’s
lack of self-confidence can be enhanced and consequently they can feel inferior
because of men’s attitude towards them (Bushell, 1987). Women are supposed to
be “good girls”, not make waves, do whatever needs to be done without question,
and not confront authority. If no one thinks that a woman can be a leader than it
becomes more difficult to stay confident
(Whelan, 2009).
Internalizing negative thinking can
sabotage women’s leadership skills. The negative messages that women receive on
a daily basis will build and they begin to internalize. Women begin to believe
that it is wrong to be outspoken, more powerful than men, or aggressive in any
way (Sandberg, 2011).
Many women
underestimate their own potential and performance abilities and put themselves
down before others can. If a woman is successful she is often ridiculed and
must have had help or she just got lucky, causing her self-esteem and
self-confidence to drop (Sandberg, 2013).
Aggressiveness and stubbornness is when women
rub men the wrong way when they display masculine traits (Bushell, 1987). If a
woman acts too aggressive, she is pushy and threatening. If she is too
empathetic, she is too soft and not tough enough. If she acts like a man,
people will dislike her (Valerio, 2011). The double blind dilemma occurs and
women are “dammed if they do and damned if they do not” (Whelan, 2009).
Overachieving is a necessity for women to
get ahead. Men are encouraged to boast about their accomplishments, but women
are not. Even though women perform just effectively as men, they have to
constantly prove their credibility and qualifications. This is a barrier to
obtain important jobs, influence others, and get leadership positions in
organizations. Many women feel that one mistake can ruin opportunities for
advancement. They feel extra pressure to smile, be nice, and find ways to show
disagreement in a more subtle manner (Valerio, 2011).
Women
leaders find that they feel lonely at the top many times because there are so few
female leaders at the top of management. They experience feeling of isolation
to the degree that it can affect their performance and appear aloof, distinct,
uninterested and cold. These results can
drastically affect their performance level and many women do not seek top
positions because of the feelings of loneliness (Whelan, 2009).
Women build their own internal barriers at the
early stages of childhood by not volunteering and not raising their hand when
they know they have the right answers. They do not expect to take leadership
roles within their classroom, school environment, hold officer roles within clubs
and organizations or be CEO’s of big corporations (Whelan, 2009).
Lack of determination to be successful
can prevent women from being leaders. This lack of determination stems from
cautious instincts and excessive doubts of their own abilities. Women conform
to how they should behave and what they have to do to be successful while
making decisions to please others instead of themselves (Saujani, 2013).
Society communicates to women that they must
choose between living life and being a leader. Leadership brings large amounts
of responsibility, long work hours, and interruptions when out to social
events. The lack of living life can be unattractive to some and considered not
worth the hassle (Sandberg, 2013).
Taking risks are alien to a woman’s nature.
Women are taught to “play it safe” and that is why so few make it to the top or
stay there. Women are afraid they will not excel or they take baby steps
instead of big leaps. Women do not like to take risks because they are unsure
if they have the current skills to get the job done (Sandberg, 2013).
Expectations get in the way for women
and they hold too high a standard for themselves (Saujani, 2013). By holding
high standards, many decide to forego the chance to show the courage to be a
leader. Due to anxiety about if they are ready for a big challenge often leads
to the insatiable quest for perfection, endless preparation, and the lack of
desire before they even try for the leadership position.
Women are taught to take a passive role.
They are encouraged to develop attitudes that they need to “wait their turn”,
to know their proper place in society, and to hide their ambitions (Saujani,
2013).
Women have fear of failure (Denmark, &
Paludi, 2008) and the fear obstructs their engagement in activities that are
important to them and holds them back from admitting that they desire more. It
is hard to be likable and ambitious at the same time (Saujani, 2013). They have
fears about making the wrong choices, drawing negative attention to themselves,
overreaching into areas they are not capable of handling, and speaking up too
much (Sandberg, 2013).
There are many blocks
to success that a woman encounters that hinders her professional growth and
leadership abilities. Some of these
blocks are historical within society, within herself or due to external
factors. Regardless of the source of the blocks, women need to examine these
blocks, develop self-awareness and remove those blocks to move towards success (Sandberg,
2013).
Lack of paid maternity leave can be a complex
situation to handle. By nature being a woman comes with the decision of whether
or not to bear children. When a woman gets pregnant she may not be covered by
sick, or paid maternity leave offering no safety net of benefits. Approximately
one half of Americans do not have paid sick time or maternity leave (Whelan,
2009). The Family Medical Leave Act was passed in 1993, but this only applies
to women who can afford to take 12 weeks of unpaid maternity leave. This
excludes women who work for a small company that employ 50 or fewer workers or hold
temporary jobs (Rhode, 1997). This legislation stipulates that women have to be
a full-time worker and have worked for the company at least for one year and companies
are not required to offer these benefits. Since January 2014 Obama Medical
Health Care Coverage the rules have changed, however women must take the
initiative to apply for the benefits and many opt to keep their own health care
coverage which may not include paid maternity leave (Kleiman, 2007).
82.2% of single parent homes are run by
women and single mothers often find it difficult to keep up with their
responsibilities. Companies can feel the effect or have the impression that the
woman’s job is suffering because of being a single parent (Whelan, 2009).
Quality and affordable childcare is
lacking and difficult to find (Rhode, 1997) and consequently, many families
depend upon family members or unlicensed providers. The lack of child care may
limit women to obtain full-time work and resort to part-time work with more flexible
hours, low pay, no benefits, and no opportunities for advancement in their
career. Even if a woman has a full-time job, this lack of finding adequate care
may result in feelings of guilt, stress, workplace absences and less
satisfaction with their work life and their marriages (Rhode, 1997).
Women generally are viewed as the main
care giver in any family. Therefore when the woman’s aging parent requires care,
it falls onto her list of responsibilities. Lack of sufficient parental care is
almost non-existent. Work environments usually involve long hours and there is limited
support from family members (Wellington, 1998). Companies do not
take into account the need for flexible work arrangements. Many men refuse to
assume family responsibility; because they believe that they work hard enough outside
the home without doing home chores and if one partner’s career has to suffer
because of aging parents, it should not be theirs (Rhode, 1997).
A woman’s personal life
can suffer if taking the responsibility of being a leader. Women are socialized
with the belief that if a woman is working and successful, then she is so
consumed by her career that she cannot have a personal life. She would never
have the time for social events, family vacations, and romantic getaway (Sandberg,
2013).
Another barrier that hinders a woman from
seeking leadership positions is unequal pay. The average pay for a woman is
$31,900 annually and the average pay for a man is $39,700 annually even though
they oftentimes are the same age, have the same education, hours of work, and are
unionized (Whelan, 2009). The more education a woman has the greater disparity
in her wages (10 Surprising Statistics on Women in the Workplace, 2010). Lily
Ledbetter was a woman that advocated for equal pay because after working for
the Goodyear plant as a manager for 19 years, she found that she earned less
than the lowest paid man and she sued the company. This caused the passing of
the Lily Ledbetter Equal Pay Act in 2009, which was an amendment to the Civil
Rights Act of 1964, addressing unlawful employment practices (Ledbetter, 2012).
In the 1980’s approximately 50% of women
graduated college and since then, the number of women with college degrees has
slowly and steadily advanced. Women are entering more fields that have been previously
dominated by men, but the percentage of women in corporate America has not
changed. According to Fortune 500 in 2011, only 2.4% of women are CEO’s (Sandberg,
2013).
Mentors
and sponsors are very important in higher level leadership positions. Anyone
that wants to be an effective leader needs close guidance, advice and
supervision. Oftentimes women do not desire or are unsuccessful in leadership
because there is a lack of women mentors or sponsors that help advance careers,
make connections (Saujani, 2013), give strategic advice, close a deal, handle
personal problems, point out steps to reach goals, cut the red tape and obtain
inside information (Branson, 2007). Finding adequate mentors and sponsors for
women is a challenging task (Sandberg, 2013).
Change is a difficult aspect of
life. If a woman wants to become a
leader she needs to focus her life on reaching success by setting priorities on
her time and surround herself with people who can support her to change. Her mindset wants to keep things status quo,
with no changes and therefore no personal or professional growth can occur. She needs to look for support, reassurance,
clarity and direction to strive forward (Saujani, 2013).
There
is a lack of opportunity for female employees who have management potential
(Wellington, 1998). 47% of women feel that they are not advancing because of
lack of opportunity (Saujani, 2013). There
is a lack of career planning, job experience, and successful planning for women
because managers fail to account for advancing women. Managers are reluctant to
give women life experience (Wellington, 1998) and women often
have to work longer in a lower level position before advancing (Kelchner).
Sandbagging is forestalling for
advancement and silently refusing to support co-workers. Other co-workers will
purposely downplay a woman’s accomplishments, reduce credibility, sidetrack and
curtail the careers of women who advance too quickly (Branson, 2007).
The new boss phenomenon is when employees
point out a woman leader’s weaknesses by using stereotypes, prejudice, and
discrimination. In many instances even though she has become the boss these
factors contribute to her being fired within the first few months (Branson,
2007).
The
glass ceiling is a barrier that exists where women cannot obtain prestigious
jobs in a company. This occurs because there is an overlap between qualities
that people associate with leadership and the qualities that people associate
with masculinity (Hughes, Ginnett, & Curphy, 2012) and
this is compounded by men claiming that the glass ceiling does not exist
(Branson, 2007).
The
glass cliff is when women are more likely to be hired than men for an
organization. This sounds positive but this usually occurs when the
organization is declining and therefore the woman appears to ultimately be the
cause for the company’s failure (Ginnett, & Curphy, 2012).
Low social economic status is an intergenerational
problem because of the lack of sufficient income to obtain adequate health,
food, housing, safety and clothing that the rest of society can afford. Women in poverty find it difficult to obtain
and maintain a sufficient standard of living. They are often unemployed or rely
on social security and other services, and can live in remote areas and
therefore stay caught in the poverty cycle. Many women work jobs, not careers,
and focus on survival and supporting their families; not making career moves
towards leadership positions (Branson, 2007).
Currently women lack the support of
institutions and there are only a few organizations that recognize or promote
women in leadership positions. There are
plenty of opportunities for women to be leaders from a CEO level to service
jobs. Even though historically women
have shirked away from leadership situations, institutions need to provide the
support for a woman to seize the opportunities (Ginnett, & Curphy, 2012).
Women can make excuses by blaming others for
their lack of success. They need to do an inventory of their own action plan
that must be detailed and on a timetable for completion to take steps towards
becoming a leader. Women need to focus on identifying the blocks to
success and turn those into positives by having self-awareness of their actions
which inhibits their success (Kelchner).
Women must to buy into their own future
and realize that with success comes change. They need to develop a broad vision
as a leader having insight into the future. Women need to create a culture and
environment conducive to breeding passion, enthusiasm, respect and
integrity. Striving towards leading into
the future can be challenging, but exciting (Kelchner).
It is women’s responsibility to accept
being a leader and to take the initiative to improve conditions for not only
themselves, but for their gender as a whole.
When women take on stronger and more demanding leadership positions,
then and only then, will women’s needs and wants be better expressed.
Works Cited 50 Reasons
Kelchner, L. (n.d.).
Gender Differences in the Workplace & Statistics. Small Business.
Retrieved March 31, 2014, from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/gender-differences-workplace-statistics-13294.htm
