Leadership and resilience go hand in hand, but what about the gender divide when it comes to these characteristics?
Historically, leadership positions have been male-heavy, and although the balance is being redressed, female leaders are still outnumbered by their male counterparts.
The Wall Street Journal revealed that in 2020, women lead 167 of the US’s top firms – more than double compared to a decade ago, but still less than 6% in total.
Here in the UK, the picture is similar; in 2020, just five of the FTSE 100 companies are steered by women.
Yet, despite this imbalance, the benefits of women in leadership roles are widely documented. In 2019, HBR published a report that found that women outperform men across critical leadership skills. And with the recent focus on diversity in many businesses, companies now endeavour to make their teams, particularly their leadership teams, more representative of the 50-50 overall gender split.
Leadership resilience is a topic that has gained significant attention, especially since the start of the pandemic, and today we look at how resilience as a leadership trait presents itself across the genders.
Are Women ‘Better’ Leaders than Men?
The HBR research I mentioned earlier found that women scored higher across the board on a range of leadership topics, such as taking the initiative, practising self-development and acting with resilience. They scored higher on 84% of the competencies associated with leadership than their male counterparts.
The problem of measuring leadership arises when we look at the data presented by women who were asked to score themselves. Generally, women scored themselves lower than when independently judged by peers and colleagues.
Yes, there are far fewer women in leadership roles due to a history of gendered stereotypes, and despite the number increasing, it seems that women are still being held back by these labels and ideologies.
This brings me on to the topic of resilience in female leaders. Are women able to be better leaders because of a history of having to practice resilience? Let’s take a look at some data.
Resilience in Women
Resilience is a fascinating topic, and studying it can lead us to understand ourselves, our peers and colleagues, and the world we live and work in better.
The topic of resilience has been studied extensively at a scientific level, and I want to pick up on two different studies which raise some interesting concepts about resilience.
The first study is by Iimura and Taku (2018), who found that females have higher levels of conscientiousness than males. Conscientiousness had previously been identified as the best predictor of resilience in a study by Fayombo (2010).
Although we are still unclear as to the exact reasons behind why we become the people we are, we know that life experiences are pivotal in shaping our personalities.
Despite a massive focus on the damaging gendered stereotypes that have persisted for years, men and women are still treated differently by society, which can cause these learned behaviours to turn into embedded characteristics.
A female leader making her way through her career will be all too aware that she might have to fight harder for her place at the table, perhaps increasing this desire to be resilient in all challenging situations.
Resilience in Women and Men – It’s All Relative
The second study was conducted in 2008, although it is still as relevant today. A paper published on sex differences in the heritability of resilience by Boardman, Blalock and Button, found that neither sex showed a greater incidence of inherited resilience.
This confirms that resilience is something that we can pick up based on our life experiences -and more importantly, we can work on and develop.
Challenging situations are not something that either of the sexes is inherently more equipped to deal with – women and men can be equally resilient. However, as the data shows, women are perhaps more aware of the need to prove themselves in an uneven leadership landscape.
Learning Resilience
As a leader – male or female – it is essential to understand that your likelihood of success is not something built into your DNA; instead, it results from your learned experiences and the work you put in to develop your leadership skill set.
Becoming a more resilient leader is possible, as is developing any other leadership competency.
If you are interested in learning more about resilience, this is something we can help with. Our ideology is based on assisting leaders in developing, and we offer accredited courses dedicated to improving resilience – click here for more information about our Raising Resilience course.
Additionally, on our blog, you will find a range of leadership articles, and we also have a range of free downloadable leadership resources you can find here.
Until next time,
Julia
About Zestfor
Zestfor specialises in developing Training programmes and resources scientifically tailored for technical markets – including Pharmaceutical, IT, and Life Sciences.
Our blend of in-classroom, online, and virtual live-stream delivery methods will engage and assure even the most introverted team members from the first meeting – whether face-to-face or virtually. To have a brief chat, call us on 0845 548 0833. Alternatively, please email our team here.
