Women and Leadership Theories
Women and Leadership Theories |
Women rarely hold highly influential leadership positions even in “developed” countries, where women are commonly believed to have the same opportunities as men. Below are theories presented in the literature used to explain the nature of female leadership and why the leadership gap between men and women remains.
For the theories "domestic work" and "discrimination in the workplace", we have found ample supporting evidence, however, we have vehemently rejected the theory that men have innately better "leadership qualities" than women.
Our goal as an organization is to support women to become the leaders they were meant to be. We believe that women are just as capable of being successful leaders as men with the same abilities. What we are not doing is stating that women are on the flip side “better” than men. The support of both women and men in the movement to increase female leadership is absolutely critical. Society needs to redefine what being a "woman" and a "man" means.
Domestic work: * Compared with men, women have a leisure deficit in the US. Married men have several hours more leisure per week than married women, amounting to 212 hours more leisure per year – the equivalent of almost five 40 hour work weeks * 37% of women with strong credentials, voluntarily dropped out of employment at some point in their lives, compared with 24% of similarly qualified men. The primary reason that these women take time out is for “family time” but for men it is to change careers. Dropping out of the labour force has many obvious costs beyond surrendering one’s psychological investment in paid work: lost income, impeded career growth, depreciation of skills, and difficulty reestablishing one’s career. * Over one recent fifteen-year period, US women earned an average of $273, 592 compared with $722, 693 for men. By this measure, women’s earnings were only 38% of men’s in large part because of their time away from paid work.
Women rarely hold highly influential leadership positions even in “developed” countries, where women are commonly believed to have the same opportunities as men. Below are theories presented in the literature used to explain the nature of female leadership and why the leadership gap between men and women remains.
For the theories "domestic work" and "discrimination in the workplace", we have found ample supporting evidence, however, we have vehemently rejected the theory that men have innately better "leadership qualities" than women.
Our goal as an organization is to support women to become the leaders they were meant to be. We believe that women are just as capable of being successful leaders as men with the same abilities. What we are not doing is stating that women are on the flip side “better” than men. The support of both women and men in the movement to increase female leadership is absolutely critical. Society needs to redefine what being a "woman" and a "man" means.
Domestic work: * Compared with men, women have a leisure deficit in the US. Married men have several hours more leisure per week than married women, amounting to 212 hours more leisure per year – the equivalent of almost five 40 hour work weeks * 37% of women with strong credentials, voluntarily dropped out of employment at some point in their lives, compared with 24% of similarly qualified men. The primary reason that these women take time out is for “family time” but for men it is to change careers. Dropping out of the labour force has many obvious costs beyond surrendering one’s psychological investment in paid work: lost income, impeded career growth, depreciation of skills, and difficulty reestablishing one’s career. * Over one recent fifteen-year period, US women earned an average of $273, 592 compared with $722, 693 for men. By this measure, women’s earnings were only 38% of men’s in large part because of their time away from paid work.