Accelerating the Advancement ofWomen Leaders

Robin J. ElyDiane Doerge Wilson Professor of Business Administration

Senior Associate Dean for Culture and Community

Global Diversity and Inclusion

8th Diversity and Inclusion Seminar

Barcelona

February 27, 2015

Agenda

Barriers to women’s advancement

Cultural context: Gender stereotypes

Organizational context: Gendered norms and work practices

Accelerating women’s advancement

Lessons learned from a work-in-progress: Harvard Business School

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Cultural Context: Gender Stereotypes

Belief: Women lack ambition

False. Women lack support for their ambition

Leader Woman

Competitive AssertiveDecisive

WarmNurturing

Communal

What the Culture Tells Us

Woman ≠ Leader

Man Woman

Competitive AssertiveDecisive

WarmNurturing

Communal

What the Culture Tells Us

Woman ≠ Leader

Leader Woman

Competitive AssertiveDecisive

WarmNurturing

Communal

What the Culture Tells Us

Woman ≠ Leader

Research Findings

Experiment: MBA students evaluate two different versions of case of a successful

woman entrepreneur (Heidi and Howard).

Asked to evaluate style, competence, likeability, whether to hire.

Outcomes: Equally competent and effective.

He’s more genuine and kind; she’s more self-promoting and power hungry.

He’s more likeable and more likely to be hired.

The more aggressive they perceived her, the more they disliked her.

No relationship between his aggressiveness and likeability.

Frank Flynn and Cameron Mitchell, MBA Class experiment, NYU Stern School of Business

Media and the Double Bind

Sonia Sotomayor: “blunt, testy . . . sharp-tongued, and occasionally combative”

- NYT

NYT Op Ed columnist, Maureen Dowd, questions Hilary’s authenticity: “Can Hillary Cry Her Way Back to the White House?” . . . And her competence: “We are at war. Is this how she’ll talk to [North Korean leader]?”

A World-wide Phenomenon

England’s Margaret Thatcher

“Attila the Hen”

Israel’s Golda Meir

“the only man in the Cabinet”

India’s Indira Gandhi

“the old witch”

-Richard Nixon

Germany’sAngela Merkel

“the iron frau”

Powerful, Ambitious Woman:A Cultural Oxymoron

The Cultural Ideal:Mother Who Quits Her Job

“[Women] leave [the workplace] more easily [than men] and find other parts of life more fulfilling.”

“They don’t want to do what it takes to get [to the top].”

Belkin, 2003

#1 Barrier : Women prioritize family over work

- HBS Alumni

(75%)

2013 HBS Alumni Survey: Importance of job & personal factorsWomen Men

Quality of personal and family relationships #1 #1 Work that is meaningful and satisfying #2 #2 Compatibility of work with personal and family life #3 #3 Ability to make a contribution to society #4 #5 Leisure pursuits and personal development #5 #4

Study of Men & Women Partners in Top Accounting Firm Probability of accepting leadership role, if offered: Men and women – 70% Proportion offered a leadership role?

Women – 47% Men – 68%

Women and men have similar aspirations

Research Findings

Research Findings

2013 HBS Alumni Survey: Work and Family Status

Gen X Baby Boom

%W%M %W%M At home full time

caring for kids:

Working full time: 74 95 57 72

Ever out of job market

> 6 mos for kids: 29 1 44 3

Out for any reason: 38 17 64 30

Fewer women are “opting out” than is commonly believed

10 0 9 0

Organizational Context: Gendered Norms and Work Practices

1st generation gender bias (explicit, intentional)

2nd generation gender bias (implicit, unintentional)

Workplace designed to fit men’s styles and life

situations

Appears gender neutral, but creates different

patterns of experience for women and men

Micro-practices and interactions accumulate,

impeding women’s advancement or pushing them

out altogether

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Organizational Context: Gendered Norms and Work Practices

Healthcare company: “I sat in a performance review and actually counted the number of times women were described as ‘nice.’ That was never a point of discussion about the men being reviewed.”

Accounting firm: “In year-end evaluation sessions, a woman was found a little bit short, and we didn’t see how she was going to get there. A man was found a little bit short, but we could figure out how he was going to get there because he looked like me, and I knew what I looked like 5 years ago and what I needed to grow into this.”

Financial management firm: “As soon as I started working at home one day a week my performance reviews went down despite the fact that my clients were happier and I got more work done.”

Consulting firm: “Our job postings seek perfection. Men who don’t meet all the qualifications apply anyway; women hold back.”

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Organizational Context: Gendered Norms and Work Practices

Healthcare company: “I sat in a performance review and actually counted the number of times women were described as ‘nice.’ That was never a point of discussion about the men being reviewed.”

Accounting firm: “In year-end evaluation sessions, a woman was found a little bit short, and we didn’t see how she was going to get there. A man was found a little bit short, but we could figure out how he was going to get there because he looked like me, and I knew what I looked like 5 years ago and what I needed to grow into this.”

Financial management firm: “As soon as I started working at home one day a week my performance reviews went down despite the fact that my clients were happier and I got more work done.”

Consulting firm: “Our job postings seek perfection. Men who don’t meet all the qualifications apply anyway; women hold back.”

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Organizational Context: Gendered Norms and Work Practices

Healthcare company: “I sat in a performance review and actually counted the number of times women were described as ‘nice.’ That was never a point of discussion about the men being reviewed.”

Accounting firm: “In year-end evaluation sessions, a woman was found a little bit short, and we didn’t see how she was going to get there. A man was found a little bit short, but we could figure out how he was going to get there because he looked like me, and I knew what I looked like 5 years ago and what I needed to grow into this.”

Financial management firm: “As soon as I started working at home one day a week my performance reviews went down despite the fact that my clients were happier and I got more work done.”

Consulting firm: “Our job postings seek perfection. Men who don’t meet all the qualifications apply anyway; women hold back.”

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Remedies

Increase awareness of bias

Reduce discrimination

Institute work-family accommodations

Drive from the top: benchmark, set metrics, hold people accountable

Accelerating women’s advancement is deep, ongoing, transformational work

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HBS Case Example: Background

The Culture and Community Initiative

Historical gender grade gap—publicly acknowledged

Disproportionate turnover among women faculty

Dean Nohria appointed July 2010

“Inclusion” is one of the School’s five priorities

Why are women not reaching parity with men?

20% women in tenured ranks; one third untenured

36% women in student body

Created the CCI and a new leadership position

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HBS Case Example: Mission

To cultivate a culture in which all members of the

community can thrive and reach their full potential for

advancing the mission of the School without

compromising excellence

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HBS Case Example: Mission

To cultivate a culture* in which all members of the

community can thrive and reach their full potential for

advancing the mission of the School without

compromising excellence

To advance this goal requires transformational work

Collaborators:

Susan SturmCenter for Institutional and Social Change

Columbia Law School

Heidi BrooksYale School of Management

* The way we do things around here.

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HBS Case Example: Mission

To cultivate a culture* in which all members of the

community can thrive and reach their full potential for

advancing the mission of the School without

compromising excellence

To advance this goal requires transformational work

Collaborators:

Susan SturmCenter for Institutional and Social Change

Columbia Law School

Heidi BrooksYale School of Management

* The way we do things around here.

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HBS Case Example: Mission (cont.)

It starts with leaders . . .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajCqT6elBoo

. . . who demonstrate commitment and passion

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HBS Case Example: Inquiry

External team interviewed 120 faculty

Thriving and success – what it looks like

Critical junctures and turning points in careers

Experiences of feedback and evaluation

Key relationships

Issues and conflict

How things get done/how change occurs

Conducted network survey

Identified patterns in the way different groups experience thriving/not thriving

HBS Case Example: Intervention

Analysis conducted and conveyed with eye to actionability

Shared report with full faculty

Raised awareness—making gender discussible!

Identified high-leverage task domains in which to experiment (domains that affect everyone):

Where are the pain points?

Where is there energy for experimentation?

Where is the leadership?

Identifying intermediate and longer-term indicators

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Key Take-aways

From eliminating inequality advancing a shared purpose

Numbers are indicators, not goals From either/or both/and

Both do—and don’t—focus on targeted groups From isolating causes understanding interactions,

mechanisms, and leverage points

Analysis and feedback with eye to actionability From detached expert distributed leadership

Build capacity for ongoing reflection and learning—from the get-go

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Conclusion: The Leadership Challenge

For the system to make progress, leaders must personally be willing to:

Go through the same fundamental shifts of mind, heart, and behavior they want for the system as a whole

Build awareness of how their assumptions and reactions may be unintentionally undermining their effectiveness

Engage in ongoing dialogue to surface hidden aspects of the culture

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